Hebrews 11:19 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Accounting that God, &c.— Reasoning, that God, &c. Doddridge. Archbishop Tillotson observes, that Abraham's faith was in this respect the more admirable, as, so far as we can learn, there never had been one single instance of a resurrection from the dead in or before the days of Abraham; "whose will," says Heylin, "made a full oblation of his son: his obedience was consummate, and his heart, if we may so speak, was at all the expence of sacrifice." The word παραβολη, rendered figure, is literally a parable, a mode of information either by words or actions, which consists in putting one thing for another. Now in a writer who regarded this commanded action as a representative information of the redemption of mankind, nothing could be more fine or easy than this expression. For though Abraham did not indeed receive Isaac restored to life after a real dissolution, yet the son being in this action to represent Christ suffering death for the sins of the world, when the father brought him safe from mount Moriah after three days, (during which the son was in a state of condemnation to death,) the father plainly received him under the character of Christ's representative, as restored from the dead. For as his being brought to the mount, his being bound, and laid on the altar, figured the sufferings and death of Christ; so his being taken from thence alive, as properly figured Christ's resurrection from the dead. With the highest propriety therefore and elegance of speech, might Abraham be said to receive Isaac from the dead in a parable or representation. See Parkhurst on the word Παραβαλη.