And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering
Which Josephus F1 says was laid upon the ass, and
carried by that; and if so, he took it from thence: but it is
probable it was carried by his two servants, since it was not
more than Isaac himself afterwards carried, as in the next
clause:
and laid [it] upon Isaac his son:
who was a grown man, and able to carry it: in this also he was a
type of Christ, on whom the wood of his cross was laid, and which
he bore when he went to be crucified, ( John 19:17 ) ; and this
wood may be also a figure of our sins laid on him by his Father,
and which he bore in his body on the tree, ( 1 Peter 2:24
) ; and which were like wood to fire, fuel for the wrath of God,
which came down upon him for them:
and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife;
a vessel in one hand, in which fire was to kindle the wood with,
and a knife in the other hand to slay the sacrifice with; the one
to slay his son with, and the other to burn him with; and to
carry these for such purposes must be very trying. This is the
first time we read in Scripture of fire for use, or of a knife.
Some say the first inventor of fire was Prometheus, others
Phoroneus F2, from whence he seems to have his
name; but according to Sanchoniatho F3, the immediate posterity
of Cain first invented it, whose names were light, fire, and
flame; and these, he says, found out the way of generating fire,
by rubbing pieces of wood against each other, and taught men the
use of it. "Knife", in the Hebrew language, has its name from
eating and consuming, as Ben Melech observes; some render it a
"sword" F4, but wrongly, and which has led the
painter into a mistake, to represent Abraham with a sword in his
hand to slay his son:
and they went both of them together;
from the place where they left the young men, to the place where
the sacrifice was to be offered.