[begats, begats, begats]...
Terah took his son Abram and his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, his son Abram's wife, and they went out together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan; but when they came to Haran, they settled there. The days of Terah were 205 years, and Terah died in Haran.
Now the Lord said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation; and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the Earth shall be blessed."
So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. Abram took his wife Serai and his brother's son Lot, and all the possessions that they had gathered, and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran; and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan.
When they had come to the land of Canaan, Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. Then the Lord appeared to Abram, and said, "To your offspring I will give this land."
So he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him. From there he moved on to the hill country on the east of Bethel, and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east, and there he built an altar to the Lord, and invoked the name of the Lord. And Abram journeyed on by stages toward the Negeb.
3 comments:
"I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the Earth shall be blessed."
There's a paradox I need to think about for a while.
that is quite a paradox ....
I was wondering about what it means that they just got up and moved. My bible commentary talks about the idolatry in Ur. Was Abraham considered an initiate? I don't know.
I see this as: Terah traveled part way towards the land God intended, but stopped short. Abram had to break loose to get on with the project!
To wish anyone well is a blessing; to wish anyone ill is a curse. This special case is here to reassure a people who have gotten around a lot, without necessarily being assured of a friendly welcome...
and the rest is a reminder, that God has not chosen to bless this family merely for their own sakes, but as a means of blessing all God's peoples. Many have remembered, and truly blessed the whole world! Some have tried 'to be like the other nations,' and have shown us all too clearly how that turns out! (So how could we curse them, without cursing ourselves?!)
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