1Misery is mine!
Indeed, I am like one who gathers the summer fruits, as gleanings of the vineyard.
There is no cluster of grapes to eat.
My soul desires to eat the early fig.
2The godly man has perished out of the earth,
and there is no one upright among men.
They all lie in wait for blood;
every man hunts his brother with a net.
3Their hands are on that which is evil to do it diligently.
The ruler and judge ask for a bribe.
The powerful man dictates the evil desire of his soul.
Thus they conspire together.
4The best of them is like a brier.
The most upright is worse than a thorn hedge.
The day of your watchmen,
even your visitation, has come;
now is the time of their confusion.
5Don’t trust in a neighbor.
Don’t put confidence in a friend.
With the woman lying in your embrace,
be careful of the words of your mouth!
6For the son dishonors the father,
the daughter rises up against her mother,
the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
a man’s enemies are the men of his own house.
7But as for me, I will look to Yahweh.
I will wait for the God of my salvation.
My God will hear me.
8Don’t rejoice against me, my enemy.
When I fall, I will arise.
When I sit in darkness, Yahweh will be a light to me.
9I will bear the indignation of Yahweh,
because I have sinned against him,
until he pleads my case and executes judgment for me.
He will bring me out to the light.
I will see his righteousness.
10Then my enemy will see it,
and shame will cover her who said to me,
“Where is Yahweh your God?”
My eyes will see her.
Now she will be trodden down like the mire of the streets.
11A day to build your walls!
In that day, he will extend your boundary.
12In that day they will come to you from Assyria and the cities of Egypt,
and from Egypt even to the River,
and from sea to sea,
and mountain to mountain.
13Yet the land will be desolate because of those who dwell therein,
for the fruit of their doings.
14Shepherd your people with your staff,
the flock of your heritage,
who dwell by themselves in a forest.
Let them feed in the middle of fertile pasture land,
in Bashan and Gilead, as in the days of old.
15“As in the days of your coming out of the land of Egypt,
I will show them marvelous things.”
16The nations will see and be ashamed of all their might.
They will lay their hand on their mouth.
Their ears will be deaf.
17They will lick the dust like a serpent.
Like crawling things of the earth, they will come trembling out of their dens.
They will come with fear to Yahweh our God,
and will be afraid because of you.
18Who is a God like you, who pardons iniquity,
and passes over the disobedience of the remnant of his heritage?
He doesn’t retain his anger forever,
because he delights in loving kindness.
19He will again have compassion on us.
He will tread our iniquities under foot.
You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.
20You will give truth to Jacob,
and mercy to Abraham,
as you have sworn to our fathers from the days of old.
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).