In the Bible we have…the nature of boys and girls, of men and women, more accurately charted than in the work of any modern novelist or playwright. You can learn more about human nature by reading the Bible than by living in New York. –BRUCE BARTON
Around 2000 B.C. a man named Abram began a journey that changed history forever. Traveling northwest from the Sumerian city of Ur (in what is today southern Iraq), he settled for a while in Haran (southeast Turkey), then headed southwest to make Canaan (Israel) his permanent home. When he sought refuge in Egypt during a famine, he had managed to traverse the full length of the Fertile Crescent. The sharpest turn Abram made along the way, however, was not geographic but religious. Without historical precedent, he discarded the gods of his father and began to worship a single deity separate from nature. Credited as the father of monotheism, he is revered today by Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike.
Yet Abraham—his name changed along the way, too—is also a man of deep mystery. The Genesis narrative of his life is more like an impressionist painting than a photograph. Much is left to the interpretation of the reader. With so many details omitted, believers of every faith have tried to fill in the blanks with legend. The result is that Abraham, like many great men of the past, has become to us a figure larger than life, almost superhuman. And, to no one's surprise, many mere mortals can no longer relate to him.
Ironically, we begin to see Abraham’s greatness most clearly when we view him as flesh and blood. Behind the hype, beneath the legend, beyond the mystery, is a real person who speaks to us in our humanity as surely as God spoke to him in his heart. As he becomes one of us, we are able to connect with him and are more apt to make a similar journey ourselves. With this end in mind, may I reintroduce you to Abraham, the man.
His father was Terah, a resident of ancient Ur and a worshiper of many gods, particularly the moon god Sin. Archaeological digs in the area have revealed that one-fourth of the land within the walls of this city was dedicated to this lunar deity. The metaphoric connection between moonlit night and physical death made Ur a favorite burial spot for royalty and subject. In all, 1850 cemetery plots have been excavated there, including sixteen royal graves. In this fairly sophisticated city—replete with an irrigation system, a favorite board game, a fabulous multi-tiered temple, and a thriving commerce on the southern end of the Euphrates—religion permeated almost every endeavor. Here or in its immediate surrounds, Abraham spent his entire childhood and early adult life. Here he married his half-sister Sarah, a practice not uncommon in his day. Here, upon the untimely death of his brother, he assumed the guardianship of his nephew Lot. And here, from familiarity, his father uprooted him and the whole clan.
The exact reason Terah made the move is unclear, but it may have been political and economic instability. According to cuneiform records from Ur, neighboring Elamites and Amorites began to plague the city around 2000 B.C., marking the end of the great city’s zenith and the beginning of its decline. Terah may have sensed this unrest to be a harbinger of things to come—indeed, Ur fell to Elam in 1950 B.C.—and thus moved elsewhere. If so, expedience rather than faith was the motivating factor. Consistent with this, there is no mention in Genesis of a divine voice urging Terah to move from Ur.
Of all Mesopotamian cities, Haran was the obvious choice for Terah to relocate. For one thing, a commercial relationship had existed for years between Haran and Ur. In addition, the two cities shared the same focal deity: the moon god Sin. Once settled there, Terah and his sons flourished, their herds becoming so large that servants had to be hired to manage them. For Abraham, life was prosperous and stable. Other than Sarah’s infertility—a heavy burden for the couple to bear—his future looked bright and secure. The furthest thing from his mind was leaving Haran.
Then God called.
God’s voice seems to come to the most unsuspecting individuals. So it was with Abraham. Just as Haran was beginning to feel like home, he received a call from a different God, a deity without name and above nature, urging him to move away "to a land I will show you." Unable to shake the inward directive, he led his perplexed wife and nephew in the direction of Canaan. Many people in Haran, like those of Noah’s day, were skeptical, even derisive. Included among them was Abraham’s brother Nahor, who remained behind as caretaker of Terah’s agricultural empire. Abraham’s first stop in his pilgrimage was Shechem, which literally means "shoulder," located just south of the Sea of Galilee where the central hills of Canaan descend sharply to the plain below. There he built an altar to his new God. He then continued southward to Luz—later renamed Bethel by his grandson, Jacob—where a second altar was erected. During his nomadic wanderings, he would often return to these two sites for worship. His devotion to God, even in the infancy of his faith, seemed all-encompassing and unflappable.
Finally, after the aforementioned refuge in Egypt, he settled for good in Canaan. In one of the most selfless moments recorded in the Bible, he gave the pick of the land to Lot, who—in contrasting selfishness and ingratitude—chose the fair and fertile Jordan River Valley adjacent to the Dead Sea. With no apparent ill feelings, Abraham headed once again to the hills, this time with God’s blessing and promise. He purchased from the Hittites a parcel of well-watered land beside a large oak tree at a place called Hebron. Directly in line with Shechem and Bethel to the north, it became for him the place he called home. Eventually, in a nearby cave, it also became the place of his burial. In the interval between cave purchase and cave entombment, Abraham bequeathed to the world monotheism—to Judaism and Christianity through Sarah’s long-awaited son Isaac and to Islam through his eldest son Ishmael.
Sadly, in what was by far the weakest point of his life, he also gave birth to the strife that remains so prevalent in monotheism today. At the urging of Sarah, increasingly impatient in her childlessness, he impregnated her Egyptian handmaiden, Hagar. Nine months later, Ishmael was born. Abraham loved the boy and made plans for him to carry on both family and faith. This is why, when Abraham initiated the rite of circumcision thirteen years later, Ishmael was the first candidate chosen.
But Sarah’s late-in-life pregnancy changed the entire landscape. Once Isaac arrived, Hagar and Ishmael did not fare well. The treatment they received was harsh and inexcusable, enough to make any fair-minded reader wince. At Sarah’s urging, Abraham reluctantly expelled the two into the wilderness to fend for themselves. As a result, Isaac became Abraham’s sole heir, a Hebrew patriarch revered by future generations of Jews and later by Christians. But, thankfully, the story did not end there. The God of Abraham did what Abraham himself would not do. Displaying a sense of justice that would later become the battle cry of many a prophet, he took up the cause of Hagar and Ishmael and embraced the two outcasts. Though shunned by his father, a great multitude also rose from Ishmael’s seed. Muhammad would later claim Ishmael as the father of Islam, the third religion to link its family roots to Abraham.
Hebron, Abraham’s home, is today called the "City of the Patriarchs." There, surrounded by walls built by Herod the Great, is the cave where Abraham and Sarah are laid to rest. Thousands of worshipers from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam visit the site every year. This peaceful convergence at Abraham’s tomb is a testimony to his greatness and goodness. But the animosity and war that plague the region also expose his weakness and sin.
He was, underneath all the hype, a human being like you and me—shaped by his background, called by God to walk by faith into the unknown, often obedient but sometimes not, bestowing many blessings but also sharing some blame.
Around 2000 B.C. a man named Abram began a journey that changed history forever. Traveling northwest from the Sumerian city of Ur (in what is today southern Iraq), he settled for a while in Haran (southeast Turkey), then headed southwest to make Canaan (Israel) his permanent home. When he sought refuge in Egypt during a famine, he had managed to traverse the full length of the Fertile Crescent. The sharpest turn Abram made along the way, however, was not geographic but religious. Without historical precedent, he discarded the gods of his father and began to worship a single deity separate from nature. Credited as the father of monotheism, he is revered today by Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike.
Yet Abraham—his name changed along the way, too—is also a man of deep mystery. The Genesis narrative of his life is more like an impressionist painting than a photograph. Much is left to the interpretation of the reader. With so many details omitted, believers of every faith have tried to fill in the blanks with legend. The result is that Abraham, like many great men of the past, has become to us a figure larger than life, almost superhuman. And, to no one's surprise, many mere mortals can no longer relate to him.
Ironically, we begin to see Abraham’s greatness most clearly when we view him as flesh and blood. Behind the hype, beneath the legend, beyond the mystery, is a real person who speaks to us in our humanity as surely as God spoke to him in his heart. As he becomes one of us, we are able to connect with him and are more apt to make a similar journey ourselves. With this end in mind, may I reintroduce you to Abraham, the man.
His father was Terah, a resident of ancient Ur and a worshiper of many gods, particularly the moon god Sin. Archaeological digs in the area have revealed that one-fourth of the land within the walls of this city was dedicated to this lunar deity. The metaphoric connection between moonlit night and physical death made Ur a favorite burial spot for royalty and subject. In all, 1850 cemetery plots have been excavated there, including sixteen royal graves. In this fairly sophisticated city—replete with an irrigation system, a favorite board game, a fabulous multi-tiered temple, and a thriving commerce on the southern end of the Euphrates—religion permeated almost every endeavor. Here or in its immediate surrounds, Abraham spent his entire childhood and early adult life. Here he married his half-sister Sarah, a practice not uncommon in his day. Here, upon the untimely death of his brother, he assumed the guardianship of his nephew Lot. And here, from familiarity, his father uprooted him and the whole clan.
The exact reason Terah made the move is unclear, but it may have been political and economic instability. According to cuneiform records from Ur, neighboring Elamites and Amorites began to plague the city around 2000 B.C., marking the end of the great city’s zenith and the beginning of its decline. Terah may have sensed this unrest to be a harbinger of things to come—indeed, Ur fell to Elam in 1950 B.C.—and thus moved elsewhere. If so, expedience rather than faith was the motivating factor. Consistent with this, there is no mention in Genesis of a divine voice urging Terah to move from Ur.
Of all Mesopotamian cities, Haran was the obvious choice for Terah to relocate. For one thing, a commercial relationship had existed for years between Haran and Ur. In addition, the two cities shared the same focal deity: the moon god Sin. Once settled there, Terah and his sons flourished, their herds becoming so large that servants had to be hired to manage them. For Abraham, life was prosperous and stable. Other than Sarah’s infertility—a heavy burden for the couple to bear—his future looked bright and secure. The furthest thing from his mind was leaving Haran.
Then God called.
God’s voice seems to come to the most unsuspecting individuals. So it was with Abraham. Just as Haran was beginning to feel like home, he received a call from a different God, a deity without name and above nature, urging him to move away "to a land I will show you." Unable to shake the inward directive, he led his perplexed wife and nephew in the direction of Canaan. Many people in Haran, like those of Noah’s day, were skeptical, even derisive. Included among them was Abraham’s brother Nahor, who remained behind as caretaker of Terah’s agricultural empire. Abraham’s first stop in his pilgrimage was Shechem, which literally means "shoulder," located just south of the Sea of Galilee where the central hills of Canaan descend sharply to the plain below. There he built an altar to his new God. He then continued southward to Luz—later renamed Bethel by his grandson, Jacob—where a second altar was erected. During his nomadic wanderings, he would often return to these two sites for worship. His devotion to God, even in the infancy of his faith, seemed all-encompassing and unflappable.
Finally, after the aforementioned refuge in Egypt, he settled for good in Canaan. In one of the most selfless moments recorded in the Bible, he gave the pick of the land to Lot, who—in contrasting selfishness and ingratitude—chose the fair and fertile Jordan River Valley adjacent to the Dead Sea. With no apparent ill feelings, Abraham headed once again to the hills, this time with God’s blessing and promise. He purchased from the Hittites a parcel of well-watered land beside a large oak tree at a place called Hebron. Directly in line with Shechem and Bethel to the north, it became for him the place he called home. Eventually, in a nearby cave, it also became the place of his burial. In the interval between cave purchase and cave entombment, Abraham bequeathed to the world monotheism—to Judaism and Christianity through Sarah’s long-awaited son Isaac and to Islam through his eldest son Ishmael.
Sadly, in what was by far the weakest point of his life, he also gave birth to the strife that remains so prevalent in monotheism today. At the urging of Sarah, increasingly impatient in her childlessness, he impregnated her Egyptian handmaiden, Hagar. Nine months later, Ishmael was born. Abraham loved the boy and made plans for him to carry on both family and faith. This is why, when Abraham initiated the rite of circumcision thirteen years later, Ishmael was the first candidate chosen.
But Sarah’s late-in-life pregnancy changed the entire landscape. Once Isaac arrived, Hagar and Ishmael did not fare well. The treatment they received was harsh and inexcusable, enough to make any fair-minded reader wince. At Sarah’s urging, Abraham reluctantly expelled the two into the wilderness to fend for themselves. As a result, Isaac became Abraham’s sole heir, a Hebrew patriarch revered by future generations of Jews and later by Christians. But, thankfully, the story did not end there. The God of Abraham did what Abraham himself would not do. Displaying a sense of justice that would later become the battle cry of many a prophet, he took up the cause of Hagar and Ishmael and embraced the two outcasts. Though shunned by his father, a great multitude also rose from Ishmael’s seed. Muhammad would later claim Ishmael as the father of Islam, the third religion to link its family roots to Abraham.
Hebron, Abraham’s home, is today called the "City of the Patriarchs." There, surrounded by walls built by Herod the Great, is the cave where Abraham and Sarah are laid to rest. Thousands of worshipers from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam visit the site every year. This peaceful convergence at Abraham’s tomb is a testimony to his greatness and goodness. But the animosity and war that plague the region also expose his weakness and sin.
He was, underneath all the hype, a human being like you and me—shaped by his background, called by God to walk by faith into the unknown, often obedient but sometimes not, bestowing many blessings but also sharing some blame.
