Lecturer to speak on ho9w religions view Isaac

By Judy Harrison

Of the NEWS Staff

BANGOR – The concept of self-sacrifice as perceived by three of the world’s religions will be the focus later this month of a lecture by a member of the Bates College religion faculty.

Mishael M. Caspi, 70, of Lewiston will be the guest lecturer on Thursday, Oct. 23, at a program co-sponsored by the Bangor Theological Seminary and Congregation Beth Israel.

Caspi will speak on “The Binding of Isaac in Three Traditions,” focusing on the way the story of Abraham’s attempted sacrifice of his son Isaac is told in the Judaic, Christian and Islamic traditions.

The guest lecturer will focus on the way the story illuminates each religion, he said during a recent phone interview.

“Although I am a biblical scholar who deals in scholarship relating to these three traditions,” Caspi, a native of Israel, said, “I will not present this as much as a scholar but as a poet, which I also am, to explain my fascination with the literary works done with this motif.

“As a poet, I look at the story as it is, and I am fascinated by the drama of it.”

In addition to Isaac, Caspi has studied and written about many other biblical figures including Eve, Job and Elijah. He said that his approach to studying the stories in the Christian Bible, the Torah and the Quran is more literary than trying to trace their origins as many biblical scholars would do.

The story of Isaac is told in Genesis. God instructed Abraham to take his son Isaac to a mountaintop and sacrifice him to God. Just as Abraham was about to slay his son, an angel of the Lord called to him and told him to stop.

“And, he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me,” it is written in the King James Version.

Caspi has been a member of the Bates faculty since 1995. He has taught at the University of Pittsburgh, the University of California Santa Cruz and St. John’s University. He also has held positions at the College of the Negev in Israel and the Teacher Training College in Brazil.

In all, Caspi has written more than 25 books in English, Arabic and Hebrew. His publications include “Take Now Thy Son: The Motif of the Agedah (Binding) in Literatures,” “Women on the Biblical Road: Ruth, Naomi, and the Female Journey” and “The Answered Prayer: Folktales from Yemen.”

His works in progress include “Red Pomegranates,” “Oral Poetry of Women in the Middle East” and “Still Small Voice: Elijah in Three Traditions.”

BTS and the synagogue began the series in an effort to provide the community with an avenue to better understand and appreciate the Christian and Jewish faiths. The lecture series is supported through the Sylvia Friedman Memorial Fund.

“The Binding of Isaac in Three Traditions” will be presented at 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 23, in the David Nelson Beach Chapel at Bangor Theological Seminary in Bangor. For information, call 942-6781.