Genesis 12:1

Now the Lord had said unto Abram,.... In Ur of the Chaldees, before he came and dwelt in Charran, as seems from Acts 7:2 and so Aben Ezra interprets it; but Jarchi and others think, that what follows

Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee: Now the Lord had said unto Abram.

GENESIS CHAPTER 12 God calls Abram from his own country and kindred to Canaan, . Promises to make of him a great and flourishing nation, and to bless in Christ his seed, ,3. Abram obeys, . God appears to him, and promises to give Canaan to his seed; he builds an altar, . He removes to Beth-el, and there builds an altar, . There being a famine he goes down to Egypt, . He advises Sarai to equivocate, . She is taken into Pharaoh’ s house, . Pharaoh kind to Abram for her sake, . God plagues him because of Sarai, . He calls Abram, and expostulates with him, ,19. Sends him safely away, . The Lord had said, to wit, in Ur of the Chaldees, by comparing , with ; or, did say, again, i.e. renewed the command in Haran, whilst Abram might possibly linger there, as afterwards Lot did in Sodom, longer than he should. But the former interpretation is more probable, because Moses speaks here of that command of God which came to Abram before he was gone from his kindred and father’ s house, and therefore before he came to Haran. And this command was given to Abram either immediately, or by Shem, then the governor of God’ s church. From thy father’ s house; from the family of Nachor, which was now become idolatrous, ; and consequently their society was dangerous and pernicious; and therefore God mercifully snatcheth him as a brand out of the fire. A land that I will show thee; which as yet he nameth not, for the greater trial and exercise of Abram’ s faith and patience: compare .

Genesis 12:1 Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’ s house, unto a land that I will shew thee:Ver. 1. Now the Lord had said to Abram.] But was not this to command him to do that which was against nature? No, but only against corrupt nature, which must be denied, and mortified, or there is no heaven to be had. Father and friends must be hated (that is, not loved, as "Esau have I hated"), where they hang in our light, or stand in our way to keep us from Christ. Get thee out of thy country.] This is a hard saying to flesh and blood; for, Nescio qua natale solum ,& c. But hard or not hard, it must be done, because God bids it; and difficulty, in such a case, doth but whet on heroic spirits, making them the more eager and resolute. It pleased David well to be set to fetch a hundred foreskins of the Philistines. God’ s kingdom must be taken by violence. It is but a delicacy to dream of coming there in a featherbed. Too many, with Joseph, dream of their preferment, but not of their imprisonment. He that will be Christ’ s disciple here, and co-heir hereafter, must deny himself; that is an indispensable duty. Abram was old-excellent at it. And from thy kindred, and father’ s house.] Who set out fair with Abram - as did likewise Orphah with Ruth - but settled in Haran, which was also in Chaldea, not far from Ur, and would go no farther, after the old man’ s death. There they had feathered their nests, gathered substance, and got souls, that is servants; and, therefore, there they would set up their staff, and afterwards turned again to idolatry. Many follow God as Samson did his parents, till he light upon a honeycomb; or as a dog doth his master, till he meet with carrion; and then turn him up. Demas forsook God, and embracing this present world, became afterwards a priest in an idol-temple, as Dorotheus tells us. Unto a land that I will show thee.] Yet told him not whither, till he was upon the way, but "called him to his foot," that is, to follow him, and his direction. Magnus est animus qui se Deo tradidit , saith Seneca. Eundum quocunque Deus vocarit , saith another, etiamsi in ea loca migrandum esset - “ Pigris ubi nulla campis Arbor aestiva recreatur aura: Quod latus mundi nebulae malusque Iupiter urget .”

XII.(1) Now the Lord had said unto Abram.—Heb., And Jehovah said unto Abram. There is no new beginning; but having briefly sketched the family from which Abram sprang, and indicated that he had inherited from them the right of primogeniture, the narrative next proceeds to the primary purpose of the Tôldóth Terah, which is to show how in Abram Jehovah prepared for the fulfilment, through Israel, of the prote-vangelium contained in the promise made to Eve at the fall (Genesis 3:15). The rendering “had said” was doubtless adopted because of St. Stephen’s words (Acts 7:2); but it is the manner of the Biblical narrative to revert to the original starting point. Thy country.—A proof that Abram and his father were no new settlers at Ur, but that the race of Shem had at this time long held sway there, as is now known to have been the case. Thy kindred.—This rendering is supported by Genesis 43:7; but it more probably means thy birthplace. It is the word translated “nativity” in Genesis 11:28. where its meaning is settled by the prefixed “land;” and the sense is probably the same here. If so, the command certainly came to Abram at Ur, though most of the versions suppose that it happened at Haran. A land that I will shew thee.—In Genesis 11:31 it is expressly said that the land was Canaan, but possibly this knowledge was concealed from the patriarch himself for a time, and neither he nor Terah knew on leaving Ur what their final destination would be.

CHAPTER XII God calls Abram to leave Haran and go into Canaan, 1; promises to bless him, and through him all the families of the earth, 2, 3. Abram, Sarai, Lot, and all their household, depart from Canaan, 4, 5; pass through Sichem, 6. God appears to him, and renews the promise, 7. His journey described, 8, 9. On account of a famine in the land he is obliged to go into Egypt, 10. Fearing lest, on account of the beauty of his wife, the Egyptians should kill him, he desires her not to acknowledge that she is his wife, but only his sister, 11-13. Sarai, because of her beauty, is taken into the palace of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, who is very liberal to Abram on her account, 14-16. God afflicts Pharaoh and his household with grievous plagues on account of Sarai, 17. Pharaoh, on finding that Sarai was Abram's wife, restores her honourably, and dismisses the patriarch with his family and their property, 18-20. NOTES ON CHAP. XII Verse 1. Get thee out of thy country] There is great dissension between commentators concerning the call of Abram; some supposing he had two distinct calls, others that he had but one. At the conclusion of the preceding chapter, Genesis 11:31, we find Terah and all his family leaving Ur of the Chaldees, in order to go to Canaan. This was, no doubt, in consequence of some Divine admonition. While resting at Haran, on their road to Canaan, Terah died, Genesis 11:32; and then God repeats his call to Abram, and orders him to proceed to Canaan, Genesis 12:1. Dr. Hales, in his Chronology, contends for two calls: "The first," says he, "is omitted in the Old Testament, but is particularly recorded in the New, Acts 7:2-4: The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham while he was (at Ur of the Chaldees) in Mesopotamia, BEFORE HE DWELT IN CHARRAN; and said unto him, Depart from thy land, and from thy kindred, and come into the land (γην, a land) which I will show thee. Hence it is evident that God had called Abram before he came to Haran or Charran." The SECOND CALL is recorded only in this chapter: "The Lord said (not HAD said) unto Abram, Depart from thy land, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto THE LAND, הארץ HA-arets, (Septuagint, Τηνγην), which I will show thee." "The difference of the two calls," says Dr. Hales, "more carefully translated from the originals, is obvious: in the former the land is indefinite, which was designed only for a temporary residence; in the latter it is definite, intimating his abode. A third condition is also annexed to the latter, that Abram shall now separate himself from his father's house, or leave his brother Nahor's family behind at Charran. This call Abram obeyed, still not knowing whither he was going, but trusting implicitly to the Divine guidance." Thy kindred] Nahor and the different branches of the family of Terah, Abram and Lot excepted.

1. Now the lord said] Lit. “and Jehovah said.” The narrative opens with characteristic simplicity, and with the abruptness possibly indicating its selection from a group of similar traditions. the lord said] Here, as elsewhere, we must not suppose that “the word of Jehovah” was accompanied either by any external manifestation, or by an audible sound. God in old times “hath spoken unto the fathers” even as He speaks now to those who hear His voice, “in divers manners” (Hebrews 1:1). out of thy country … kindred … father’s house] See Genesis 24:7. The threefold tie of land, people, and home, is to be severed. Abram is to lay the foundations of the Chosen People independently of any obligation or favour due to local environment or personal association. He is to rely only on his God. Thus the first trial of the patriarch’s faith requires him, (a) to renounce the certainties of the past: (b) to face the uncertainties of the future: (c) to look for and to follow the direction of Jehovah’s will. Cf. Hebrews 11:8, “by faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed to go out … and he went out, not knowing whither he went.” the land that I will shew thee] The country is not designated by name: an additional test of faith.

- The Call of Abram 6. שׁכם shekem Shekem, “the upper part of the back.” Here it is the name of a person, the owner of this place, where afterward is built the town called at first Shekem, then Flavia Neapolis, and now Nablous.

1. The Lord had said — Rather, the Lord said. The pluperfect rendering was adopted by our translators from a supposed necessity of harmonizing this verse with Acts 7:2.