1After these things Yahweh’s word came to Abram in a vision, saying, “Don’t be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward.”
2Abram said, “Lord Yahweh, what will you give me, since I go childless, and he who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3Abram said, “Behold, you have given no children to me: and, behold, one born in my house is my heir.”
4Behold, Yahweh’s word came to him, saying, “This man will not be your heir, but he who will come out of your own body will be your heir.” 5Yahweh brought him outside, and said, “Look now toward the sky, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” He said to Abram, “So your offspring will be.” 6He believed in Yahweh, who credited it to him for righteousness. 7He said to Abram, “I am Yahweh who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give you this land to inherit it.”
8He said, “Lord Yahweh, how will I know that I will inherit it?”
9He said to him, “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.” 10He brought him all these, and divided them in the middle, and laid each half opposite the other; but he didn’t divide the birds. 11The birds of prey came down on the carcasses, and Abram drove them away.
12When the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram. Now terror and great darkness fell on him. 13He said to Abram, “Know for sure that your offspring will live as foreigners in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them. They will afflict them four hundred years. 14I will also judge that nation, whom they will serve. Afterward they will come out with great wealth; 15but you will go to your fathers in peace. You will be buried at a good old age. 16In the fourth generation they will come here again, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet full.” 17It came to pass that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold, a smoking furnace and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. 18In that day Yahweh made a covenant with Abram, saying, “I have given this land to your offspring, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates: 19the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, 20the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, 21the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.”
We first encounter Abraham (father of many nations) as Abram (great father) in Genesis 11:26-31). He was the son of Terah, brother of Nahor and Haran, and uncle of Lot. Abram's brother Haran died while Abram was still in Ur of the Chaldees (Gen 11:28), where also he married Sarai, his half-sister. We discover toward the end of Genesis 11 that his father Terah left Ur, and went to the land of Canaan, via a city named Harana, where Terah died.
The story of Abraham becomes important in chapter 12, in which we are introduced to important biblical characters, locations, and events that set the stage for the remainder of the Bible. Yahweh came to Abram was commanded him to go to a land that He would show him. In this passage, Yahweh sets forth and unilateral and unconditional covenant, in which He promised to make from him a great nation, make his name great, and through him bless all of the families of the earth.[1]
"Abraham (Abram) was first of the patriarchs, father of Isaac and Ishmael, grandfather of Jacob and the traditional ancestor of the Jewish people. Abraham (originally Abram, which means "exalted father") came from Ur in Mesopotamia. His father, Terah, took him (with his wife, Sarah, and his nephew, Lot) to Haran. God called Abraham to leave this new home and to find another home elsewhere in Canaan. After a brief stay in Egypt, Abraham settled near Hebron where he became involved in a local political quarrel when Lot was taken prisoner by an alliance of four eastern chieftains. Abraham launched a successful attack against this confederacy and on his victorious return encountered the mysterious Melchizedek, king of Salem, to whom he gave a tenth of all the spoil he had taken in the battle.
For many years of their marriage, he and Sarah were childless, but God assured Abraham that he would eventually become the father of a great nation. Sarah disbelieved and persuaded Abraham to beget a child by her maid, Hagar, who bore him his first son, Ishmael. When Abraham was ninety-nine years old, God appeared to him, and instituted with him a covenant of circumcision, giving him the new name of Abraham (meaning "father of a multitude") and told him that a son, to be named Isaac was shortly to be born to Sarah. When the boy was in his childhood, God ordered Abraham to take him up to a mountain in the land of Moriah and offer him up as a sacrificial victim. Abraham prepared to do so, but was prevented at the last moment from carrying out the sacrifice, and told that he would be blessed for his faithfulness in being ready to offer up his son.
When Sarah died Abraham bought the plot of ground (the field of Ephron in Machpelah) that became the burial place for many generations of his descendants. He subsequently made arrangements for the marriage of Isaac, and took another wife, Keturah, who bore him Zimran, Medan, Midian, Ishbak and Shuah. At the age of one hundred and seventy five, Abraham died and was buried in Machpelah.
The principal narrative of the part of Genesis dealing with Abraham's history is interrupted in various places by other stories involving the patriarch. These include the parallel stories of his sojourns in Egypt and in Gerar. On both occasions Abraham lied about his relations with Sarah, jeopardising the fulfilment of God's promise (as both Pharaoh and Abimelech intended to take Sarah for themselves), while protecting himself. Both times God intervened to save him from the consequences of his deception. In another story we read of Abraham's intercession on behalf of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, which were destroyed for their wickedness."[2]
[1] See Genesis 12:1, for an explanation of God's covenant with Abraham.
[2] Based on the website Mini-Biografias de Personajes Biblicos Web de Recursos Cristianos) (trans. Mini-Biographies of Biblical Characters, Christian Resources Web).