The Season 2, Episode 11 episode of Sleepy Hollow is titled “Akeda” and provides a very succinct view of the show’s premise, its mythos, its worldview, its theology.
Those familiar with Jewish theology will recognize the term Akeda aka ‘Akedah, etc. as referring to the binding of Isaac. This refers to when, as recorded in Genesis 22, YHVH commands Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac:
And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham: and he said, Behold, here I am. And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of. And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and clave the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up, and went unto the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass; and I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife; and they went both of them together. And Isaac spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father: and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering? And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering: so they went both of them together. And they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood. And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son. And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I. 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. And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son. And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovahjireh: as it is said to this day, In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen.
And the angel of the Lord called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time, and said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, for because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son: That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies; and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice.
There is a lot of symbolism here which I elucidate elsewhere as I did some extensive research in response to the Muslims who claim that Abraham has told to kill Ishmael rather than Isaac; see Who Was Abraham Told to Sacrifice, Isaac?
What Sleepy Hollow did within the Akeda episode is to expose their anti-Judeo-Christian Gnosticism. Now, Gnosticism is inherently anti-Judeo-Christian and the term Gnostic Christianity makes about as much sense as the term vegan cannibal. Consider any and every Judeo-Christian doctrine and Gnosticism turns is upside down, inside out and backwards.
In short, Gnosticism considers the realm of spirit to be pure and the physical realm corrupt thus, whoever created the physical realm must be corrupt. In other words, the God of the Bible, YHVH, is corrupt since He created the physical realm. With YHVH as the “bad guy,” satan, in the form of the illuminating serpent, becomes the “good guy” as he liberated us from the oppressive YHVH by urging us to rebel against Him. This same story has come down to us in various forms such as the one wherein Prometheus brings fire (technology) to humanity against the wished of Zeus; see here for details.
Thus, Sleepy Hollow is anti-Judeo-Christian even whilst playing off of Judeo-Christian themes. Within the show, one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse was raised from a 200 year long occult-sleep-spell by Moloch. Within the show, Moloch resides in the parallel dimension called Purgatory and is described as “the God Demon of Child Sacrifice.” Yet, at the end of the Akeda episode, this same horseman Jeremy Crane aka Henry aka War.
Now, one of the problems with our pop-occulture and media is biblical illiteracy so that as you read various articles about Sleepy Hollow and this episode in particular you realize that the authors know not of what they speak. For example, may state that Moloch is a character from John Milton’s Paradise Lost. Yet, pray tell, whence did Milton get that name? From the Bible. The Bible describes Moloch aka Molech as an abominable idol of the Ammonites and Phoenicians to which children were sacrificed.
When you consider texts such Leviticus chapter 18 chapter 20, 1 Kings chapter 11, 2 Kings chapter 23 and Jeremiah chapter 32 you will learn that children were burned to death to this idol and that YHVH utterly condemns any such practice being done.
It is rather odd that within a culture, the current USA’s, that approves of child sacrifice as it is legal and supposedly ethical a pop-occultural show would condemn it. Sure, in the USA child sacrifice is cleaned up, out of sight and out of mind and performed within the sterile offices of personages that are for some odd reason allowed to be called “doctors” but it is still that which it is; child sacrifice.
The bottom line is that the Akeda episode layers metaphors. On the surface the bad guy Moloch who commands child sacrifice is killed and the audience is glad of it. However, within the episode’s context of Genesis 22’s Akeda/binding of Isaac; it is YHVH who is being condemned. Moreover, when Crane/Henry/War kills Moloch he states, “For any man willing to sacrifice his child should die. As should any god!” This pertains to the Christian doctrine of Jesus, God’s Son (and God the Son), being sent, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
Thus, the show is, in reality, depicting not merely the death of the idolatrous abomination Demon God, Moloch but the death of God; YHVH.
They turn YHVH, the God of the Bible, into a demon (a very Gnostic view) and condemn YHVH to death for sending Jesus to die for our sins. Yet, there are three main factors to consider: 1) Bing premised on secularism and/or Gnosticism; they provide no premise upon which to condemn anything at all. 2) Jesus was not sacrificed to God by human, upon an altar, so as to appease God, etc.
3) Rather, Jesus was a God sacrifice for humans. Indeed, God sent His Son and in keeping with the perfectly harmonious nature of the Trinitarian God, the Son gave His life willingly, “No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father” (John 10:18).
Overall, the Akeda episode exposes Sleepy Hollow as neo-Gnostic anti-Judeo-Christian and this is discernable by taking its own context as is and discerning via a little understanding of Gnostic theology.
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