<aside> 🚧 This page tries to cover too much information. At some point, I will break it in to smaller pieces to dive deeper into the many facets of Abraham and Lot’s complicated stories.
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<aside> 📁 Table of Contents
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Back to Genesis
<aside> 📅 This page was originally posted on my Blogger version of the blog on June 30, 2015 The content below has a few minor tweaks for clarity, and additional references, and some updated information.
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Abram, whose name is later changed to Abraham, is known as the father of many nations. It is through him that one of the most important covenants God bestowed upon man is given. He begins the official patriarchy of the Israelites; it is from his covenant and through his seed that the 12 tribes of Israel are produced. Though he is not perfect and makes many mistakes, God shows both mercy and patience with Abraham in order to bless him with favor.
From Shem to Noah, to Seth, to Adam, we can trace Abraham's lineage all the way back based on the information given to us in Genesis 11. Estimated years of birth for Abraham include 2166 BC,[1] 1996 BC,[2] and 1946 BC.[3] Abraham is the son of Terah—a distant descendant of Shem—and has two brothers (Nahor and Haran). Haran dies, presumably at a young age since he dies before their father. Haran's son Lot (Abraham's nephew) travels with Abraham and comes into play during the judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah and the Battle of the Kings. Since Abraham did not have children until late in life, and Haran died early in life, Abraham might have taken on a fatherly role with Lot.
The first bit of traveling Abraham does is with his father Terah, his wife Sarai (later called Sarah), and his nephew Lot. We aren't told why Nahor, Abraham’s only living brother at this time, chooses to stay. Abraham and his family leave Ur and journey to Canaan (named for Ham's son Canaan) and end up in a city called Haran. It is noted in the footnotes of The Holman KJV Study Bible that the Hebrew words for Haran the person and Haran the place are different and probably not related.[1] While in Haran, Abraham is instructed by God to leave his father's house and go to Canaan. After leaving for Canaan, Abraham journeys to Egypt due to famine.[4] Much later, Abraham travels to Gerar.[5] Compared to those mentioned before him, it seems that Abraham did more traveling that the average person of the time.
<aside> 🦶🏽 For reference, Ur was located in what is now called Iraq and Canaan was located in modern Israel. If you were to make this trip today, you could drive from one location to the other in 13 hours.[13] That is farther than I lived from my birthplace/parents’ home when I originally wrote this, but closer than I live now. Of course, Abraham did not have a car and had to travel this distance by foot or on an animal such as a horse or camel. By foot, Google Maps estimates it would take 292 hours (12.167 days) to travel this distance—the terrain was likely different back then, and a different route may have been optimal during Abraham’s day, but this is still a good estimate. Cairo, Egypt is another 8.5 hours South of Jerusalem by car, 141 hours (5.875 days) by foot.[14] ****Abraham covered a remarkable amount of territory.
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Abraham is told six times—Genesis 12:1-3, 13:14-17, 15:4-6, 17:1-4, 17:16-19, 18:9-15—that through the son of his wife Sarah, he will become the father of many nations. Much emphasis is placed on Sarah's inability to conceive and her growing age. The repetition of the promise was a reminder for both Abraham and his wife, as well as future readers of their story, that God's plan never fails and always happens at God's time. Many women today worry about their "biological clock," but Sarah serves to remind us that God's Will will be done regardless of our age.
12 Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also? 13 And the Lord said unto Abraham, Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a child, which am old? 14 Is any thing too hard for the Lord? At the time appointed I will return unto thee, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son.
The last visit God pays to Abraham and Sarah to deliver His message, He comes with 2 angels under the veil of men. Like Abraham, Sarah laughs at God's promise, this reappears in the name of their son Issac, which means "he laughs."[1] Throughout the course of Abraham's life, God is constantly reminding Abraham that He will be the father of many nations, and Abraham is constantly doubtful, but Abraham renews the covenant through a burnt offering, presumably to atone for his doubt.
God tells Abraham that if the grains of dust on the Earth can be numbered then Abraham's seed will be numbered. God repeats this in Genesis 15 using the stars instead to illustrate the vastness of the number of Abraham's seed. It is obvious that God is using such large quantities to illustrate the vastness of Abraham's seed, but let’s look at some numbers anyway. The two largest "nations" born from Abraham are the Hebrews (or Jews) and Christians. While Christians may not be physically descendant from Abraham, Christ is and it is through Christ that we are Christians, thus we are spiritual descendants of Abraham. Currently there are approximately 2.18 billion Christians[8] and between 13.5-15.5 million Jews.[6] These numbers do not include the generation that died during the 4000 years between Abraham and now! There are just over 7 billion people on the planet today,[7] which means just less than 1/3 of the population is a descendant of Abraham. Islam is generally considered an Abrahamic religion, though it is debated by some whether Muslims worship the God of Abraham.[9] The answer to that debate is immaterial because regardless, Islam stems from Abraham’s first son, Ishmael, thus adherents of Islam would still be considered descendants of Abraham. If one adds Muslims to the count of spiritual descendants of Abraham, then another 1.6 billion people are added which bumps the percentage to just over 50% of the world! Also, one has to remember that Arabs are descendants of Ishmael (and possibly some of Abraham’s other sons, like Midian), regardless of religious affiliation; this still adds many to the number of Abraham's descendants.
And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth: so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered.