Isaac

Etymology

From the Hebrew root 'tsachaq' (צָחַק), meaning to laugh. Both Abraham and Sarah laughed when told they would have a child in old age — Abraham in wonder (Genesis 17:17), Sarah in disbelief (Genesis 18:12). God said: 'Name him Isaac — laughter.'

Who they were

Isaac was the child everyone had stopped expecting. Abraham was a hundred years old and Sarah ninety when he was born. Sarah said, 'God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.' But Isaac's childhood was marked by the most harrowing episode in Genesis: God told Abraham to sacrifice him on Mount Moriah. Father and son walked together up the mountain, Isaac carrying the wood. 'Where is the lamb for the burnt offering?' Isaac asked. Abraham answered, 'God himself will provide the lamb.' At the last moment, with the knife raised, God stopped Abraham and provided a ram. The trauma of that day echoes through Isaac's quieter adult story. He is the most passive of the patriarchs — things happen to him more than he makes them happen. He was the prize in the servant's quest to find a wife (Rebekah). He was deceived by his son Jacob and his wife into giving the blessing to the wrong son. He dug wells and re-dug his father's wells. Yet God renewed the covenant with him: 'I will be with you and bless you.' Isaac lived to 180 — longer than Abraham — and was buried by both his sons together. His name, laughter, captures both the impossibility of his birth and the joy that followed. Paul calls him the child of promise, the one born 'by the power of the Spirit.'

Family

Father

Abraham

Mother

Sarah

Spouse

Rebekah

Children

Esau,Jacob

Character qualities

• Bearer of promise
• Quiet endurance
• Faithfulness to wells and land
• Vulnerability to deception

Key verse

Genesis 21:6

Where they appear

Themes

Variants & related forms

Isaak · Itzhak · Yitzhak · Izzy

Related names