John Richter

Assignment #3

Abraham is known as the father of faith, and is Kierkegaard’s focus when discussing the topic.  He was willing to sacrifice his son in order to uphold his faith to God, up until the moment where God called him off, stopping his son from being sacrificed at his hand.  Kirekegaard asks, then, “Is it possible to speak unreservedly about Abraham without running the risk that some individual will become unbalanced and do the same thing?” Unfortunately, I feel problems do arise when speaking about Abraham in such a way.  He must be fully understood in order for anyone to speak of him first.

Abraham was not blind to the situation he encountered.  He knew that God was putting him in a very difficult, paradoxical situation.  It is that reason for which God chose to test Abraham.  It was the ultimate situation for a test of faith.  Abraham understood that he could possibly be outlasted, even put to death, for what God was asking him to do.  Yet he had so much faith and believe in the Almighty’s word that he went along with the command.  He did not do this because he thought killing was right, or because he was just doing as he was told.  He loved and believed in God so much, that he knew that a horrid act such as murdering your first born son had to be an important task.  He knew, because of the severity of the request, that it was OK to believe God. He knew that what God was telling him was the right thing to do.  That in the end, it was not the murdering of his son that would be looked upon, but his obeying of God and his following of what was RIGHT. It may seem confusing, and as I said, is inherently paradoxical, but that is the method that Abraham followed.  By realizing the grave consequence of the request by God, and even though the act in which he was physically carrying out was wrong, he knew that he had to obey and do the right thing.  And, in the end, his faith was rewarded.

People do not always realize this and everyone does not fully understand the concept of faith, and what Abraham is doing by attempting to carry out God’s word.  People can see “faith” as blind adherence to things that demanded, or perhaps even as insanity.  People can take the idea of faith to far, and perhaps try to create their own faith, which is false and not exactly the right thing to do.  People can argue that Abraham really was wrong, and nothing, not God, not nothing, should ever compel someone kill their child.  In that case Abraham would be considered insane and wrong.  However, I believe Abraham was right in his faith, and it did prove rewarding.  He had his faith solidified and so sure in God that he knew that it was the right thing to do.  People who look at this can easily say that what they are doing is the right thing to do merely because of faith, even if it’s a horrid act.  The idea of faith is abused here, and that is the problem with regarding Abraham without reserve in his acts of faith.  There are many exceptions.

Abraham is the father of faith, and was a prime example of the practice.  It cannot, however, be held that faith is all-knowing and omniscient in all occasions.  Abraham encountered a terrible paradox and his faith proved right.  He had a higher connection to a higher power that allowed him to do this.  I suppose what I’m trying to say in this whole paper, is that one should not follow faith the way that Abraham did lest they have a direct connection with the lord such as Abraham.  Faith can be an astonishing tool, as we saw with good Abe, however can also be a terrible dark tunnel of deception.  Faith is not really faith with all people, sometimes merely pathetic hope or even insanity.  Faith in my opinion is very dangerous, fore if every person who thought they heard a voice from god that told them to do something followed that voice, and we would have an unsafe society.  Faith is a wonderful thing, in concept, but because the consequences can and have been dire (terrorism for example), lets stick to common sense.