In The Guide for the Perplexed, Maimonides argues that the story of the binding of Isaac contains two 'great notions'. The thought of actually killing Isaac never crossed their minds. Though readers of this parashah throughout the generations have been disturbed, even horrified, by the Akedah, there was no miscommunication between God and Abraham. Citing the Prophet Jeremiah's exhortation against child sacrifice (Chapter 19), they state unequivocally that such behavior 'never crossed God’s mind', referring specifically to the sacrificial slaughter of Isaac. This is precisely how the sages of the Talmud (Taanit 4a) understood the Akedah.
God's commandment to Abraham was very specific, and Abraham understood it very precisely: Isaac was to be 'raised up as an offering', and God would use the opportunity to teach humankind, once and for all, that human sacrifice, child sacrifice, is not acceptable.
Isaac's death was never a possibility - not as far as Abraham was concerned, and not as far as God was concerned. Rabbi Ari Kahn (on the Orthodox Union website) elaborates this view as follows: In The Binding of Isaac, Religious Murders & Kabbalah, Lippman Bodoff argues that Abraham never intended to actually sacrifice his son, and that he had faith that God had no intention that he do so. Mosaic on the floor of Beth Alpha depicting the Akedah
