History fans are well familiar with the ancient accounts of pagans sacrificing children to appease their angry gods. The ancient Zoroastrians are a good example:
Embarus, a native of the island Pyraeum, offered his daughter in sacrifice to appease the wrath of the gods.
It was the pagan gods who demanded the sacrifice of children for their wrath to be satisfied, and it was the Canaanites who practiced sacrificing their children to their gods, a practice that the God of Israel forbade in the Law of Moses:
You must not worship the Lord your God in their way, because in worshiping their gods, they do all kinds of detestable things the Lord hates. They even burn their sons and daughters in the fire as sacrifices to their gods.
Deuteronomy 12:31
Furthermore, in Jeremiah 32:35, the God of Israel harshly condemns the practice of human sacrifice, stating that such an act “never entered His mind.”
However, the god of Calvinism might see things differently because his followers seem to be convinced that he demands human sacrifice to be appeased. For instance, Donald Macleod, associated with the Calvinist group The Gospel Coalition, elucidated that God offered His own Son as a sacrifice to Himself:
[God] is engaged in the most solemn business that earth can witness. He is offering a sacrifice. The cross is his altar, and his own Son the sacrifice.
The Binding of Isaac – According to Calvinism
Genesis 22:1-19, also known as “The Binding of Isaac,” recounts how God tests Abraham’s faith by commanding him to kill his son Isaac. Still, at the last moment, once affirming Abraham’s obedience, God provides a ram as a substitute, renewing His covenant blessings.
Genesis 22 starts with the phrase “God tested Abraham” (Genesis 22:1). Yet, Calvinists believe this chapter primarily illustrates the doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement for sin, allegedly depicted in the famous narrative of the Binding of Isaac.
For instance, in teaching about Genesis 22, Calvinist pastor John Piper shares a story in which a pastor friend of his preached to a group of men:
At one point in his message, he paused and asked the men if they knew who killed Jesus. Some said, “the soldiers did.” Some said, “The Jews did.” Some said, “Pilate.” But my friend waited a moment and then simply said, “His Father killed him.” … Just as Abraham lifted the knife over the chest of his son Isaac…so God the Father lifted the knife over the chest of his own Son, Jesus—but did not spare him.
Calvinists claim a parallel exists between Abraham nearly killing his son Isaac and God allegedly killing Jesus, considering both as acts of penal substitutionary atonement for sin, where one is sacrificed to forgive the sins of the sacrificer. Suppose this analogy holds true, and Abraham did intend to kill Isaac to appease God’s wrath. In that case, two questions arise: First, would God actually forgive Abraham’s sins if he killed Isaac? If so, would that not contradict God’s own commandments in Israel’s Law? Second, if God killed Jesus, to whom did God present His Son? To Himself?
It makes no logical sense for God to kill-sacrifice the Son to Himself because, if God is a unified Trinity, God doesn’t need to appease or satisfy Himself. Such an act would imply internal division or conflicting desires within God, which contradicts the nature of a perfect, harmonious, and all-powerful deity. Sacrificing the Son to Himself suggests a need for God to reconcile Himself to His own justice, which undermines His omnipotence and the unity of His will and purpose.
However, Genesis 22 does not discuss wrath, punishment of sin, or penal substitution. As we previously established, the biblical tradition features various types of offerings, and the Genesis text does not suggest that Isaac’s offering was associated with sin, nor does it imply that Abraham intended to sacrifice his son Isaac to appease God’s wrath—a notion that God Himself said is detestable to Him.
In fact, nothing in the Genesis narrative suggests that Isaac’s near-death experience was meant to atone for sin; rather, it was a test of Abraham’s faith and obedience. The Genesis text lacks any language typically associated with sin offerings, focusing instead on the covenantal relationship and Abraham’s trust in God in light of their covenant.
It is not insignificant that the ancient readers of Genesis knew child sacrifice was forbidden by the Law (Deut 12:31; 18:10; Lev 18:21; 20:2–5). But surely you do not need me to quote Bible verses to know that murder—especially of your child—is wrong and evil. In any event, God never meant Abraham to sacrifice his son because God intervened to stop him. God called out to Abraham, “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him” (Genesis 22:12). The purpose of the test was to determine whether Abraham truly had faith in God’s promise, trusting that God would resurrect Isaac from the dead (Hebrews 11).
God provided a substitute, a ram caught in the thicket (Genesis 22:13). God did not kill the ram. Abraham did. DTS theologian Glenn Kreider states, “There is no allegory here suggesting that God would wield the knife over his own Son in a parallel manner.” Instead, there seems to be a stress test of Abraham’s faith.
The Binding of Isaac – According to the New Testament
Before Moses, sacrifices were mainly about offering something as a gift to the divine. This is what we see in Genesis 22. God, who asks for Abraham’s son, never said, “I need your son to be killed so I can forgive your sins.” We must remember that Abraham was still unfamiliar with the Mosaic sacrificial system, which would only be instituted hundreds of years later.
God tested Abraham to ascertain his faith, as He had previously promised to bless Abraham’s descendants through his son Isaac. Thus, God’s test was to determine whether Abraham truly trusted in His promise:
By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, even though God had said to him, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.
Hebrews 11:17-19
The New Testament refers to the story of the Binding of Isaac yet never uses it to suggest—as Calvinists do—that God killed Jesus. The Binding of Isaac is mentioned in Hebrews chapter 11, among a list of other acts of great faith recorded in the Old Testament.
Similarly, in Romans 8:32, although not a quote, an obvious allusion is made to the Binding of Isaac. In that verse, Paul did not see the sacrifice of Jesus as God pouring his wrath on Jesus, but in relation to God giving good gifts. According to Paul, God “did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all.” (Romans 8:32). Just as Abraham was willing to let go of his son, so did our heavenly Father, who was willing to give up Christ for us. Christ was God’s gift to the world (John 3:16, 2 Corinthians 9:15, Romans 8:32). In Genesis 22, God didn’t kill Isaac nor the ram. In the New Testament, it also wasn’t God who killed Jesus. Humankind did.
The only substitution parallel between Genesis 22 and Jesus is that just as God provided Abraham with a ram to kill, so too has God provided us with an innocent Lamb to be sacrificed:
God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith.
Romans 3:25
The Binding of Isaac – According to Judaism
Long before the New Testament was composed, the Binding of Isaac was already a renowned narrative within Judaism. However, it was never regarded as a tale of atonement:
Jewish interpreters show no sign of understanding Isaac’s sacrifice as atonement for sin…Paul merely wanted to express here the depth of God’s commitment to his people and did so in language that probably presented itself readily to mind both because of his familiarity with Genesis 22:1–18 and because of the use he had just made in Romans 8:12–30 of the common Christian conviction that Jesus was God’s Son (8:17, 29; cf. 5:10).
Zondervan Exegetical Commentary
Thus, Genesis 22 is yet another troubling example of a biblical narrative being hijacked and used by Calvinism to promote Divine Abuse.
Conclusion
Imagine God promising to give you a dog as a gift, with the assurance that this dog will one day give you beautiful puppies. Then, unexpectedly, He asks you to give the dog back to Him. You might argue, “But You promised me the dog would have puppies!” Or, you can choose to trust that God will resurrect your dog and fulfill His promise. This is a test of your faith in God’s promise, not some strange method for you to appease His wrath so He doesn’t punish you in hellfire.
This article is a copy-paste from my book, ‘The “Gospel” of Divine Abuse,’ available on this Amazon page.
A free sample is available here.
