Rembrandt, Caravaggio, and Beyond: "The Binding of Isaac" (work in progress)

Beit Alfa Synagouge; 6th C

• 3-part mosiac, including mishkan & aron, zodiac scenes, and akedah, which has the best coloring
• Devoid of all emotion, belying the complexity of the narrative it tells
• Relays the three scenes of the story linearly, but out of chronological order
• On the viewer's left the two servants hold onto the donkey. On the right, Avraham raises a small Yitzchak onto the altar, while the arm of an angel stretches outward, the words "אל תשלח" etched underneath. The ram is given center stage as it hangs from a tree by a rope. (AlHaTorah.org)

The binding of Isaac as described in Gen 22:1-19. On the right is an altar with flames rising from it. Abraham stands next to it, one hand holding his son Isaac and the other a long knife. The names of Abraham and Isaac are inscribed above the figures. A hand emerges from a cloud above Abraham and Isaac, symbolizing the angel of God. Nearby are the Hebrew words meaning "lay not your hand [upon the lad]". The ram and the two servants with the donkey are depicted behind Abraham.

The ancient synagogue of Beit Alpha is located in the Beit She'an Valley, north-east Israel. The mosaic floor of the synagogue was discovered in 1929, when members of Kibbutz Beit Alpha dug irrigation channels for their fields. Excavations were carried out the same year, exposing mosaics preserved intact for almost 1,500 years. Later excavations, in the early 1960s, exposed remains of some houses, indicating that the synagogue had stood in a Jewish village of the Byzantine period (5th-6th centuries).

Two dedicatory inscriptions, one in Aramaic and one in Greek, are situated just inside the main entrance to the prayer hall, flanked by a lion and a bull facing each other. The Aramaic inscription states that the mosaic floor was laid during the reign of Emperor Justin (probably Justin I, beginning of the 6th century) and that the cost was covered by donations from members of the community. The Greek inscription reads: May the craftsmen who carried out this work, Marianos and his son Hanina, be held in remembrance.

Basilica of San Vitale; Ravenna, Italy; 6th C

The lunette illustrates the Hospitality of Abraham on the left and center (Genesis 18:1-15) and the Sacrifice of Isaac on the right (Genesis 22:1-18). The juxtaposition points to the significance of the two events as types of the sacrifice of Christ and the sacrifice of the Mass. The prominence of the loaves, each with an incised cross, underlines the typology. (At the time, the bread consecrated in the Eucharist was in the form of loaves offered by the faithful – see McLachlan, 350.) The typology is also referenced by the sacrificial animals – the lamb offered by Abraham on the left, the ram on the right that will be substituted for Isaac, and the lambs or sheep adorning the capitals of the columns below.

Ram in christeological pose

"Sacrifice of Isaac"; 1603;

Carravagio's painting is the most graphic of the three, filled with both pathos and horror. The thee protagonists completely fill the canvas. Avraham stands in the center, one hand grasping the knife, the other holding a clearly terrified Yitzchak by the neck. A very human looking angel grabs onto Avraham's arm as if to restrain him, perhaps frightened that otherwise he will carry through with the deed. Only the head of the ram makes its way into the painting. It waits by Yitzchak but its gaze is intent on Avraham. (AlHaTorah.org)

The angel shows Avraham the ram - man can’t really control their own fate, they need God (Christian influence)

Achar - behind him vs. another ram

Although the pair of figures barely discernible in the right background may refer to the two young men who accompanied Abraham but were left at the foot of the mountain to wait while he sacrificed his son, other details do not follow the account in Genesis 22 precisely. According to the Biblical text, Abraham prepared for a burnt offering, laying Isaac bound on a pile of wood on an improvised altar. Just as Abraham was about to slay his son, an angel intervened by calling to him. A ram then unexpectedly appeared, divinely provided as a substitute sacrifice for Isaac. In Caravaggio's visualization of the subject, the angel physically materializes beside Abraham. This treatment of the subject was customary, and Caravaggio took full advantage of its potential for drama.

It is another of his favored crucial moments between one course of action and another abruptly superseding it. Abraham has laid Isaac down on the altar, drawn the knife, and is at the point of slitting his throat; the restraining angel rushes urgently to the rescue just in time. The focus of the action is on the patriarch's right hand holding the knife. The three heads are radial to it, and it joins the authoritarian figures on the left to the victims on the right. The other hands are hardly less expressive: the angel's left with its commanding gesture and Abraham's left grasping his squirming son to steady him. The concealment of Isaac's hands emphasizes his helplessness.

Monsignor Maffeo Barberini's agents paid Caravaggio for this painting and perhaps another that has not been identified, in four installments, the first in May, 1603, and the last in January, 1604. The precision of this documentation provides a key to Caravaggio's chronology and evolution. The frieze-like composition he adapted from his own Judith, reversing the sequence of action to read from left to right. But during the five intervening years the figures have become more fully three-dimensional, and the space adequate to permit them to move freely within a single frame of reference. Abraham is the same model as the background apostle in the Incredulity and as the second Saint Matthew. The light on the angel and the modeling of his body make him the Capitoline Youth's unsullied brother; without the clue of his wings, he would seem as mortal, and his nudity and his capability to interfere with the implacable Abraham would be inexplicable. The terrified Isaac is Caravaggio's naughty little friend, the Amor, no longer victorious and now a couple of years older. Parenthetically, can we read the image as a playfully sarcastic intimate threat to the boy?

Our first glance at Caravaggio’s painting focuses on the horror in Isaac’s face; this is no devout illustration of patriarchal piety, but what Phyllis Trible calls a “text of terror”. Two parallel diagonals of light lead us from the face of Isaac, to the angel, to Abraham and to the ram. Despite these physical connections, the relationships are disconnected: the angel points approximately but not directly at the ram; Abraham looks approximately but not directly at the angel; Isaac approximately faces the viewer; only the ram looks directly at Abraham and the angel while nuzzling up to Isaac. The avoidance of eye contact is Caravaggio’s way of expressing the surreal madness of the scene. Above: Caravaggio, The Sacrifice of Isaac, 1601-02

a

angel is on the ground, not in heaven

Isaac looking right at us

What is Abrham's response? Doesn't appear releaved like Rembradnt Is he questioning angel? Is Abraham doing God's real will? Can divine really interfere?

What will happen next?

He doesn't look to ram when angel tells him to

Would Abraham have sacrificed Isaac? Maybe, acc to C,, no acc to R

A Museum Quality Print of the Sacrifice of Isaac by Veronese, the artist finished this oil on canvas in 1586 with the original measuring 51 by 37 inches and now hanging at the Prado Museum in Madrid, Spain. The painting depicts the moment in time from the Old Testament, Genesis Book 22 in which Abraham prepares to sacrifice his only son Isaac, on order from God and being stopped by the Angel. God is testing Abraham's faith by requiring him to sacrifice his son, when God sees that Abraham follows His orders without question, he is convinced of Abraham's faith. He then sends an angel to save Isaac at the last moment, ordering that a Lamb be sacrificed instead of Isaac. The composition shows Isaac being held on the altar by his father, whose right hand bears the knife he is going to use to kill his son, with the angel holding this arm in order to save Isaac. This work of art was acquired at the auction of the belongings of Charles I of England and was installed at the Monastery of El Escorial where it remained until entering the Prado Museum Collection in 1837 where it remains today.

An image of the Old Testament scene (Genesis 22, 1-19) in which, on the orders of God, Abraham prepares to sacrifice his son, Isaac. Seeing that Abraham follows his orders with blind faith, God accepts this as proof of his faithfulness and sends an angel to save Isaac at the last moment, ordering that a lamb be sacrificed in his place. This passage from the Bible is understood as a foreshadowing of Christ´s sacrifice on the Cross: the ass symbolises the Synagogue, the lamb refers to Christ and the altar to the cross.The main scene occurs in the foreground, with a semi-nude Isaac being held on the sacrificial altar by his father, Abraham, whose right hand bears the knife. An angel holds his arm in order to stop the sacrifice. Like others from the fifteen eighties, this late work merges the characters into the landscape. The figures are ordered diagonally. The angel and Isaac are luminous, but the former´s light casts the surprised patriarch´s face into shadow. This work was acquired by Conde de Fuensaldaña for Felipe IV in England and was installed at the Monastery of El Escorial, where it remained until entering the Prado Museum collection in 1839.

In contrast to the other artists, Veronese chooses to place the altar, here depicted as part of a bigger sanctuary, at the center of his work. To the right, an adult Yitzchak kneels with his arms crossed, perhaps in prayer. Avraham is grasping Yitzchak's head, but looking upward towards the angel who is attempting to wrest the knife from Avraham's hand. In the foreground, the ram is depicted peeking out through the shrubbery. On the other side of the shrine, there is only one figure depicted. A man stands with his donkey, facing away from the scene, seemingly unaware of the drama transpiring a mere few feet away. (AlHaTorah.org)

Rembrandt, "Sacrifice of Isaac," 1635

Rembrandt’s innovation is Abraham’s hand covering isaac’s face. Simon Shama says he’s smothering him. Why? In order for abraham to do the akeda, he can’t see the face of isaac (The humanity of the other lies in the face - idea of Levinas). Rembrandt uses hands a lot. From a physical perspective, hands are very difficult to draw/paint correctly. Rembrandt likes using motion in his pieces, and here he has a knife in motion. There is no ram in Rembrandt’s piece. Why does he not include the ram? According to the text, the ram is not in the scene yet. Rembrandt wants to capture human pathos, feeling. He doesn’t want the ram in the piece, b/c it ruins the drama of the moment. There is no formal mizbeach in Rembrandt’s painting. Rembrandt isn’t painting this to inspire Church goers about the Church’s Catholic agenda.

God ordered Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac as a test of his faith (Genesis, 22: 1-13). Abraham set out to carry out the command, proving his belief, but God sent an angel to stay his hand just as he was about to sink the knife into his son's body. Rembrandt captures all the the dramatism of the culminating moment in this terrible intended sacrifice. Abraham's amazement as the angel stops him with hand raised is revealed in his expressive gesture and the strong expression of his face, which almost borders on madness. We see a moment of great emotional tension, expressed in dynamic forms and lines. The heightened dramatism, monumental form, turbulent movement, sharp contrasts of light and shade are typical of Rembrandt's works of the 1630s and reflect in this painting the features of the Baroque style.

Not the hand with the knife that is the focus

Knife slowly falling highlights tension

no force on hand -- slightest touch causes him to drop knife. scared

detailed knife and sheath, dull knife

laying on wood with hands behind his back - unclear if they are bound

covering face -is Isaac us?, lighting on him

; CHrist is the lamb

Isaac’s face is covered in both painting and the etching. Isaac isn’t even bound up. Isaac is willing to sacrifice himself. The akeda is even harder for Isaac b/c he didn’t receive this divine command. This is a very jewish interpretation. In the middle ages, jews were faced with the issue of dying for the faith (w/o God’s command) by persecution. The akeda switches from Abraham to Isaac. Until Rembrandt, artists are not interested in isaac. Whereby Jews, isaac is a crucial character of the story.

The angel is either hugging or restraining isaac. Abraham’s not looking at the angel. In the text, abraham hear’s the voice of angel, he doesnt see it. According to the midrash, when the malach told abraham to stop, abraham wanted to keep going. In the etching, abraham is tightly grasping the knife. He’s not sure if he wants to stop. Rabbi Lamm idea developed from the Kotzker about challenge of akeda (Sermon 1969): Before the akeda Abraham has already sacrificed his humanity by merely choosing b/w his son and God.The greatest test for avraham in the akeda was stopping the akeda when God told him to stop. Abraham already had sacrificed isaac by choosing God over Isaac. This is no longer the binding of Isaac, but Abraham’s Sacrifice. [http://brussels.mc.yu.edu/gsdl/collect/lammserm/ index/assoc/HASHc7ed.dir/doc.pdf] The juxtaposition of Rembrandt and Rabbi Lamm is to show the two types of interpretation that both great masters displayed.

Relationship to the Biblical Text

The artists' choices reflect certain ambiguities in the Biblical text and different possible interpretive stances:

Yitzchak's Age

While the mosaic depicts Yitzchak as a young child, Caravaggio renders him as a teenager, and Veronese portrays him as a young adult. Which is closer to the Biblical text? The episode is not dated making it impossible to know with certainty. The opening of the chapter, "וַיְהִי אַחַר הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה" might connect it to the previous one in which Yitzchak is born and weaned, making Yitzchak a toddler or young boy. In contrast, various Midrashim⁴ link the story to the death of Sarah in the next chapter, making Yitzchak thirty seven. Ibn Ezra takes a middle position, suggesting that Yitzchak was a teenager.⁵ The ramifications of the different suggestions are significant. Was Yitzchak an active partner in the test? How aware was he of what was taking place? Could he have resisted?

Witnesses to the Event

While there are no bystanders present in Caravaggio's rendering of the episode, Veronese paints a man standing with a donkey in the foreground of his work, presumably one of the two servants who accompanied Avraham. According to the Biblical text, however, these servants did not follow Avraham all the way to the site of the sacrifice. The choice to nonetheless include him raises an interesting issue regarding the story: Were there any witnesses to the event? This relates to the larger question of the purpose of the whole trial: was it intended for Avraham alone, or did it contain a message for the outside world as well? See Purpose of Akeidat Yitzchak for more.

The Altar

The altar in the Beit Alfa mosaic is a fairly simple structure, sharply contrasting with the shrine painted by Veronese. The latter suggests that the site of the sacrifice had previous religious significance, and perhaps had served others as a house of worship. Is this true of Mt. Moriah? Was there a history of sacrificial worship at the site, and perhaps even an entire sanctuary? Rambam, following Chazal,⁶ suggests that the altar "built" by Avraham was previously utilized by Adam, Kayin and Hevel, and Noach, and thus sanctified already from time immemorial. See Choice of Yerushalayim for how this suggestion plays into different understandings of why Yerushalayim was chosen as David's capital city.

Yitzchak: A Willing Participant?

While Veronese sets Yitzchak in a submissive pose, almost as if he were in the midst of prayer, Caravaggio's Yitzchak is a mask of horror. What was Yitzchak feeling throughout the episode? Was he a willing sacrifice, viewing the act as the ultimate show of devotion, or was he acted upon against his will?⁷

Binding of Isaac?

Though the story is often referred to as the "Binding of Isaac", none of these artists chose to portray Yitzchak as being bound. This omission makes one question what about the binding was deemed as so crucial to the story that it is always called "The Akeidah". Interestingly, this is the lone appearance of the verb עקד in Tanakh,⁸ making the very definition of the word questionable!

"וְהִנֵּה אַיִל אַחַר נֶאֱחַז בַּסְּבַךְ"

While Veronese depicts the ram as hiding in the bramble, the Beit Alfa Mosaic has it tied to a tree, standing on its hind legs. Is there any textual support for this latter portrayal? Might this be a rendering of the unusual phrase "אַיִל אַחַר"?‎⁹ More likely, though, the synagogue mosaic's depiction is influenced by Christian iconography in which the ram is meant to prefigure Jesus on the cross.¹⁰ It is therefore highlighted in the middle of the image, and depicted as hanging down from a straight tree (representing a cross) rather than being caught in the shrubs.

• (AlHaTorah.org(