J is at a lovely age (most of the time). His English vocabulary is rapidly expanding - as is his Turkish vocabulary, although not to the same extent. His running commentary on life certainly makes life more interesting and frequently entertaining. Occasionally L and I find ourselves trying desperately not to laugh.
Here's a few highlights from the last few weeks:
"Thank you for my beautiful tea Mummy!"
"S is a terror!" (L is to blame for that one, not me!)
Me: "We're going to the zoo! What do you think we're going to see?"
J: "A pterodactyl?"
[J announces to a Turkish visitor at our house] "I'm making bacon! This is my bacon! I like bacon sandwiches!"
Me: "What do you think Gilly Babes [my mum] would like for her birthday?
J: "A dumper truck!"
[J trying to teach S to talk] "Say 'Thomas [the tank engine] and friends'"
"This is my train. His name is Trainy."
[J to S] "Don't knock my tower over, little one."
Monday, 19 November 2018
Saturday, 10 November 2018
What temperature does water boil at?
What temperature does water boil at?
When I lived in the UK, I thought the answer to that question was fairly straightforward. And though I might have had an inkling that it wasn't quite that simple scientifically, it didn't really matter to me.
However, where we live now, water boils at just over 96 degrees Celsius. We live at a height of about 1100m above sea level - and can see mountains from our house and neighbourhood! To put that into context, Snowdon is 1085m above sea level. So we live at a higher altitude than the highest mountain in England and Wales (though not quite as high as Ben Nevis in Scotland, which is 1345m). We look out onto a 'small' mountain from our flat and L and I have been talking about walking up it one day. But our 'small' mountain is about 1800m high. Whereas the huge mountain that we can see if we walk about ten minutes from our flat is just over 3900m high.
As far as I understand it, the simple explanation for why water boils at a lower temperature here is that as altitude increases, atmospheric pressure decreases. Lower pressure causes water to evaporate more quickly and so water boils at a lower temperature.
To be honest, relative to the rest of the world we don't live at a particularly high altitude, just relative to the UK!
Living at this altitude doesn't actually make any difference to our daily lives (although L did try suggesting once that the reason he ached more after a run was maybe due to the altitude, especially as he ran half way up our 'small' mountain. Though I'm pretty sure it had more to do with the fact that he hadn't been doing much running for a while).
However, it does impact cooking and baking. Water never reaches 100 degrees Celsius, so foods cooked in water (e.g. pasta and vegetables) can take a few minutes longer to cook. And according to what I've read, rising agents such as yeast, baking powder or bicarbonate of soda can create a larger rising effect while additional liquid might be needed in baking recipes to compensate for the faster evaporation.
I'm not sure I really notice the effects on cooking and baking that much, but it's nice to have a scientific excuse to fall back on if something doesn't turn out right: "oh, the recipe was written to be cooked at sea level so I probably need to adjust it a bit next time to take into account our altitude."
Monday, 5 November 2018
Seat belts, car seats and culture
We have a car! There are several reasons I am glad we have a car but probably the biggest reason I'm grateful for our car is that our children can now travel safely in car seats in our car.
In the UK, the law regarding car seats for children is strict and I think generally accepted. Before a newborn baby leaves hospital, nurses will often check that there is a car seat. Failing to transport children, especially small children, safely in a car is usually seen as not only illegal but a moral failing of a parent, a form of neglect. I'm generalising, I'm sure there are parents in the UK who don't use car seats for their children, but on the whole the use of car seats for small children seems to have entered the collective consciousness in the UK as one of those things that you really should do. A similar thing could also be said about wearing seatbelts; over several decades the introduction of new laws and hard-hitting television adverts has helped increase seat belt usage and convince the vast majority of the UK public as to the necessity of wearing seatbelts.
In Turkey, the law is clear. Everyone in a car must wear a seatbelt and children under 150cm and less than 35kg must be seated in an appropriate child car seat. And children are not legally permitted to travel in the front of the car.
However, it is fair to say that here, although the law may be clear, it is flouted regularly. Although I have seen some car seats in cars here, it is very common for children to sit on the laps of parents (more generally in the back, sometimes in the front) or to sit by themselves in the back, without car seats and often without seat belts. It is also common for the maximum occupancy of the car to be exceeded, sometimes considerably.
This has put us in an interesting position. I don't like the fact that we've done it, but we have, when necessary, taken our children in cars without car seats. This was a short term measure (until we got a car) and wherever possible, we have gone out of our way to try and make sure we travelled safely. However, while Turks are usually very concerned about children's safety and wellbeing, from the people I've encountered here, there often seems to be a lack of understanding about the importance of both car seats and seatbelts.
We had anticipated that some people here wouldn't understand the priority we put on our children travelling in car seats and that was a major factor in deciding to get a seven seater car - we wanted to be able to help by giving people lifts to meetings but still wanted J and S to be safe. However, when we first got our car, we hadn't really thought through what we would do if we were giving lifts to people who didn't use seat belts (never mind car seats), which led to at least one uncomfortable situation where we had children (not ours) in our car who were not safely restrained. After checking with a couple of people, we've learned that we can politely request people in our car to wear a seatbelt without causing offence and now do so. We also don't take for granted that everyone will automatically wear their seatbelts and check; just the other day I had to remind a 17 year old to wear his seat belt. Car seats are a trickier issue because we really would cause offence if we refused to take somebody because there was no car seat. In addition, car seats are expensive. So we're still thinking through how to approach this one.
This whole issue has brought up bigger questions though. Generally people like us learn to think very carefully and wait to make judgements on any cultural issue. We have to appreciate that different cultural practices come from different cultural values, and usually that's fine. Different, and maybe sometimes a bit weird to us, but fine. I understand that Turkish culture is different from British/Western culture and just as there are both good and really terrible things that come about due to Western culture, there are similar good and bad things that arise from Turkish culture.
So we understand and accept that some things in this culture are just different and maybe a bit uncomfortable but depending on your cultural viewpoint, are not by themselves morally bad. For example, when I first heard that traditionally a woman would need to get permission from both her father and her older brother to get married, I was shocked. Why should an older brother get a say? But in this culture, an older brother has important responsibilities regarding his family, and as I live longer in this culture, I can appreciate the roots and logic of the practice.
But what do you do when there is something in the culture (in this case, a lack of awareness of the life-saving importance of seat belts and car seats) that you think it just plain wrong? Do we accept it anyway - we are guests in this country, after all - and just keep our thoughts to ourselves? Do we try and explain what we think? If so, how do we do that in a sensitive away, without causing unnecessary offence? How would we feel if a foreigner who'd lived a couple of years in the UK started trying to explain why something that British people were doing was wrong and should be done differently?
I don't have easy answers to these and we're still wrestling through with some of these questions. I think that one of the major factors has to be how important something is. Some people in Turkey believe that eating ice cream or going barefoot indoors in winter will make you ill. To be honest, those issues are not important enough that I'm going to worry too much about them. And if someone tells me my children should wear socks or they'll get ill, I'll happily explain why I don't believe that, but I'm not going to insist on converting everyone I meet to my viewpoint. However, seat belts and car seats are important and can literally be life or death issues. So that has to have an impact.
I've mentioned that we now have a practice of asking everyone in our car to wear a seat belt. I think that, given the right moment, I would take an opportunity to explain why seat belts (and car seats) are so important. And if I knew someone who was going to have a baby and I suspected that they were not thinking of buying a car seat, I might gently broach the subject with them and ask if they were going to get one. And undoubtedly as I spend longer in this culture, I might learn to take a different approach.
In thinking this through though, one of the points that has been going around my head has been how would I respond if I lived in the UK and a non-British person tried to tell me about something that many/most British people do which they believed was wrong and dangerous. Would I have the humility to listen to them? Could I conceive that I, and most of my country, might be wrong on an issue? Or if I was in the minority and happened to agree with the foreigner on the issue they were telling me about, would I be prepared to use my non-foreigner status in the UK to try and convince other British people that they should change their minds on a particular issue?
In the UK, the law regarding car seats for children is strict and I think generally accepted. Before a newborn baby leaves hospital, nurses will often check that there is a car seat. Failing to transport children, especially small children, safely in a car is usually seen as not only illegal but a moral failing of a parent, a form of neglect. I'm generalising, I'm sure there are parents in the UK who don't use car seats for their children, but on the whole the use of car seats for small children seems to have entered the collective consciousness in the UK as one of those things that you really should do. A similar thing could also be said about wearing seatbelts; over several decades the introduction of new laws and hard-hitting television adverts has helped increase seat belt usage and convince the vast majority of the UK public as to the necessity of wearing seatbelts.
In Turkey, the law is clear. Everyone in a car must wear a seatbelt and children under 150cm and less than 35kg must be seated in an appropriate child car seat. And children are not legally permitted to travel in the front of the car.
However, it is fair to say that here, although the law may be clear, it is flouted regularly. Although I have seen some car seats in cars here, it is very common for children to sit on the laps of parents (more generally in the back, sometimes in the front) or to sit by themselves in the back, without car seats and often without seat belts. It is also common for the maximum occupancy of the car to be exceeded, sometimes considerably.
This has put us in an interesting position. I don't like the fact that we've done it, but we have, when necessary, taken our children in cars without car seats. This was a short term measure (until we got a car) and wherever possible, we have gone out of our way to try and make sure we travelled safely. However, while Turks are usually very concerned about children's safety and wellbeing, from the people I've encountered here, there often seems to be a lack of understanding about the importance of both car seats and seatbelts.
We had anticipated that some people here wouldn't understand the priority we put on our children travelling in car seats and that was a major factor in deciding to get a seven seater car - we wanted to be able to help by giving people lifts to meetings but still wanted J and S to be safe. However, when we first got our car, we hadn't really thought through what we would do if we were giving lifts to people who didn't use seat belts (never mind car seats), which led to at least one uncomfortable situation where we had children (not ours) in our car who were not safely restrained. After checking with a couple of people, we've learned that we can politely request people in our car to wear a seatbelt without causing offence and now do so. We also don't take for granted that everyone will automatically wear their seatbelts and check; just the other day I had to remind a 17 year old to wear his seat belt. Car seats are a trickier issue because we really would cause offence if we refused to take somebody because there was no car seat. In addition, car seats are expensive. So we're still thinking through how to approach this one.
This whole issue has brought up bigger questions though. Generally people like us learn to think very carefully and wait to make judgements on any cultural issue. We have to appreciate that different cultural practices come from different cultural values, and usually that's fine. Different, and maybe sometimes a bit weird to us, but fine. I understand that Turkish culture is different from British/Western culture and just as there are both good and really terrible things that come about due to Western culture, there are similar good and bad things that arise from Turkish culture.
So we understand and accept that some things in this culture are just different and maybe a bit uncomfortable but depending on your cultural viewpoint, are not by themselves morally bad. For example, when I first heard that traditionally a woman would need to get permission from both her father and her older brother to get married, I was shocked. Why should an older brother get a say? But in this culture, an older brother has important responsibilities regarding his family, and as I live longer in this culture, I can appreciate the roots and logic of the practice.
But what do you do when there is something in the culture (in this case, a lack of awareness of the life-saving importance of seat belts and car seats) that you think it just plain wrong? Do we accept it anyway - we are guests in this country, after all - and just keep our thoughts to ourselves? Do we try and explain what we think? If so, how do we do that in a sensitive away, without causing unnecessary offence? How would we feel if a foreigner who'd lived a couple of years in the UK started trying to explain why something that British people were doing was wrong and should be done differently?
I don't have easy answers to these and we're still wrestling through with some of these questions. I think that one of the major factors has to be how important something is. Some people in Turkey believe that eating ice cream or going barefoot indoors in winter will make you ill. To be honest, those issues are not important enough that I'm going to worry too much about them. And if someone tells me my children should wear socks or they'll get ill, I'll happily explain why I don't believe that, but I'm not going to insist on converting everyone I meet to my viewpoint. However, seat belts and car seats are important and can literally be life or death issues. So that has to have an impact.
I've mentioned that we now have a practice of asking everyone in our car to wear a seat belt. I think that, given the right moment, I would take an opportunity to explain why seat belts (and car seats) are so important. And if I knew someone who was going to have a baby and I suspected that they were not thinking of buying a car seat, I might gently broach the subject with them and ask if they were going to get one. And undoubtedly as I spend longer in this culture, I might learn to take a different approach.
In thinking this through though, one of the points that has been going around my head has been how would I respond if I lived in the UK and a non-British person tried to tell me about something that many/most British people do which they believed was wrong and dangerous. Would I have the humility to listen to them? Could I conceive that I, and most of my country, might be wrong on an issue? Or if I was in the minority and happened to agree with the foreigner on the issue they were telling me about, would I be prepared to use my non-foreigner status in the UK to try and convince other British people that they should change their minds on a particular issue?
Monday, 15 October 2018
Paragliders
In our new flat, our balcony looks out onto a small mountain called Ali Dağı (which literally means 'Ali Mountain'). We live pretty much at the foot of it and if you look out the balcony, you can see the summit. Often we can see paragliders taking off from the top - J and S (especially S) love watching them.
The paraglider landing spot is an area of grass about 1km from our flat, with a walking/running track around it. We often head there on a Sunday afternoon for a quick walk and run around and to watch the paragliders landing.
The photos below give a fairly accurate representation of what it is like. Because not only is the paraglider landing place used for paragliders landing, at a weekend it is also full of people who've come to sit outside, kick a ball around, have a picnic and enjoy being outside on a warm afternoon. Yesterday I saw someone who had obviously ordered takeaway to be delivered to the landing place (and I thought what a great idea!).
But I do feel sorry for the paragliders. It's not enough to try and land a paraglider (which seems to require quite a bit of space and quite a lot of skill), they must also negotiate the groups of people literally sitting all over the field. Some people even bring camping chairs. And many people sit there often apparently oblivious to the paragliders landing around them, with no intention of moving whatsoever!!
I've never seen a collision yet, though I have heard paragliders shouting at people to watch out.
The paraglider landing spot is an area of grass about 1km from our flat, with a walking/running track around it. We often head there on a Sunday afternoon for a quick walk and run around and to watch the paragliders landing.
The photos below give a fairly accurate representation of what it is like. Because not only is the paraglider landing place used for paragliders landing, at a weekend it is also full of people who've come to sit outside, kick a ball around, have a picnic and enjoy being outside on a warm afternoon. Yesterday I saw someone who had obviously ordered takeaway to be delivered to the landing place (and I thought what a great idea!).
But I do feel sorry for the paragliders. It's not enough to try and land a paraglider (which seems to require quite a bit of space and quite a lot of skill), they must also negotiate the groups of people literally sitting all over the field. Some people even bring camping chairs. And many people sit there often apparently oblivious to the paragliders landing around them, with no intention of moving whatsoever!!
I've never seen a collision yet, though I have heard paragliders shouting at people to watch out.
The side of Ali Dağı is on the left hand side of the photo, and the paraglider can be seen close to it.
Coming into land on a field full of people
Over everyone's heads
Zoomed in
And just about to land
Saturday, 6 October 2018
Books I've read - Oct 2018
Being back in the UK over summer was a great opportunity to catch up on some reading. Here's a few of the books I've read (or finally finished!) and appreciated over the last few months.
The Imperfect Disciple - Jared Wilson
This book is subtitled 'grace for people who can't get their act together' and it aims to be a discipleship book that is honest about how messy real life can get, even for Christians. I loved the relentless focus on the Good News and reiteration of the concept that we never graduate from the Good News, and found Jared Wilson's conversational writing style very easy to read and engaging. However, it is quite American (a few pop culture references passed me by) and I can imagine that some readers could find the informal writing style a little tricky to get used to. But I loved it.
A couple of quotes that stood out to me:
“There is more security with Christ in the middle of a stormy sea than without Christ in the warm stillness of our bathtub.”
"It can be ok when pieces of our wish dreams come true, and some of us might actually get the whole shebang, but it's also dangerous to dwell in that imaginary world, because when our joy is placed anywhere but in Christ, we are setting ourselves up for incredible, crushing disappointment and spiritual and emotional disaster."
NB: I found that this book was significantly cheaper to purchase on Kindle. The downside is I can't lend it to anyone, the upside is that I didn't have to wait for someone coming across to bring me it or pay for shipping.
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows
This is a novel written in the form of letters written from one character to the other (this form of writing is called 'epistolary'. Who knew?). It's set just after World War Two and focuses on the impact of the Nazi occupation of the Channel Islands. I really enjoyed it as a light read. Apparently there's a film adaptation, although I haven't seen that.
Old Wives' Tales - Clare Heath-Whyte
Old Wives' Tales is a collection of short biographies of eighteenth century women e.g. Charles and John Wesley's wives. I really appreciated the way that the author didn't present these women as super-spiritual, flawless heroines but was realistic about their characters.
The Optician of Lampedusa - Emma Jane Kirby
This is a fictional telling of a true story, the 2013 Lampedusa boat tragedy where a boat carrying over 500 people sank. Only 155 people survived; only 5 out of 80 women on the boat survived and no children under the age of 12 survived. As might be expected, this book is harrowing but it is also brilliant, written from the perspective of an 'ordinary' Italian who was on the fishing boat that happened to be first on the scene of the capsized boat. I really recommend it.
Every Man in This Village is a Liar - Megan Stack
Megan Stack is a journalist who covered several different Middle Eastern countries after 9/11 and this is her account of her experiences. It's a sad book, as most books that cover the Middle East are. But this type of book is also a necessary book. I'm very conscious that I live such a sheltered, privileged life in contrast to most of the world's population so I try and make sure that I read some books that help me know a little bit more about what life is like for most of the world.
Wonder - R J Palacio
This is a children's book, according to Amazon recommended for children ages 8-12 years so it was kind of an accident that I read it. But I actually really enjoyed it (the sign of a good children's book is when adults and children enjoy reading it, right?). It's about a boy with a severe facial difference who starts school for the first time aged 10/11 years and just wants to be accepted as an ordinary boy. I'm going to add it to my list of books to read to J when he's a bit older.
The Imperfect Disciple - Jared Wilson
This book is subtitled 'grace for people who can't get their act together' and it aims to be a discipleship book that is honest about how messy real life can get, even for Christians. I loved the relentless focus on the Good News and reiteration of the concept that we never graduate from the Good News, and found Jared Wilson's conversational writing style very easy to read and engaging. However, it is quite American (a few pop culture references passed me by) and I can imagine that some readers could find the informal writing style a little tricky to get used to. But I loved it.
A couple of quotes that stood out to me:
“There is more security with Christ in the middle of a stormy sea than without Christ in the warm stillness of our bathtub.”
"It can be ok when pieces of our wish dreams come true, and some of us might actually get the whole shebang, but it's also dangerous to dwell in that imaginary world, because when our joy is placed anywhere but in Christ, we are setting ourselves up for incredible, crushing disappointment and spiritual and emotional disaster."
NB: I found that this book was significantly cheaper to purchase on Kindle. The downside is I can't lend it to anyone, the upside is that I didn't have to wait for someone coming across to bring me it or pay for shipping.
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society - Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows
This is a novel written in the form of letters written from one character to the other (this form of writing is called 'epistolary'. Who knew?). It's set just after World War Two and focuses on the impact of the Nazi occupation of the Channel Islands. I really enjoyed it as a light read. Apparently there's a film adaptation, although I haven't seen that.
Old Wives' Tales - Clare Heath-Whyte
Old Wives' Tales is a collection of short biographies of eighteenth century women e.g. Charles and John Wesley's wives. I really appreciated the way that the author didn't present these women as super-spiritual, flawless heroines but was realistic about their characters.
The Optician of Lampedusa - Emma Jane Kirby
This is a fictional telling of a true story, the 2013 Lampedusa boat tragedy where a boat carrying over 500 people sank. Only 155 people survived; only 5 out of 80 women on the boat survived and no children under the age of 12 survived. As might be expected, this book is harrowing but it is also brilliant, written from the perspective of an 'ordinary' Italian who was on the fishing boat that happened to be first on the scene of the capsized boat. I really recommend it.
Every Man in This Village is a Liar - Megan Stack
Megan Stack is a journalist who covered several different Middle Eastern countries after 9/11 and this is her account of her experiences. It's a sad book, as most books that cover the Middle East are. But this type of book is also a necessary book. I'm very conscious that I live such a sheltered, privileged life in contrast to most of the world's population so I try and make sure that I read some books that help me know a little bit more about what life is like for most of the world.
Wonder - R J Palacio
This is a children's book, according to Amazon recommended for children ages 8-12 years so it was kind of an accident that I read it. But I actually really enjoyed it (the sign of a good children's book is when adults and children enjoy reading it, right?). It's about a boy with a severe facial difference who starts school for the first time aged 10/11 years and just wants to be accepted as an ordinary boy. I'm going to add it to my list of books to read to J when he's a bit older.
Saturday, 22 September 2018
Settling in
One month ago we arrived in our new city. On one hand it feels like we've been here ages, on the other hand we feel like we've just arrived.
It feels like we've managed to find some semblance of routine and normality fairly quickly. I do Turkish study first thing in a morning while L gets the boys up, fed, dressed etc. Then I look after the boys during the day while L does Turkish study, computer programming, job researching and hunting.
We are enjoying having a choice of parks within a 1 - 10 minute walking radius - all with grass and trees next to them! We're meeting neighbours as well - news of our moving-in has obviously spread through the building as every neighbour we meet seems to already know of us. It's not every day you get a foreign family moving into your building in this part of the world!
We are so glad to be out of Istanbul but at the same time we miss our friends and the community that we had in Istanbul. Moving from one city to another in a country that isn't your home country is an odd thing. We're used to living in a different country from our friends and family in the UK so although there are certainly painful moments saying goodbye to them still, it's a familiar set of emotions. But now we have also gained a whole new set of people to miss, and the routines and life that we shared with them. We knew when we went to Istanbul that we would only be there for a couple of years but we consciously made friends knowing that our time in Istanbul would be temporary. And I'm so grateful to our friends in Istanbul, who knew that we wouldn't be staying long term but still invested in friendships with us.
But we are not pining for life in Istanbul. We love having a bigger flat and not living in an area so dense that it was sometimes claustrophobic. We have been so welcomed by our believing family here and it is a privilege to join with them. Having moved to a much more conservative city, we weren't sure what kind of reception we'd get from our neighbours but everyone so far has been very friendly (thankfully we live in an area that is probably more welcoming and tolerant than other areas).
God is good :-)
It feels like we've managed to find some semblance of routine and normality fairly quickly. I do Turkish study first thing in a morning while L gets the boys up, fed, dressed etc. Then I look after the boys during the day while L does Turkish study, computer programming, job researching and hunting.
We are enjoying having a choice of parks within a 1 - 10 minute walking radius - all with grass and trees next to them! We're meeting neighbours as well - news of our moving-in has obviously spread through the building as every neighbour we meet seems to already know of us. It's not every day you get a foreign family moving into your building in this part of the world!
We are so glad to be out of Istanbul but at the same time we miss our friends and the community that we had in Istanbul. Moving from one city to another in a country that isn't your home country is an odd thing. We're used to living in a different country from our friends and family in the UK so although there are certainly painful moments saying goodbye to them still, it's a familiar set of emotions. But now we have also gained a whole new set of people to miss, and the routines and life that we shared with them. We knew when we went to Istanbul that we would only be there for a couple of years but we consciously made friends knowing that our time in Istanbul would be temporary. And I'm so grateful to our friends in Istanbul, who knew that we wouldn't be staying long term but still invested in friendships with us.
But we are not pining for life in Istanbul. We love having a bigger flat and not living in an area so dense that it was sometimes claustrophobic. We have been so welcomed by our believing family here and it is a privilege to join with them. Having moved to a much more conservative city, we weren't sure what kind of reception we'd get from our neighbours but everyone so far has been very friendly (thankfully we live in an area that is probably more welcoming and tolerant than other areas).
God is good :-)
The Feast of the Sacrifice - Part 3
This is Part 3 of a short series of blog posts on the Feast of the Sacrifice. You can read Part 1 here and Part 2 here.
Kurban Bayramı, the Feast of the Sacrifice or Eid al-Adha, remembers Abraham's almost sacrificing of his son before he is stopped by the Angel of the Lord. The biblical narrative can be found in Genesis 22. The Muslim version differs slightly and is also a lot shorter.
I don't think I'm alone in finding this account uncomfortable reading. It seems like God tests Abraham by asking him to sacrifice what he holds dearest and when Abraham is literally about to do so, he is stopped. He sees a ram caught in a thicket, which he sacrifices instead. And later, in the book of Hebrews, Abraham is commended for his faith in offering Isaac as a sacrifice.
A quick look at Wikipedia confirms that there have been many different Jewish, Christian, Muslim and modern scholars who have written about this account. I don't want to get into the details of the account here but I do want to use it as an example of what we can do when we come across parts of the Bible that, even after we've looked at the issue from every angle, still don't give us answers that perfectly satisfy us and might still leave us a bit uncomfortable.
What it comes down to is what lens we view the world through. If we view the world and history through our own personal lens of what we think is right and just, there's going to be a lot of unanswered questions. There will also be unanswered questions about our lens; what right do we have to assume that our perspective is accurate? Where our sense of justice and morality originate from?
The better option is to look at accounts such as Abraham's near-sacrifice of Isaac through the lens of the cross. I don't really understand why God tested Abraham in this way but I do know that this event points forward to someone else who willingly went to be sacrificed, the Father's own beloved Son. And when he was nailed to a cross, there was no one to stay the Roman guard's hand, no ram caught in a bush. Looking at the account of Abraham and Isaac through the lens of the cross does not give us any magic answers but it does show us that God has already demonstrated the depth of his love for us, a depth that we cannot fathom or understand. So we can have complete confidence in God even while we don't fully understand his intentions and plans.
It also reminds me that God is not my little pet God, who always acts in the way I would like him to and whose every action I can perfectly understand and rationalise. He is the Almighty God, and his ways are not my ways - thankfully, because my ideas, plans and reasoning is not flawless and are usually mixed up with all kinds of motives. But God is love, he is good, he is sovereign and he works all things for his glory and the good of those who love him. When he sent his Son to this world, he proved beyond all doubt how much he loves his children. So we can trust him enough to leave our unanswered questions with him.
Kurban Bayramı, the Feast of the Sacrifice or Eid al-Adha, remembers Abraham's almost sacrificing of his son before he is stopped by the Angel of the Lord. The biblical narrative can be found in Genesis 22. The Muslim version differs slightly and is also a lot shorter.
I don't think I'm alone in finding this account uncomfortable reading. It seems like God tests Abraham by asking him to sacrifice what he holds dearest and when Abraham is literally about to do so, he is stopped. He sees a ram caught in a thicket, which he sacrifices instead. And later, in the book of Hebrews, Abraham is commended for his faith in offering Isaac as a sacrifice.
A quick look at Wikipedia confirms that there have been many different Jewish, Christian, Muslim and modern scholars who have written about this account. I don't want to get into the details of the account here but I do want to use it as an example of what we can do when we come across parts of the Bible that, even after we've looked at the issue from every angle, still don't give us answers that perfectly satisfy us and might still leave us a bit uncomfortable.
What it comes down to is what lens we view the world through. If we view the world and history through our own personal lens of what we think is right and just, there's going to be a lot of unanswered questions. There will also be unanswered questions about our lens; what right do we have to assume that our perspective is accurate? Where our sense of justice and morality originate from?
The better option is to look at accounts such as Abraham's near-sacrifice of Isaac through the lens of the cross. I don't really understand why God tested Abraham in this way but I do know that this event points forward to someone else who willingly went to be sacrificed, the Father's own beloved Son. And when he was nailed to a cross, there was no one to stay the Roman guard's hand, no ram caught in a bush. Looking at the account of Abraham and Isaac through the lens of the cross does not give us any magic answers but it does show us that God has already demonstrated the depth of his love for us, a depth that we cannot fathom or understand. So we can have complete confidence in God even while we don't fully understand his intentions and plans.
It also reminds me that God is not my little pet God, who always acts in the way I would like him to and whose every action I can perfectly understand and rationalise. He is the Almighty God, and his ways are not my ways - thankfully, because my ideas, plans and reasoning is not flawless and are usually mixed up with all kinds of motives. But God is love, he is good, he is sovereign and he works all things for his glory and the good of those who love him. When he sent his Son to this world, he proved beyond all doubt how much he loves his children. So we can trust him enough to leave our unanswered questions with him.
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