The Meaning of the "Akedah" in Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition

Author(s): Avi Sagi

Source: Israel Studies , Spring, 1998, Vol. 3, No. 1 (Spring, 1998), pp. 45-60
Published by: Indiana University Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/30246795

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 Avi Sagi

The Meaning of the Akedah in

Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition

BIBLICAL MYTHS ARE A RECURRING motif in the self-interpretation of

Israeli culture, reflecting this culture's perception of its unique plight. A
process of self-interpretation through myths, however, implies a particular
reading, whether conscious or unconscious, of the myths themselves. Is-
raeli culture thus adds a layer to traditional interpretations.
A myth that is central to this process of self-reflection is that of the
Akedah [the binding of Isaac]. The purpose of this paper is two-fold: to
consider the interpretation of this myth within Israeli culture, and to exam-
ine whether this interpretation represents a continuity or a break with
traditional Jewish perceptions of the Akedah.
TheAkedah myth features as a code word used by Israeli society to talk
with itself about itself and its troubled fate. Moshe Shamir, a leading writer
from the founders' generation, excelled in formulating its meaning in Israeli
culture: "The story of the Akedah is the greatest, most magnificent, and
most deeply meaningful of all. It is the story of our generation."' Changes in
attitudes toward the Akedah point to shifts in the ways Israeli society
approaches the meaning of its existence.
Two basic attitudes can be discerned in relation to the myth. Whereas
the first views theAkedah as the deepest symbol of modern Israeli existence,
epitomizing the Zionist revolution and the sacrifices it exacted, the second
rejects both the myth and its implications. Historically, the first precedes the
second. A complex picture develops, however, since the rejection of the
myth is a process rather than a single, specific event. The two views have
been involved in a prolonged contest that also mirrors cultural changes.
Let us begin with the first. The Akedah myth has been sanctified by
many writers. Thus, for instance, Uri Zevi Greenberg writes: "Let that day
come ... / when my father will rise from his grave with the resurrection of
the dead/ and God will command him as the people commanded Abraham./
To bind his only son: to be an offering-/ ... let that day come in my life!
I believe it will." When speaking of the Zionist experience, Abraham

45

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46 * ISRAEL STUDIES, VOLUME 3, NUMBER I

Shlonsky writes: "Father/ take off your tallit and tefillin today/ ... and take
your son on a distant lane/ to mount Moriah."3 In a poem by Hayim Gouri,
the traditional notion of abiding by God's judgment becomes compliance
with the bidding of history. Fathers bequeath the Akedah to their sons:
"Isaac, as the story goes, was not sacrificed./ He lived for many years,/ saw
what pleasure had to offer,/ until his eyesight dimmed.// But he bequeathed
that hour to his offspring.// They are born with a knife in their hearts."*
The contrasts between the biblical description of the relationship be-
tween Abraham and Isaac and that suggested in modern Hebrew literature
are worth noting. First, contrary to the passive figure of the biblical story,
the Isaac of modern literature is an active hero who initiates the Akedah.
Second, modern literature lays greater emphasis than the biblical text on
intergenerational cooperation, as if no rift divided the fathers offering the
sacrifice from their sons. Third, rather than a single, lonely hero, Isaac is the
paradigmatic Zionist pioneer. The first two dimensions, which, as noted,
are missing from the biblical text, are developed extensively in the Midrash.
I cannot develop this issue here, but it is worth noting that the Midrash
"corrected" the biblical text in light of religious or literary considerations,
while the "corrections" of modern literature reflect the essence of the Zion-

ist revolution. The Zionist Isaac tells the story of an entire generation:
rather than being passive victims, the Isaacs assume responsibility for their
destiny and sacrifice themselves on the altar of national renaissance.
When was this ideal picture undermined? When did Israeli culture
begin to feel uncomfortable with the myth of the Akedah?5 Contrary to
appearances, the shattering of this myth is not one more declaration of a
"here and now" culture striving to shed historic symbols and live the
present. Queries and doubts about theAkedah myth began to surface soon
after independence. We read in the central work about the War of Libera-
tion, written by S. Yizhar and published in 1958:

There is no evading the akedah. It only seems you could leave everything and
run; you cannot ... I hate our father Abraham, who binds Isaac. What right
does he have over Isaac? Let him bind himself. I hate the God who sent him

and closed all paths, leaving only that of the akedah. I hate the fact that Isaac
serves merely as a test between Abraham and his God ... The sanctification of
God in the akedah, I hate. To kill the sons for a test of love! To use power and
interfere and take life to make a point by force. And the world that stood still
and did not cry out: Villains, why must the sons die.6

In more than one sense, this epic might be seen as a story about theAkedah,
and these pointed lines explicitly formulate one of its most basic messages.

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 The Meaning of the Akedah in Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition * 47

At the opening of the book, Motta transfers command of the post to Giddy
and says: "And take Giddy, your son, your only son, whom thou lovest, and
get going-do something to justify your existence."? Existence, then, is
justified in terms of the very readiness to be sacrificed, which had been so
sharply attacked in the opening lines.
In this text we find, for the first time, the revolt of the sons, the refusal
to identify with Isaac. This is the beginning of the generational rift eventu-
ally culminating in the rejection of theAkedah myth.
Yizhar does not renounce the Zionist narrative. The opposite is true.
But he is vehemently opposed to the onerous price and, without suggesting
fundamental changes in the self-perception of Israeli society, he does object
to it in this work.

The change in the attitude toward the Akedah is gradual. Yariv Ben
Aharon, a scion of Zionist aristocracy, published a novel right before the Six
Day War where fathers are more harshly censured:

Is it not the way of the world that a son buries his father? Nature kills by
natural death, and the son only buries. And do not fathers bind and sacrifice
their sons on the altar of war, as if seeking to evade their own sentence? Should
not a father die for his ideals? Is it not my duty to bury him before he buries
me? I mean, before his ideals are realized?8

Ben Aharon severs his links with the parents' generation: the children refuse
to be Isaacs, to assume responsibility for the founders' ideals.
In a later work that is a roman a clef about the sons' generation, Ben
Aharon comes to view theAkedah as the litmus test of the relations between
fathers and sons. He returns to his accusation that the fathers will not be
satisfied with less than the sons' sacrifice.9
Yariv Ben Aharon claims that the covenant of secular Zionists with
their land forced the actual sacrifice of their children, since theAkedah is no
longer an act of faith, but an expression of the deep bond with the land.
They do not expect a miracle, and they actually strive to offer a concrete
sacrifice. Ben Aharon draws a distinction between the biblical story and the
cultural-pioneering symbol of the Akedah:

Dear father Naboth ... have you ever thought of the abysmal difference
between those who sacrifice themselves and those who sacrifice their children?

Do not tell their children too, to soothe the searing pain with a sedative! Dear
father Naboth, in refusing to accept Isaac's sacrifice, God is saying: I do not
want you to become immortal by sacrificing your son! . . . And the path
leading from the smashing of your father's idols in exile to the creation of a

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48 * ISRAEL STUDIES, VOLUME 3, NUMBER I

new life in the land of Israel through your son-you have not yet under-
stood.Io

Ben Aharon blames the parents for the secularization of the religious
symbol, which has led to a total misunderstanding of its meaning. He
wishes to return the symbol to its religious context and sever it from its
concrete denotations. He thereby seeks to bring about a quasi-religious
renaissance in the tradition of A. D. Gordon, and rejects the prevalent
secular overtones of Zionist culture, where the symbol of theAkedah has, in
his view, served to justify the death of the sons.
Whereas Ben Aharon ascribes the protest to the sons, Aharon Meged
places it in the mouth of one of the stillest voices in modern Israeli culture-
the mother. Tziporah, the wife of Davidov the protagonist, speaks of their
son Nimrod:

Do you know he was shortsighted? Do you know he was barred from combat
duty? No, no, he shouldn't have died, this was an akedah. You remember the
story of the akedah: The father, Abraham, takes his son, his only son, whom he
loves, and goes up Mount Moriah. This is how it was. Exactly. Only without
the angel."

TheAkedah here is a metaphor for an inexplicable event, a senseless death.

Surprisingly, after the Six Day War, we witness a great weariness, a
yearning for liberation from the symbol of the Akedah. In 1968, about ten
years after the publication ofYizhar's novel, Habimah Theater staged a play
by Yigal Mossinsohn where Shimshon, a blinded officer, thinks of his life in
terms of an Akedah:12

Take with you your only son, whom you love-here is the emphasis-whom
you love, Isaac, and go to mount Moriah and offer him as a burnt offering. This
is how it starts. And Abraham stretched out his hand, and took the knife to slay
his son ... and God lay in ambush to see whether Abraham, the great believer,
is ready to sacrifice his son. . . . And he is, "like everyone," like our parents ...
Except that Isaac today, you get it? -goes to the akedah willingly ... And God
still lies in ambush to check whether we know how to keep the contract with
him.

The father in the play, named Manoah after the father of the biblical Samson,
also ponders the fathers' fate in terms of the Akedah myth: "This is a cruel

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 The Meaning of theAkedah in Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition * 49

generation, comrades, when we the parents send our sons to die, to their
akedah. ... this appears to be our destiny ... and we have drawn a covenant
of blood with this land, in thy blood live ... we have no other option." Upon
hearing Manoah speak these words at a memorial service for the sons who
fell in combat, Shimshon enters the room and says: "Back to Abraham and
to the knife on Mount Moriah, to Jacob wrestling with the angel, to
Joseph's coat dipped in blood. ... Today's Shimshon does not want re-
venge-he wants peace ... One day may come and our outstretched hand
will not come back empty, empty and sad?"
In tones less strident and less accusing than those ofYizhar, Mossinsohn
states his wish to be released from this "grand" myth. Nor are his imputa-
tions as serious as Yizhar's, since, in his view, fathers and sons are jointly
responsible for the Akedah, which must end. In its place, Mossinsohn-
Shimshon expects to lead a normal life when, "my children ... will no longer
know war."

In May 1970, Habimah Theater staged a play by Hanoch Levin.'3 The

play deals with the sons' profound contempt for their parents and, in a
passage called "Akedah" Abraham and Isaac engage in a rather mundane and
prosaic dialogue. The father justifies himself, as it were, by claiming "God
told me," and the son answers "I've got nothing against you, dad, if you have
to slay, slay." In the course of this dialogue, Isaac shows growing "under-
standing" for the plight of his father, who is bound by a divine command.
The father is a pitiful creature who complains about the accusations hurled
against him. Isaac is the one who belittles the sacrifice:

They tell you to slay, father, so jump to attention and slay, and Heaven forbid
you should feel any remorse. What's happening here, after all? They're slaying
a kid. What's the big deal, slaying a small, weak kid? What is it to slay a kid,
what's a kid after all?1'

And so this sarcastic dialogue goes on, conveying deep disdain for the
parents who believe that they, rather than their sons, are the victims of the
sacrifice. In the poem "Dear father, when you stand on my grave," which
follows the "Akedah" dialogue, Levin writes:

And do not say that you've brought a sacrifice,/ because I was the one who
brought the sacrifice,/... dear father, when you stand on my grave/ old and
weary and very lonesome,/ and when you see how they lay my body to rest-
/ ask for my forgiveness, father.'

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50 * ISRAEL STUDIES, VOLUME 3, NUMBER I

The weariness and pain of the Akedah come to the fore after the Yom
Kippur War. Thus, for instance, Menahem Heyd writes: "And there was no
ram-/ and Isaac in the thicket.// And the angel did not say slay not/ and
we-/ our son, our only son, Isaac"''6 The pain is particularly intense be-
cause no ram came to replace Isaac. Many poets report this feeling-the
miracle failed.I7
Protests against the Akedah myth gained strength after the Lebanon
War, and I quote only two examples. Yehudah Amihai speaks of a plot to
sacrifice the sons:

The true hero of the akedah was the ram./ Unaware of the connivance of
others,/ it volunteered, as it were, to die in Isaac's place ... // The angel went
home./ Isaac went home./ And Abraham and God went long ago./ But the
true hero of the akedah is the ram.'8

Replacing the two heroic figures--Abraham and Isaac-with an anti-

hero--the ram--is part of a trend seeking to moderate the dramatic over-
tones characteristic of Israeli life. The hero is not the one involved in

purposeful action, but rather the one confronted with a tragic situation and
unable to understand the forces that have led to it. A poem by Yitzhak Laor
offers the most poignant expression of this protest:

To pity the offering? . . . The ass?/ Thus to surrender? From the Negev to
Mount Moriah to be sacrificed?/ To trust a father like that? Let him kill him
first. Let him slam his father/ his only father Abraham/ in jail in the poorhouse
in the cellar of the house just so/ he will not slay./ Remember what your father
did to your brother Ishmael.'9

Yizhar had adopted the Akedah story, but had pointed an accusing
finger at the fathers, while Mossinsohn longed for release from its oppres-
sive weight. Laor now blames the sons' compliance, their willingness to die
rather than refuse. He rejects the narrative: the sons should have remem-
bered the cruelty of the founding fathers, father Abraham, and their im-
moral behavior toward Ishmael, the Arabs. The biblical wording, "Remem-
ber what your father did to your brother Ishmael," resembles the verse
"Remember what Amalek did to thee." The fathers, then, are Amalek, while
the victims are the Arabs and the pack of foolish sons. This poem exposes a
deep breach between fathers and sons, between founders and followers. To
a large extent, it also entails a rejection of the entire Zionist ethos.
Why this profound transformation? Why the growing criticism of the

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 The Meaning of theAkedah in Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition * 5I

Akedah myth after the creation of the state? There are several reasons, which
are also echoed in the cultural realm. The first, although the least important,
is the grief for the fallen. Fathers have been burying their sons for a long
time, and they, too, not only the accusing sons, suffer and mourn. Through
the existential experiences of fathers and sons, the Akedah in the Israeli
context has gradually turned into a tale of pain and bereavement. No longer
is the myth accepted, even welcomed; now is a time for tears and sorrow, for
fathers to weep over the sacrifice. The oppressive feeling gripping parents
faced with the Akedah of their own sons turns them into victims. In his

poem about Isaac, Amir Gilboa writes: "Father, father, quickly save Isaac/
so that no one will be missing at the midday meal.// It is I who am being
slaughtered, my son,/ and already my blood is on the leaves./ And father's
voice was smothered/ and his face was pale.'"y
Whereas Levin or Ben Aharon had despised those parents who had
thought of themselves as victims, Gilboa understands their grief. Note that
the parents, the Abrahams, had been passive figures in the Zionist story.
Now, as their roots in the land deepen, the founders return to being active
figures, able to voice their sorrow. In the Israeli public arena, this sorrow is
expressed in their refusal to be naive spectators, and in the parents' increas-
ingly vocal protests against unwarranted sacrifices.
One of the figures voicing this criticism is the mother, hitherto the
concealed heroine. Contrary to the historical Sarah, who is absent from the
biblical text, she is the one who protests in Meged's work.
An additional reason is the rift between the founders' generation and
the sons. The sons no longer wish to be "Isaacs" passive heroes whose fate
is determined by their parents' ideals. This is the rift emerging in the works
by Ben-Aharon, Levin, and even Laor. Not only the young sons, who came
into maturity after the establishment of the State, but the older sons too,
such as Ben-Aharon, refuse to be passive heroes. Independence means
liberation from the parents' ideals, a wish that assumes contradictory guises
as we consider different writers- either a total rejection of the myth in Laor,
or returning it to its Jewish source.
In my view, however, the fundamental reason for the rejection of the
Akedah myth is a yearning to be released from its historic role. Broad
segments within Israeli society aspire to become part of a "normal" or "civil
society." The rejection of theAkedah myth is synonymous with the desire for
release from a perception of Israel as a society imbued with an historic
mission. The constitutive element in the consciousness of Israeli society had
been the building of a model community inspired by lofty ideals and
carrying the burden of Jewish responsibility and Jewish destiny. After the

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52 * ISRAEL STUDIES, VOLUME 3, NUMBER I

creation of the state and after military victory, however, we sense a growing
desire to be relieved from this onerous task. It is precisely after two heroic
wars -"the War of Liberation" and the "Six Day War"-that the trend
toward "normalization" gains strength. Victory has been achieved, and the
time has arrived to build a civil society that places at its core the welfare of
the individual. Sacrifices andAkedot are no longer justified. "Grand" ideas
lose their meaning, and the clearest expression of this change is precisely the
refusal to endorse the myth that best conveys them-theAkedah.
In resorting to the Akedah, Israeli culture repeats an ancient Jewish
pattern, characterized by a tendency to resort to this myth to interpret
historical reality at times of crisis and persecution."2 TheAkedah has served
in Jewish history as the archetype of Jewish endurance. Rather than an
isolated event occurring in the course of a specific relationship between
Abraham and God, theAkedah provides a clue to the status and the place of
the Jewish people in history. This interpretation dates back to ancient times.
It begins at the dawn of the people's history in its land and culminates
during the Crusades, when parents killed their children to escape conver-
sion. In TB Gittin 57b, we are told of the mother who refused to worship
idols and sacrificed her seven sons. Before killing herself, she said, "My son,
go and say to your father Abraham, Thou didst bind one [son to the] altar,
but I have bound seven altars." The Josippon quotes Elazar's speech at
Masada: "Think of what your father Abraham did, in binding his only son
to sacrifice him to God."lz Abraham Grossman points out that, during the
Crusades, these sources were used to justify the killing of children by their
parents. This justification was necessary, since, according to the Halakha,
the situations in which a person is required to die rather than transgress are
very limited.23 TB Sanhedrin 74a quotes R. Ishmael, who argues that a
person forced to worship idols in secret is not bound to die, because we are
told "and live by them." This is not an isolated opinion, and the tosafists in
Ashkenaz point out that Rabba, the amoraic sage, had also supported this
view. In a rare outburst of feeling, they write: "And this is a hard issue-
Heaven forbid that we should rule on a matter of idolatry that one should
transgress rather than be killed.""~ A ruling that places such high value on
life, even to the point of claiming that coerced idolatry is set aside before it,
was very troublesome to the Ashkenaz tosafists, because it seemed to ques-
tion their generation's deeds, and they found halakhic consolation in the
Akedah. The Akedah is indeed a prominent motif in the elegies that have
survived from that period. In an interesting document from the time of the
Crusades we read:

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 The Meaning of the Akedah in Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition * 53

And a man his brother and his sons, a brother his sister, a woman her son and

her daughter ... This one binds and is bound and this one binds and is bound
... Go and see: Was there ever such anAkedah since the times ofAdam? Were

there a thousand and one hundredAkedot in a day, all like theAkedah of Isaac,
the son of Abraham? The world shuddered at the one Akedah at Mount

Moriah, as it is said: "Behold, the mighty ones shall cry outside" (Isaiah 33:7)
and "the heavens above be black" (Jeremiah 4:28). Why did the heavens not
darken and why did the stars not suppress their glow when, in one day, on the
third of Sivan, eleven hundred souls were killed and slaughtered?2"

The continuity between modern literature and Jewish tradition is

worth noting. First, both assume that the Akedah is not merely a test, but
rather an actual event-the children were sacrificed, no substitute was
found, no miracle occurred. In his classic work, Shalom Spiegel points to an
ancient tradition claiming that Isaac was indeed sacrificed and then re-
born.6 Spiegel shows that this tradition was widespread during medieval
persecutions, and this is the tradition preferred, either consciously or un-
consciously, by modern Hebrew literature, rather than the more prevalent
lore that views theAkedah as only a test. These parallels should not surprise
us, because, as in the Middle Ages, in our times too the sons die and the
miracle of substitution fails to materialize.

Second, even if the parents offer a sacrifice, they are, first and foremost,
responding to a particular historical reality. Contrary to the biblical test,
where God initiates the experience and relates to Abraham directly, the
Akedah here is a reaction within a defined concrete context. Whereas in the

Middle Ages it was the Gentile nations that wanted to exterminate the
Jewish people, in modern literature it is the nations fighting against the state
of Israel or, in the poetry of protest, the fathers themselves.
Notwithstanding these similarities, profound differences separate Jew-
ish tradition from modern literature. In the Middle Ages there was no
divine initiative either, but theAkedah was motivated by a belief in God, an
expression of faith, an act ofkiddush haShem. In modern literature, however,
theAkedah, together with other religious symbols, has undergone a process
of secularization: it responds to the command of Jewish history and sancti-
fies the Jewish people rather than God. Naomi Shemer's poem is an interest-
ing expression of this trend. The opening lines are: "Take/ your son/ your
only son/ whom you love/ take/ Isaac/ and offer him as a burnt offering/ on
one of the mountains/ on the place/ I will show you.""'
Whereas in Scripture the commander is God, in Naomi Shemer's song

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54 * ISRAEL STUDIES, VOLUME 3, NUMBER I

the commander is anonymous. It could be history, or the nation, or the

times, but certainly not God. Emulating the biblical text while deleting the
name of the commander is significant. The prayer and the appeal-"slay
not"--are not a human prayer to God either, but a "mighty scream" rising
"from all the mountains."

No wonder, then, that, if this act of sacrifice is only performed in

response to the call of history rather than that of a living Jewish faith, the
time for refusing the historical legacy has arrived. Israeli modern culture, in
accepting or rejecting theAkedah myth, has embraced a particular interpre-
tation of the biblical text and has disregarded the rabbinical heritage, which
offers two basic perceptions of the Akedah. The first, which may be called
the "non-moral interpretation," begins with Philo and culminates in the
thoughts ofYeshayahu Leibowitz and Joseph Soloveitchik. This trend views
the Akedah as the epitome of Jewish religiosity. Philo devotes a special
chapter to the Akedah, showing it to be completely divorced from the
ancestral custom of sacrificing someone, whose sole meaning was the fear of
God: "Thus we see that he did not incline partly to the boy and partly to
piety, but devoted his whole soul through and through to holiness and
disregarded the claims of their common blood."'8 In a rabbinical midrash,
Satan says to Abraham: "Tomorrow He will say to you, 'You are a murderer
and are guilty.' Said he, 'Even so'."29 Maimonides remains within this tradi-
tion when he claims that one of the reasons for the Akedah is "our being
informed of the limit of love for God, may He be exalted, and fear of Him -
that is, up to what limit they must reach."3o
It is now worth reconsidering various elegies written after the Cru-
sades in light of the trend that views theAkedah as the paradigm of religious
life, dismissing all other values. Instead of idealizing sacrifice as a paradigm,
the main thrust of these elegies is resignation. Resignation is accompanied
by crying and sorrow for their terrible predicament, for the lack of reward.
There is an expectation that God will intervene:

... from Heaven it will be said: lay not thy hand toward destruction ... for
those I cry and [tears from] my eyes flow like water.3'

Resignation and a willingness for occasional sacrifice is not synony-

mous with the transmutation of sacrifice into the ideal norm of religious
life. In the whole history of Jewish thought, until Soloveitchik and Leibo-
witz,32 there is no evidence of any attempt to make theAkedah a life-shaping
ideal. This point is worth stressing in light of Israel Yuval's findings. Yuval
shows that self-immolation and the sacrifice of children represented the

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 The Meaning of the Akedah in Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition * 55

spiritual world of Ashkenazi Jews -part of what he calls "revengeful re-

demption"-whereby revenge for spilt Jewish blood is an essential element
in the process of redemption: "Since God is not indifferent to spilt Jewish
blood, the sacrifice on the altar of faith will not be in vain, as they may well
be the ones who will stir Him to forswear his passivity and begin the process
of redemption."33 Newly spilt Jewish blood goes to join the reservoir of
blood that will eventually move God to seek revenge. This is the impulse
behind theAkedah and the expectation that redemption is drawing close.3q
But even this approach does not suggest that the ideal religious life implies
the sacrifice of morality. The Akedah is only a means to draw us closer to
redemption, to the ideal human reality, but religious life is not sacrifice and
Akedah .

The opposite view, which could be termed "the moral trend," rejects
the simplistic perception of the biblical tale and claims that the meaning of
the story is that it never took place. When reviewing rabbinical literature,
we should note that the oldest surviving source on this issue is an instance
of the moral trend. The Mishna in Ta'anit, which is one of the oldest
anthologies, describes the rituals of public fasting and ends one of the
prayers as follows: "May He that answered Abraham our father on Mount
Moriah answer you and hearken to the voice of your crying this day. Blessed
art thou, O Lord, redeemer of Israel!" (2:4).
The Mishna does not tell us what Abraham's prayer was, although the
context clearly suggests that his prayer could only have been for his son, and
that God answered it. Abraham, then, was not a "knight of faith" of the
Leibowitz or Soloveitchik variety, and, even when he complied with God's
command, he did not forget to pray for its repeal. This tradition assumes
that believers need not ignore their feelings and, in answering Abraham's
prayer, God confirms the validity of moral obligations. It is precisely this
model, combining Abraham's prayer for a repeal of the Akedah and God's
acquiescence to it, that has now become the paradigm of religious life: God
the Redeemer liberates human beings from anguish and distress, as well as
from the demand to renounce their feelings and values.
The most daring and interesting expression of the moral trend is found
in texts that could be called "protest midrashim." Thus, for instance, the
exegesis of the verse, "By myself have I sworn" (Genesis 22:16), is: What was
the need for this oath? He had begged Him: "Swear to me not to try me
again henceforth, nor my son Isaac'."3s The Akedah, then, is not a desirable
expression of religiosity, and Abraham can demand that God spare him this
test.

No less strong a protest against God blames him for behaving like an

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56 * ISRAEL STUDIES, VOLUME 3, NUMBER I

arbitrary sovereign who disregards the norms he imposes on his subjects: "This
may be compared to a teacher who ordered his disciple ... do not lend
money on interest, yet he himself did." After giving several examples show-
ing that the legislator fails to behave according to the rules he himself has
set, the midrash quotes the verse "That God did test Abraham."'36
These protest midrashim left their mark on later exegetical literature,
and many commentators expressed their reservations about the Akedah.37
We also find a clear expression of this reversal in the meaning of theAkedah
in Jewish prayer-from an expectation of unconditional obedience im-
posed on the believer it turns into a moral obligation imposed on God:3~

And as Abraham our father bound his son Isaac on the altar and held back his

compassion in order to do thy will with a loyal heart, so may thy mercy hold
back thy anger from us, and may thy great bounty turn away thy wrath from
thy people, thy city, and thy land.39

TheAkedah is no longer a paradigm of religious life but a one-time event at

the dawn of history, a plea to God for compassion and mercy. Religious life
is not cruelty, but pity and compassion, and these are required, above all,
from God.
How did tradition contend with this myth? TheAkedah, as the test of
Abraham's faith, appears to be the literary culmination of the story. An
argument that indeed recurs from talmudic literature onwards is that the
meaning of the Akedah is precisely that it was never accomplished, and
remained as a trial meant to teach human beings to resist human sacrifice.
Whereas the non-moral trend stresses the act of sacrifice, the moral trend
emphasizes the finale of the story and the lessons to be drawn from it.4-
This flux between the two models is a typical feature of religiosity,
wavering between a sense of total commitment to God, manifest in submis-
sion and obedience, and the acknowledgment of human dignity and of
God's moral goodness.,' Although this tension is indeed a characteristic
aspect of Jewish tradition, the dominant trend is the one that interprets the
Akedah in the light of morality.
It is no wonder that Israeli culture was oblivious to the moral trend;
had it endorsed it, theAkedah myth could not have become a fundamental
aspect of its ethos. What is surprising, however, is that modern Israeli
writers, except for Ben Aharon, are unaware of this rabbinical tradition. The
reason for this is two-fold: first, the myth of theAkedah in Israeli culture was
indeed severed from its traditional source and followed an independent
course. Second, Zionism and the spiritual world that developed in its wake

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 The Meaning of the Akedah in Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition * 57

favored Scripture over rabbinical literature, as part of a general rejection of

exilic culture. The Akedah myth in Israeli society, which embodies in its
hermeneutical fluctuations the rift between the generations, was shaped by
a consciousness of rupture and rebellion from the start. Instead of an
interpretation based on an encounter between the hermeneutical tradition
and the present, Israeli culture chose to skip beyond tradition and history
and on to the origins-the biblical myth itself. This intergenerational rift
eventually evolved into a series of interpretations ascribed to the myth itself.
The founders, who broke off with their own parents, ultimately found
themselves cut off from their children. Netivah Ben-Yehudah, a famous
member of the Palmach, the renowned fighting unit from the War of
Liberation, has recently declared in an interview:

They told us to go to the army to defend the country so we went. ... I always
say that we are the Isaacs. God spared Abraham the trauma, but Isaac, who lay
on the altar on his back and, through the ropes, saw his father thrusting a knife,
lived with it for the rest of his life.42

Paradoxically, while the prevalent trend is to claim that the rejection of

theAkedah myth entails a rejection of Jewish tradition, the fact is that Jewish
tradition offers a rich variety of options for dealing with this myth that were
never available to secular Zionists.

NOTES

*1I am grateful to Batya Stein, who translated this paper from the Hebrew.
i. Moshe Shamir, BeKulmusMahir [Quick Notes] (Tel-Aviv, 1960) 332 [He-
brew]. See also Shamir's introduction to Yalkut Ha-Re'im [Writings of a Genera-
tion: An Anthology] (Jerusalem, 1992) 18-25 [Hebrew].
2. Uri Zevi Greenberg, "Korban shaharit" [Morning Offering], Sulam, 13
(1972) 145-7 [Hebrew].
3. "Hulin" [Worldliness], in Abraham Shlonsky, Ketavim [Writings], v2 (Tel-
Aviv, 1954) 136 [Hebrew]; see also ibid., "Poh" [Here], 85. For another image of the
Akedah in this context, see Yitzhak Lamdan, "Al haMizbeah" [On the Altar], in Kol
Shire Yitzhak Lamdan [Yitzhak Lamdan: Poems] (Jerusalem, 1973) [Hebrew].
4. Hayim Gouri, "Yerushah" [Heritage], in Shoshanat Ha-Ruhot [Compass-
Rose] (Tel-Aviv, 1966) [Hebrew]. This translation is from The Penguin Book of
Hebrew Verse, tr. T. Carmi (Harmondsworth, UK, 1981) 565.
5. For a more extensive analysis, see Ruth Karton-Blum, "Me'ayin haEtsim

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58 0 ISRAEL STUDIES, VOLUME 3, NUMBER I

haEleh baYad" [Where is that wood from?],Moznayim, 62 (1989) 9-14 [Hebrew];

Gideon Efrat, "Akedat Yitzhak baDrama haIsraelit" [TheAkedah in Israeli Drama],
Moznayim, 49 (I989) 345-51 [Hebrew]; Gideon Efrat, Akedat Yitzhak baOmanut
halsraelit [TheAkedah in Israeli Art] (Ramat-Gan: HaMuzeon leOmanut Israelit,
n.d.) [Hebrew]; I. Cohen, BeHevyion haSifrut halvrit [Within the Depth of Hebrew
Literature: Hebrew Literature in the Light of Jungian Theory] (Tel-Aviv, 1981) 51-
74 [Hebrew]; Yosef Melman, "'Zekhor et Asher Asa Avikha'-Akedat Yitzhak:
Yesodot Mashma'utah baSipur haMikra'i veGilgulah beShirat haMekha'ah Bat
Yamenu" ["Remember what your father did"-TheAkedah: Its foundations in the
Biblical narrative and its transformation in the contemporary poetry of protest], in
Zvi Levi (ed), HaAkedah vehaTokheha [Fathers and Sons: Myth, Theme, and Liter-
ary Topos] (Jerusalem, 1991) 53-72 [Hebrew].
6. S. Yizhar, Yemei Ziklag [The Days of Ziklag], v2 (Tel-Aviv, 1958) 804 [He-
brew].
7. Yizhar, Yemei Ziklag, vi, 8.
8. Yariv Ben-Aharon, Ha-Krav [The Battle] (Tel-Aviv, 1966) [Hebrew].
9. Ben-Aharon, Peleg (Tel-Aviv, 1993) 116. [Hebrew]
IO. Ibid., I57-8.
n1. Aharon Meged, HaHai al haMet [The Living on the Dead] (Tel-Aviv, 1983)
225. The book was first published in 1965 [Hebrew].
12. Yigal Mossinsohn, Shimshon Katsin beZahal, 0 Requiem leErets Plishtim
[Samson the IDF officer, or Requiem to the Land of the Philistines] [Hebrew]. All
quotations are from the photostatted version used in the Habimah production.
13. Hanoch Levin, "Malkat HaAmbatiah" [Queen of the bath], in Levin, Mah
Ikhpat laTsippor [What Does it Matter to the Bird?] (Tel-Aviv, 1987) [Hebrew].
14. Ibid., 89-90.
Is. Ibid., 92.
16. Mehachem Heyd, "Yitzhak Halakh leHar Moriah" [Yitzhak Went to Mount
Moriah], Yedi'otAharonot, 28 December 1973 [Hebrew].
17. See, for instance, Roni Eshel's poem, "Kaddish leYom HaKippurim": "On
the day of clemency, no compassion was decreed,/ justice was unmitigated and
mercy failed to rise./ On the day of clemency no ram appeared,/ fire was everywhere,
and the offering did rise." In A. Cohen, "Adam beMilhamah" [Man At War],Mivhar
Pirke Sifrut [A Literary Anthology] (Tel-Aviv, 1974) 327 [Hebrew].
18. Yehudah Amihai, "HaGibor haAmiti shel HaAkedah" [The true hero of the
sacrifice], She'at Hesed [The Hour of Grace] (Jerusalem-Tel-Aviv, 1983) 21 [He-
brew].
19. Yitzhak Laor, "HaMetumtam haZeh Yitzhak" [This fool, Isaac], Rak Ha-
GufZokher [Only the Body Remembers] (Tel-Aviv, 1985) 70 [Hebrew].
20. Amir Gilboa, "Yitzhak" Kehulim vaAdumim [Blues and reds] (Tel-Aviv,
1966) [Hebrew]. This translation appeared in The Penguin Book ofHebrew Verse, p.
560.
21. This issue resonates in Agnon's story "Lefi HaTsa'ar HaSakhar" [As the

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 The Meaning of the Akedah in Israeli Culture and Jewish Tradition * 59

sorrow, so the reward] in S. Y. Agnon, HaEsh vehaEtsim [The Fire and the Wood]
(Tel-Aviv, 1966) 8-9 [Hebrew].
22. SeferJosippon [The Book of Josippon], D. Flusser, ed. (Jerusalem, 1979) vi, p.
424 [Hebrew].
23. Abraham Grossman, "Shorashav shel Kiddush HaShem beAshkenaz haKe-
dumah" [The sources of Kiddush HaShem in early Ashkenaz] in Y. Gafni and A.
Ravitsky (eds), Kedushat haHayyim veHerufhaNefesh [Sanctifying Life and Risking
Life] (Jerusalem, 1993) 99-130 [Hebrew].
24. TB Avodah Zarah 54a, s.v. betsin'a.
25. Israel Halperin (ed), Sefer haGevurah [The Book of Heroism] (Tel-Aviv,
1941) 56-7 [Hebrew].
26. Shalom Spiegel, The Last Trial, tr. Judah Goldin (New York, 1967). For
additional elegies of that period that include theAkedah motif, see B. S. Bernfeld,
Sefer HaDema'ot [The Book of Tears] (Berlin, 1924) [Hebrew]; H. Brodie (ed),
Mivhar HaShirah Ha-vrit [An Anthology of Hebrew Poetry] (Leipzig, 1924) [He-
brew].
27. Naomi Shemer, "Akedat Yitzhak" [The binding of Isaac], HaSefer haSheni
shel Naomi Shemer [Naomi Shemer: The Second Book] (Tel-Aviv, 1975) [Hebrew].
28. See stanza 198 in Philo, OnAbraham, tr. F. H. Colson (London, 1935) 97.
29. Genesis Rabbah 56:4 [Hebrew].
30. Guide of the Perplexed, tr. S. Pines (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1963) 3:24, p. soo (emphasis in the original).
31. Bernfeld, Sefer HaDema'ot, Part I, 209.
32. See, e.g., Soloveitchik, BeSod HaYahid vehaYahad [With the Individual and
the Community] (Jerusalem, 1976) 427-8 [Hebrew]; Divrei Hagut veHa'arakha
[Thoughts and Reflections] (Jerusalem, 1982) 271 [Hebrew]; Halakhic Man, tr.
Lawrence Kaplan (Philadelphia, PA, 1982) 4, n. s; and, On Repentance (Ramsey, NJ,
1984) 224, 245-8.
33. "HaNakam vehaKlalah, haDam veha'Alilah"' [Vengeance and damnation,
blood and defamation: From Jewish martyrdom to blood libel accusations], Zion,
58 (I993) 33-58.
34. Several expressions of this trend can be found at the very foundations of
Israeli culture. See, e.g., Aaron Zeitlin's "Shir HaAkedah" in Shirim vePoemot
(Jerusalem, 1950) 269 [Hebrew].
35. Genesis Rabbah 56:11 [Hebrew].
36. Ibid., 55:3 [Hebrew]. See also Pirke deRabbi Eliezer 31 [Hebrew].
37. For instance, R. Samuel b. Meir (Rashbam) views the Akedah as a punish-
ment imposed on Abraham. See the Rashbam's commentary on Genesis 22:1. See
also TB, Bava Bathra Isb.
38. See the Rosh Hashanah prayer that precedes the Teki'ata debei Rav, appar-
ently dating from the third century, in A. Landeshut, Siddur Higayyon haLev (Ber-
lin, 1848) [Hebrew].
39. Mahzor RinatlsraelleRosh HaShanah (Nusah Sefarad), ed. S. Tal (Jerusalem,

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60o * ISRAEL STUDIES, VOLUME 3, NUMBER I

1986) 200 [Hebrew]. See also The Daily PrayerBook (London: National Council for
Religious Education, 1943) 24.
40. On this trend, see TB, Ta'anit 4a and GenesisRabbah 56:12 [Hebrew]. See also
Yitzhak Arama, Akedath Yitzhak I37b [Hebrew]; Abraham Isaac Kook, Iggerot
haRe'ayah, v2 (Jerusalem, 1962) 43; Kook, Olat haRe'ayah (Jerusalem, 1963) Part I,
92-3 [Hebrew]; Martin Buber, The Kingship of God, tr. Richard Scheimann (New
York, 1973) 116; Martin Buber, Eclipse of God: Studies in the Relation between Religion
and Philosophy (New York, 1952) 153.
41. See also M. Steinberg, Anatomy ofFaith (New York, 1960) 147. For further
analysis of this issue, see my paper "Natural Law and Halakha: A Critical Analysis,"
Jewish Law Annual (forthcoming).
42. Yedi'otAharonot, Shiv'a Yamim, 26 December 1997, P. 29.

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