Abraham followed God’s call into Canaan. His original name was Abram. He was Terah’s son and the brother of Nahor and Haran; Haran’s son Lot was his nephew. Terah took Abram, his wife Sarai, and Lot from Ur of the Chaldeans toward Canaan, but settled in Haran and died there.
God told Abram to leave his country, relatives, and father’s household for a land he would show him. He promised to make Abram a great nation and a blessing, through whom all the families of the earth would be blessed. At seventy-five, Abram left Haran with Sarai, Lot, their possessions, and the people with them. At Shechem in Canaan, God promised the land to his descendants, and Abram built an altar. He also built an altar between Bethel and Ai and called on God’s name.
A severe famine brought Abram to Egypt. Fearing that he would be killed because of Sarai, he asked her to conceal their marriage and say she was his sister. She was taken into Pharaoh’s house, and Abram received animals and servants. God sent plagues on Pharaoh and his household. Pharaoh challenged Abram for not saying she was his wife, then sent them away. Abram returned with Sarai and his possessions to the altar between Bethel and Ai.
Abram and Lot had too many possessions to remain together. When their herders quarreled, Abram let Lot choose where to go first. Lot chose the well-watered Jordan plain and moved as far as Sodom; Abram remained in Canaan. God promised Abram the land he could see and descendants as numerous as the dust of the earth. Abram moved to the oaks of Mamre near Hebron and built an altar.
When Lot was captured in a war, Abram pursued with three hundred eighteen trained men from his household. They divided their forces and attacked by night, then recovered Lot, the goods, the women, and the other captives. Returning, Abram received a blessing from Melchizedek, king of Salem and priest of God Most High, and gave him a tenth of what he had gained. He refused the goods offered by Sodom’s king, who would otherwise be able to claim he had made Abram rich. He excepted what his men had eaten and his allies’ shares.
God later spoke to Abram in a vision. Abram said that he had no child and that Eliezer of Damascus would be his heir. God replied that Abram’s own son would inherit. He brought Abram outside, told him to count the stars if he could, and promised descendants like them. Abram believed God, who credited this to him as righteousness.
Abram asked how he could know he would receive the land. He brought the animals God named, divided the livestock, and laid the halves opposite one another, leaving the birds whole. As the sun set, a deep sleep fell on him. God said that his descendants would live as foreigners and suffer for four hundred years, then leave with great possessions. After dark, a smoking furnace and a flaming torch passed between the pieces. God made a covenant that day, promising the land to Abram’s descendants.
After ten years in Canaan, Sarai gave her Egyptian servant Hagar to Abram. When Hagar became pregnant, she despised Sarai, who complained to Abram. He said Hagar was in Sarai’s hands and that she could do as she saw fit. Sarai treated Hagar harshly, and Hagar fled. At a spring in the wilderness, God’s messenger told her to return and gave a promise about her son. Hagar bore Ishmael when Abram was eighty-six.
When Abram was ninety-nine, God changed his name to Abraham and promised to make him the father of many nations. Sarai’s name became Sarah. She would bear Isaac, with whom God would establish his covenant. Abraham pleaded for Ishmael, and God promised to bless him and make him a great nation too. Abraham, Ishmael, and all the males of the household were circumcised that day as the covenant’s sign.
Near the oaks of Mamre, Abraham welcomed three visitors. He asked Sarah to prepare bread and served them calf meat and milk. A visitor said Sarah would have a son when he returned at the appointed time. Listening from the tent, Sarah laughed inwardly because of their age. God asked why she had laughed, asked whether anything was too hard for him, and repeated the promise of a son.
Hearing of Sodom and Gomorrah’s great wickedness, Abraham asked whether God would destroy the righteous with the wicked. Would the city be spared if fifty righteous people were found there? He then asked about forty-five, forty, thirty, twenty, and finally ten. God answered that he would not destroy it for the sake of ten. Genesis records God remembering Abraham and bringing Lot out when the cities were destroyed.
At Gerar, Abraham again called Sarah his sister, and King Abimelech took her. God told the king in a dream that she was another man’s wife. Abimelech had not approached her. When he challenged Abraham, Abraham said he had feared being killed. He also explained that Sarah shared his father but not his mother. Abimelech returned Sarah and gave Abraham livestock and servants. When Abraham prayed, God healed Abimelech, his wife, and his female servants so that they bore children.
Sarah bore a son at the time God had promised. Abraham was one hundred. He named the child Isaac and circumcised him on the eighth day. He held a great feast when Isaac was weaned. Sarah saw Hagar’s son mocking and demanded that Hagar and her son be sent away. Abraham was deeply grieved on account of his son. God told him to listen to Sarah, saying his offspring would be named through Isaac. Ishmael would also become a nation because he was Abraham’s child. Abraham gave Hagar bread and water and sent her away with her son.
At Beersheba, Abraham and Abimelech made a covenant. Abraham complained that the king’s servants had seized his well, then gave seven ewe lambs as evidence that he had dug it. He planted a tamarisk tree there and called on the name of the everlasting God.
God tested Abraham by telling him to take Isaac to Moriah and offer him as a burnt offering, a sacrifice burned on the altar. Abraham left early with two servants and Isaac. On the third day he saw the place at a distance and left the servants behind. Isaac carried the wood, while Abraham carried the fire and knife. When Isaac asked about the lamb, Abraham said God would provide.
Abraham built an altar, arranged the wood, and bound Isaac on it. As he took the knife, God’s messenger called and told him not to harm the boy. Abraham saw a ram caught by its horns in a thicket and offered it instead of Isaac. He named the place The LORD Will Provide. God renewed the promise of descendants like the stars and the sand of the seashore, through whom all nations would be blessed. Abraham returned to his servants and went to Beersheba.
Sarah died in Hebron at one hundred twenty-seven, and Abraham mourned her. He sought a burial place from the Hittites and weighed out four hundred shekels of silver to Ephron for the cave and field of Machpelah. A shekel was a unit of weight used to measure the silver. Abraham buried Sarah in the cave he now owned.
In old age, Abraham instructed the elderly servant who managed his possessions to find Isaac a wife. She was to come from his country and relatives rather than the Canaanites, but Isaac was not to be taken back there. If she would not come, the servant would be released from the oath. He took ten camels to the city of Nahor in Mesopotamia.
At a well, the servant prayed to recognize the woman appointed for Isaac through her offer to give water to him and his camels. Rebekah came and gave them water. She was the daughter of Bethuel, son of Abraham’s brother Nahor. The servant told her family why Abraham had sent him, and Rebekah agreed to go. After traveling to Canaan, she became Isaac’s wife.
Genesis also records Abraham marrying Keturah and having sons with her. He gave all he had to Isaac and gave gifts to his other sons. While still alive, he sent them eastward, away from Isaac.
Abraham died at one hundred seventy-five. Isaac and Ishmael buried their father together in the cave of Machpelah, where Sarah was buried. After Abraham’s death, God blessed Isaac.