Bible Review, October 1993
Features
The government doesn’t understand, I said to myself as I watched the drama of the Branch Davidians at Waco, Texas, unfold on CNN day after day. Was there anything I could do to help, I wondered. As my frustration mounted, I decided to offer my services to the FBI, which by this time […]
The Lost Gospel. The very concept provokes a flood of questions. If it is lost, how do we know it ever existed? How do we know what was in it? Who lost it? And how was it lost? Perhaps most intriguing of all: Will it ever be found?
The Akedah (ah-kay-DAH), or binding of Isaac, is one of the most powerful narratives in the Hebrew Bible. For nearly 2,000 years, however, it has been read somewhat differently by Jews and Christians. It is even portrayed differently in the pictures they make. For most Christians, the Hebrew word akedah is unfamiliar; more often […]
In Jewish tradition, the Torah has 70—that is, many—facets. Its interpretations are inexhaustible. I would like to suggest a new interpretation of the Akedah, the binding of Isaac (Genesis 22), a story that has received as much “interpretation” as any in the Hebrew Bible. The story of the Akedah has already been recounted in […]