It was early morning; Abraham rose in good time, embraced Sarah, the bride of his old age, and Sarah kissed Isaac, who had taken her disgrace from her, was her pride and hope for all generations. So they rode on in silence, and Abraham’s eyes were fixed on the ground until the fourth day, when he looked up and saw afar the mountain in Moriah, but he turned his gaze once again to the ground. Silently he arranged the firewood, bound Isaac; silently he drew the knife.
Yes, we’re looking at that story from the book of Genesis, chapter 22, where God seems to want Abraham to make a human sacrifice of his son, Isaac, though the passage I just read isn’t from the book of Genesis at all. It’s from a book written by Søren Kierkegaard, the great Danish philosopher of the early nineteenth century, entitled “Fear and Trembling”, which was an extended reflection on that story about Abraham and Isaac.
Kierkegaard begins “Fear and Trembling” with a series of reflections on the Genesis 22 story where each reflection reconstructs the story in a slightly different way. In one, Abraham tells his son what he is about to do, and Isaac pleads for his life. In another, Abraham pretends to be a psychopath so that Isaac won’t blame God for what he is about to do. None of Kierkegaard’s versions of the story end well, but how do you give a happy ending to a story about a man who sets out to murder his son? And the problem here is not with the Great Dane’s retelling but with the Biblical narrative of Genesis 22 itself.
Kierkegaard is one of many philosophers and theologians who have reflected on this story, as they see it as raising one of the most fundamental of all religious questions, namely ‘how do we know when it is really God who is speaking to us?’
“There is no voice that cannot be misheard as the voice of God,” says the great Jewish philosopher Martin Buber (in “The Prophetic Faith”). How do we separate the ‘grain of inspiration from the gravel of human impulse?’ (Father Eugene Kennedy). Well … Kierkegaard says, however we do it, we do it ‘in fear and trembling’.
I first met Mordechai Vanunu in 1986. We stood at the back of St John’s Church building in Kings Cross, drinking coffee and talking into the early hours of the morning about life, philosophy, existentialism, Nietzsche, and Kierkegaard.
If you’re not familiar with Morde, he’s the man who became Israel’s ‘nuclear whistle-blower’. He’d worked for some years in Israel’s secret nuclear weapons factory, hidden under the Negev desert, and he’d taken photographs of Israel’s nuclear arsenal.
Morde had taken leave shortly after taking the photos and was travelling the world on a spiritual quest, trying to work out whether he should publish the photographs and share the truth about Israel’s nukes or whether he should just bin them.
Morde knew that if he published the truth, his family and his country would probably turn on him and the Mossad would probably kill him, and he did not want to destroy everything he loved and lived for. Even so, like Abraham, Morde felt the call of God upon him, and eventually he came to the front of our church building and said, “Now I give my life to Jesus. Now I do what I must do.”
‘Oh, to be a knight of faith,’ says Kierkegaard – to risk everything: not only your own life, but the lives of those you love, your family and your country, and to risk not just death but ignominy and shame for yourself and for your entire family. Who would have the courage to take up such a calling? Who indeed?
Notably, when Kierkegaard wrote ‘Fear and Trembling’, he was also working through his own existential crisis. He was engaged to Regina Olsen – a woman he genuinely loved – and he’d completed his doctoral studies in theology and was ready to be ordained into the Lutheran Church of Denmark. A large part of him yearned to take up priestly duties in a quiet country parish with Regina at his side, yet he felt God was calling him to a more prophetic role – to be a critic of the established church, working outside its comfortable structures; yet he knew that if he took this path, he could not take Regina with him.
Kierkegaard made his decision in 1843 and broke off his engagement, publicly spurning Regina so as to save her from any public embarrassment, after which he went on to pursue the work for which he became famous. Even so, he quietly hoped that, just as Abraham received Isaac back, he might one day receive Regina back, but he didn’t.
Morde Vanunu served eighteen years in Ashkelon prison for his act of faithfulness, including eleven and a half years in solitary (the longest any human being on record has spent in solitary). I was waiting for him outside Ashkelon prison on the day of his release in 2004, and our hope was to that he would come back to Australia with me. Even so, they wouldn’t let him leave, and they have indeed reimprisoned him since, and he’s still waiting for freedom.
There are no guarantees that knights of faith will not have to endure lifelong pain on account of the sacrifices they are required to make. Did Abraham ever regret his decision to follow what he believed was God’s call? Did Kierkegaard ever overcome his pain? In the case of dear Morde, did he ever regret his decision? Well … I kept every letter he sent me over those eighteen years in prison, and his response to that question has never varied:
“I had to overcome many personal barriers to do what I did. The chief barrier was the sacrifice of my private life to exposure and slander and of my plans for the future – all on this altar. But the action was worth it. By this action I pointed out the path in which I believe … about what must be done … [and I demonstrated] the way in which a man must be willing to sacrifice and risk his life for the sake of an act that is important and beneficial to all mankind.” (from a letter Morde sent me in 1985)
Abraham rose early in the morning. He saddled the ass himself and left early, before Sarah had awoken, not able to share with her where he was going or what he was preparing to do. He rode with Isaac by his side, but they rode mostly in silence. Then he saw the mountain of Moriah in the distance. He laid the alter. He lifted the knife. And so he became the father of faith.
First published in Father Dave’s weekly newsletter – June 26th, 2026
