Isaac's birth came about from a miracle - Abraham was 100 years old when Isaac was born (Genesis 21:5), and Sarah, at age 90, had been unable to have children (Genesis 16:1, 17:17). As explained, "Then God said, "Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish My Covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him." (Genesis 17:19).

Isaac was not Abraham's firstborn, or only, son. Fourteen years before, when Abraham was 86 (Genesis 16:16), Sarah (then called Sarai) had arranged for a child to be born to Abraham through her own Egyptian maidservant, Hagar. Ishmael was born from the arrangement (Genesis 16:1-4).

The promise did not go through Ishmael because the covenant had already been made with Abraham, with a yet-unborn Isaac the designated heir, before Ishmael was born (Genesis 15:2-6). While God does not play favorites, He was also not bound to any other arrangements for children that Abraham and Sarah had taken upon themselves to bring about after the matter had been firmly decided by God.

Nevertheless, God did see that Hagar and Ishmael would be greatly blessed - "I will so increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count." (Genesis 16:10). The Arab nations of today, as they themselves will correctly tell you, are the descendants of Ishmael. Both the Jews and Arabs are descendants of Abraham. That is why they struggle, with often bloody and tragic results, over control of the Tomb of The Patriarchs in Hebron, in which Abraham is buried, right to this very day. Both, correctly claim descent from him - the Jews through Isaac, the Arabs through Ishmael.

Abraham's greatest test of obedience to God involved Isaac. "Then God said, "Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about." (Genesis 22:2). Abraham passed the test, while God stopped it before any actual harm to could come to Isaac - "Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from Me your son, your only son." (Genesis 22:12).

Abraham had been willing to give up his son to God, just as God Himself would later give up His Own Son to a sacrifice that was allowed to happen. An interesting point is that the place where Abraham was sent to sacrifice Isaac, Mount Moriah, is today known as the Temple Mount in Jerusalem - Isaac would have been sacrificed very near the place that Jesus Christ was Crucified.

At the age of 40, Isaac married Rebekah (Genesis 25:20). After they had been married for 20 years, they had twin sons, Jacob and Esau (Genesis 25:23-26). Jacob eventually became the sole heir of the promise - a very hungry Esau foolishly sold his birthright for a bowl of stew (Genesis 25:29-34), and Jacob obtained the blessing through deception of the then nearly blind Isaac (Genesis 27:1-40). It was while he was fleeing Esau's wrath for that deception that Jacob had his Stairway To Heaven dream.

Isaac lived a very long life before dying at Hebron. There, he was buried by Jacob and Esau in what is today known as the "Tomb of The Patriarchs" - the burial place of Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebekah, Jacob/Israel and Leah. (Genesis 35:28-29, 49:31)

Fact Finder: What did Abraham believe that God would do if he had actually gone through with the sacrifice of Isaac?
Hebrews 11:17-19

Plus much, much more on the same CD! Bible Maps Over 70 detailed full-color Bible study maps. Christian Music Enjoy the magnificent sound of over 1,900 hymns (midi computer format) Biblical Clipart Over 200 beautiful Biblical graphics (.jpg and .gif) Classic Works of Biblical History The Works of Philo, Complete and Unabridged (.txt format) The Works of Josephus, Complete and Unabridged (.txt format) Edward Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (.txt format) Hebrew and Greek Alphabets The Hebrew alphabet of the Old Testament, and the Greek alphabet of the New Testament, with equivalent sounds in English.

How To Receive Your Daily Bible Study CD
(Please read carefully to understand how and why the CDs are available)

This ministry web site, with thousands of Bible studies (including a new study added every day, 365 days a year) is always freely available for everyone. As such, this Daily Bible Study has become a very expensive time and financial commitment for the author and the publisher. Every study, that takes you only minutes to read, takes many hours of work to write, format and technically make available and maintain on the web server. Without help, it would be impossible for this Daily Bible Study web site to continue. That is the simple reality of the situation.

We are not "selling" CDs. The CD is our humble thank you gift to the faithful who realize the importance of making Bible-based Christian teaching available to "all the world" as Christ commanded His servants to do. The map is an actual Daily Bible Study server statistics "snap shot" of visitors to Daily Bible Study at 7 am local time recently. The green bars represent the percentage of visitors to the web site (where on the planet requested pages were being sent to) at that moment in the entire time zone directly above the green bar. The graphic constantly changes through the day like a rolling wave across the world's time zones.

The Daily Bible Study Library CD is not for sale. The Daily Bible Study Library CD is produced as our thank-you gift to each person who actually makes a minimum $10 donation (in US, Canadian, Australian or New Zealand dollars, or 5 UK Pounds, or 5 Euros) to help this ministry to survive. The $10 / 5 Pound / 5 Euro minimum is required because it is the "break-even" cost of producing, handling and mailing the CD - amounts less than $10 / 5 Pounds / 5 Euros are therefore not a donation to this ministry but actually cause an unaffordable financial loss to the author.

The Daily Bible Study CD functions with Windows 98, ME, 2000 and XP. The directly-readable CD is designed to be easily and instantly portable from computer to computer. The contents are formatted to appear the same as the online Daily Bible Study web site and will automatically open by means of your computer's standard browser. Complete instructions are included with the CD.

Making a donation to Daily Bible Study is simple and easy
Donations are accepted in US, Canadian, Australian or New Zealand dollars, or British Pounds, or Euros, payable by personal check from your local bank - the easiest and preferred method of most people. We are able to accept regular personal checks payable from any bank in the US (in US dollars), Canada (in Canadian dollars), the United Kingdom (in Pounds or Euros), Australia (in Australian dollars), New Zealand (in New Zealand dollars) or Europe (in Euros) - write the check exactly same as if it were to someone local.
Donations may also be made by means of an International postal money order (e.g. US domestic postal money orders marked "Negotiable Only In The US and Possessions" are void in Canada).

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Key-Way Publishing
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Your CD should arrive in about 2 weeks after the day that you mailed your donation i.e. 1 week for your donation to arrive after you mailed it, then 1 week for your thank you CD to travel to you.

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God bless you!