What Does Genesis 22:7 Mean?
And Isaac spoke to Abraham his father, and said, "My father." And he said, "Here I am, my son." And he said, "Look, the fire and the wood; but where is the lamb for the rising offering?"
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And Isaac spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father: and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?THE KEY
The Hebrew word for “burnt offering” is olah, “that which ascends,” so Isaac is asking which living creature will be brought up as the offering.
THE MEANING
You can see the fire and wood and still be unable to see the lamb. The verse gives that absence a voice: the question is spoken plainly, and the next line begins its answer.
THE ROOT
עֹלָה
olah
GROWS FROM
עלה
to go up, ascend
“rising offering” in this verse is olah. The Hebrew word rendered “burnt offering” is olah, from alah, “to go up.” The offering is named by its upward movement, so Isaac’s question asks which life is to be brought up in the fire.
ALSO GROWS
alah: to go up, ascend
עָלָה
This verb carries the movement contained in the offering’s name.
ma'aleh: ascent, going up
מַעֲלֶה
This related noun keeps the upward motion audible in olah.
יִצְחָק
Yitzchak
GROWS FROM
צחק
to laugh
Isaac’s Hebrew name grows from the root for laughter: “he laughs.” Here that name stands beside a stark question about the absent lamb, holding laughter and unknowing in the same scene.
ALSO GROWS
tzachaq: to laugh
צָחַק
The verb names the action carried in Isaac’s name.
tsechoq: laughter
צְחֹק
This noun makes laughter itself a branch of the seed in Isaac’s name.
THE PATTERN
The lamb becomes the visible life through which an offering and deliverance are named.
And Abraham said, "My son, God will see to the lamb himself for the rising offering." And the two of them went together.Speak to all the assembly of Israel, saying, “On the tenth day of this month each man will take for himself a lamb according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for each house.”The next day John perceived Jesus coming toward him, and said, Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the falling short of the world.THE THREAD
And Abraham said, "My son, God will see to the lamb himself for the rising offering." And the two of them went together.The verb translated “provide” comes from רָאָה (ra’ah, “to see or perceive”), so provision is phrased through seeing to the need. The next line answers the absence Isaac names with a lamb, carrying the question from lack toward the one who sees.
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