Abraham's Silence

The Binding of Isaac, the Suffering of Job, and How to Talk Back to God

J. Richard Middleton

• Publisher: Baker Academic
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN:
  9780801098017
• eBook ISBN:
  9781493430888
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

It is traditional to think we should praise Abraham for his willingness to sacrifice his son as proof of his love for God. But have we misread the point of the story? Is it possible that a careful reading of Genesis 22 could reveal that God was not pleased with Abraham's silent obedience?

Widely respected biblical theologian, creative thinker, and public speaker J. Richard Middleton suggests we have misread and misapplied the story of the binding of Isaac and shows that God desires something other than silent obedience in difficult times. Middleton focuses on the ethical and theological problem of Abraham's silence and explores the rich biblical tradition of vigorous prayer, including the lament psalms, as a resource for faith. Middleton also examines the book of Job in terms of God validating Job's lament as "right speech," showing how the vocal Job provides an alternative to the silent Abraham.

This book provides a fresh interpretation of Genesis 22 and reinforces the church's resurgent interest in lament as an appropriate response to God.

Part 1: Models of Vigorous Prayer in the Bible

1
Voices from the Ragged Edge

In the movie The Princess Bride there is a conversation between the princess, who has been kidnapped, and her rescuer (the Dread Pirate Roberts), in which she says: “You mock my pain.” To which he replies, “Life is pain, highness; anyone who says differently is selling something.”1

Without being quite as cynical as that, most of us can affirm that pain or suffering is an indelible fact of human existence, as we know it. We live in a world racked by suffering.

A Multifaceted World of Suffering

Many marriages, despite our best intentions, fall apart. Close friends die of suicide or cancer. And we’re confronted in our inner cities with hollow-eyed people living on the street, casting furtive glances in our direction, in the hope of a handout.2

Meanwhile the victims of terrorism and political violence continue to pile up as so many dead bodies in the streets of city after city, and country after country—every decade the names change, but the suffering continues. This violence leads to millions of displaced persons—refugees from their own nations and homes—living in destitute circumstances.

And the refugee crisis is accompanied by a world that is becoming increasingly tribalistic, desensitized to the suffering of others, even callously demonizing those viewed as enemies (whether for economic, national, political, or religious reasons).

And beyond inter-human violence, the planet groans in the thrall of our pollution of air, water, and land, with huge floating continents of plastic in the Pacific, widespread rainforest depletion, and the destruction of species at an alarming rate in our own time. As earth’s climate warms (precipitated by human action), we are overwhelmed by massive and more frequent tsunamis, earthquakes, and hurricanes, which wreak destruction all over the globe, with a devastating loss of life.

The suffering of the world is multifaceted, and it is massive.

Tragic as this massive suffering is, the tragedy is compounded by our paralysis, often alternating with anger directed at those we perceive as our enemies. Despite God’s call on our lives to respond in compassion to the pain of others, we find, if we are honest, that we lack the energy for this mission. We are too spent just coping with the ordinary crises of life to give much of ourselves to the needs of others. So we pull back self-protectively into a defensive posture, avoiding even eye contact with the street person, unable to bear such exposure to the world’s wounds. Or we circle the wagons of our tribe and vehemently denounce anyone who threatens our sense of security and identity.

I believe that the roots of both our paralysis and our misdirected anger lie in our own pain that has never been adequately processed. Religious people have a very hard time dealing with pain. We prefer to accentuate the positive. But the positive—praise and celebration—isn’t always appropriate.

When Praise Is Inappropriate

Imagine barely surviving a car crash, perhaps being the only survivor, badly injured and lying in a hospital bed; then your pastor or rabbi comes to visit you and reads Psalm 150.

Praise the LORD!

Praise God in his sanctuary;

praise him in his mighty firmament!

Praise him for his mighty deeds;

praise him according to his surpassing greatness!

Praise him with trumpet sound;

praise him with lute and harp!

Praise him with tambourine and dance;

praise him with strings and pipe!

Praise him with clanging cymbals;

praise him with loud clashing cymbals!

Let everything that breathes praise the LORD!

Praise the LORD! (150:1–6)

That would, of course, be manifestly inappropriate.

Or suppose you are in the middle of a tragic divorce; or you’ve just lost your job and you’re not sure how your family is going to survive, given the mortgage payments and other bills. And someone says to you (as a friend of mine used to say in every situation): Just praise the Lord anyway, brother!

But how can you praise God when you’re suffering from the shock of disorientation? How could you, if you were an Israelite, newly exiled to Babylon, sing one of the songs of Zion? Psalm 46 is a classic Zion song, celebrating God’s presence in the midst of Jerusalem. It opens with this confident assertion: “God is our refuge and strength, / a very present help in trouble” (46:1 [46:2 MT]). Because God is in the midst of the city, the psalmist affirms that it shall never be moved (46:5 [46:6 MT]). Except the city now lies in ruins.

So a later psalmist, writing in the midst of the exile, sings not a Zion song but a lament—a communal complaint: “By the rivers of Babylon— / there we sat down and there we wept / when we remembered Zion” (Ps. 137:1). Psalm 137 goes on to ask, How can we sing YHWH’s song (like Ps. 46 or Ps. 150) in a strange, alien land? (137:4). And this psalm is relevant well beyond its original historical context, since when we are in a state of suffering, we are in an alien land, alienated from the reality of flourishing that God intends for this good creation.

In the song “These Plastic Halos,” alternative Christian artist Mark Heard describes the struggle of many churchgoers to be honest about their pain. Heard uses the metaphor of “plastic halos” to describe the masks Christians often wear in church, behind which “lurks a scarred and fragile face.” These masks serve to hide our pain because we “think our tears / would provoke holy wrath.” The result of our “stone-gray silence” (our inability to “face our fears”) is that “we press on / with feeble cheer,” “refusing comfort unawares.”3

In the final stanza Heard characterizes this approach to masking suffering as a “protocol” that we learn, in which we praise optimism and denigrate sorrow. The song ends with these words: “As we watch / the world turn to dust / the tears of God fall for us.”

I believe that the lament psalms provide an alternative protocol for addressing suffering, a protocol that is both existentially healing and deeply rooted in the redemptive sweep of the biblical narrative.

The “Problem” of (Explaining) Evil

Sometimes it isn’t a focus on praise and celebration that prevents our dealing with pain. Sometimes well-meaning people stop us short from hosting disorientation, from being fully honest about our suffering, by providing a quick (and ultimately superficial) explanation for suffering—much like Job’s comforters did.4

Even if we have never pondered the philosophical “problem of evil” (also known as the “theodicy” problem), sensitive people of faith intuitively understand its basic contours.5 This is the “problem” laid out in its simplest form.

1. We believe that God is good and loving (God doesn’t want evil and suffering).
2. We believe God is sovereign or all-powerful (God could remove or prevent evil and suffering).
3. Yet evil exists.

This certainly seems like a contradiction.6 And there are various ways to resolve it.

We could say, There is no God (that would certainly solve the logical problem, but it doesn’t help those of us who believe in God). Or we could say, God isn’t totally good or trustworthy (we could deny the first premise).7 Or we could say, God isn’t totally sovereign; God just can’t do anything about it (we could deny the second premise).8

We could even say, Evil doesn’t really exist; it is an illusion—which is affirmed by some Eastern religions.

However, by far the most common solution in the history of Christian thought is to claim that God has a “good reason” for allowing evil and suffering.9 Or, to use different terminology, there is a “greater good” that God has in mind that could not be accomplished without all the evil and suffering in the world.10 This is a Christian version of denying the third premise. In other words, what we think is “evil” is not really, ultimately evil, since it is necessary for the best of all possible worlds. This keeps God technically blameless, since God needed to allow all the evil and suffering that has actually happened in order to accomplish this greater good (whatever it is).

But to claim that every evil in the world contributes to some equal or greater good, which would be otherwise unattainable, means quite simply that there is no genuine evil. Genuine evil, as David Ray Griffin has cogently argued, requires, as a minimum, the criterion that without it the universe could be a better place. Otherwise it would not be genuine but only prima facie evil.11

There are many examples of prima facie evils that actually do serve a greater good. For example, there are times I have had to work hard on a lecture or a talk when on the surface it seemed like an “evil” to me; I would much prefer to be out walking in the woods or riding my bicycle. But I’ve buckled down to write the talk, since I judged it was a greater good that couldn’t be accomplished if I slacked off.

Or suppose a soldier is wounded on the battlefield, with no antibiotics available, and the wound becomes infected with gangrene. Perhaps his leg has to be amputated to save his life. Normally, amputating a leg would not a good thing; but in this case it serves a greater good (s...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Endorsements
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• Part 1: Models of Vigorous Prayer in the Bible
• Part 2: Making Sense of the Book of Job
• Part 3: Unbinding the Aqedah from the Straitjacket of Tradition
• Conclusion
• Scripture Index
• Subject Index
• Back Cover