Genesis 22:13 - Exposition

And Abraham lifted up his eyes (in the direction of the voice), and looked, and behold behind him —either at his back (Furst, Keil, Lange, Murphy), or in the background of the altar, i.e. in front of him (Gesenius, Kalisch). The LXX ; Samaritan, Syriac, mistaking אַחַר for אֶחַר , read "one," which adds nothing to the sense or picturesqueness of the composition— a ram — אַיִל ; in the component letters of which cabalistic writers find the initial letters of אֱלהִים יִרְאֶה־לּוֹ , God will provide for himself. In the animal itself the Fathers rightly discerned a type of Christ, though it is fanciful to detect a shadow of the Crown of thorns in the words that follow—caught in a thicket by his horns (the sebach being the intertwined branches of trees or brushwood): and Abraham went and took the ram, and (though not directed what to do, yet with a fine spiritual instinct discerning the Divine purpose) offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son— whom be thus received from the dead as in a figure ( Hebrews 11:19 ).