Then, when Terah returned, saw the mess, and asked Abe what had happened. They sought blessing in the product of their own labors, rather than in the promise of God. Thus, he seems to have rejected Stephens words flatly. - On the other hand, the objection is raised, that in the New Testament, which is confessedly the Greek rendering of , is always a created angel, and for that reason cannot be the uncreated Logos or Son of God, since the latter could not possibly have announced His own birth to the shepherds at Bethlehem. l. 5. c. 24. By clicking Post Your Answer, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and cookie policy. Can a private person deceive a defendant to obtain evidence? What are some tools or methods I can purchase to trace a water leak? He dare not become too attached to that which he cannot take with him. We are, as I said before, never told why he packs it in in Ur and heads for Canaan. Genesis - NIV Application Commentary by John Walton. "They came to Haran and dwelt there." A look at a map of the ancient world of patriarchal times would indicate that Abram traveled the well-trodden roads of his day.135 This route was that commonly traveled by those who engaged in the commerce of those days. ------------------------------------------------------------. Three major promises are contained in verses 2 and 3: a land; a seed; and a blessing. 135 Haran, for example, in Assyrian (harranu) meant main road. Waltke, class notes, p. 14. Making statements based on opinion; back them up with references or personal experience. to Harran, they settled there.(NIV). The Christian life is not knowing exactly what the future holds, but knowing Him Who holds the future. God providentially led Terah to pull up roots at Ur and to move toward Canaan (11:31). And, it may be worth noting, we see the name "Terah" alluded to in the word "Teraphim". 2. 63-64. Little wonder that men like Peter and not Paul, are our heroes, for we can see ourselves in them. It would be many years before Abram would fully grasp that this heir that God had promised would come from the union of he and Sarai. One year? The land, as we have already said, is implied in verse 1. Exodus 13:21. Terah may have told Abraham why he was leaving Ur and why he decided to settle in Haran. One purpose of the genealogy of chapter 11 is that it informs us that men were living shorter lives, and having children younger. Why do scholars think Abraham came from Ur in Mesopotamia? Abram would have been on social security for over ten years. ), or of "Elohim," and the "angel of Elohim" (Genesis 21:17; Genesis 31:11, etc. We reached the conclusion that God called Abram to leave Ur in order to travel to Canaan, and he did that before Terah's death, although he When Terah died, Abraham was free to set out from Haran on his way to Canaan. 133-134. Accordingly, the name of the true God was known and revered, at least in outward form, wherever Abram went, throughout the land. Moses did not give us all the background needed to properly grasp the significance of the call of Abram, but it has been recorded for us in the Bible. But even if the address in Genesis 22:16, where the oath of the Angel of Jehovah is accompanied by the words, "saith the Lord," and the words and deeds of the Angel of God in certain other cases, might be explained in this way, a created angel sent by God could never say, "I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob," or by the acceptance of sacrifices and adoration, encourage the presentation of divine honours to himself. This points to the fact that Ur may have been one of the largest and wealthiest cities in the Tigris-Euphrates area when Abraham emigrated northward to Haran. Schultz, Abraham, ZPEB, I, p. 22. And the guidance vouchsafed had for its object the calling forth of faith in response to the promise, which should maintain itself amidst all the changes of this earthly life. Then came he out of the land of the Chaldeans and dwelt in Charran; and from thence, when his father was dead, he removed him into this land, wherein ye now dwell" Acts 7:2-4. they came unto Harantwo days' journey south-southeast from Ur, on the direct road to the ford of the Euphrates at Rakka, the nearest and most convenient route to Palestine. (Antiqu. . At the same time, it does not follow from this use of the expression Maleach Jehovah, that the (particular) angel of Jehovah was essentially one with God, or that Maleach Jehovah always has the same signification; for in Malachi 2:7 the priest is called Maleach Jehovah, i.e., the messenger of the Lord. The Redeemer was to come from the seed of the woman (Genesis 3:15), then from the descendants of Seth, then Noah, and now Abraham (Genesis 12:2-3). He quoted the shopworn saying, God said it. Abram was a man like you and me. It gives some background on the people in the family, interesting little tidbits about the individuals and events that occurred. Vos, Genesis and Archaeology, pp. Answer Terah is known in the Bible as the father of Abram (known later as Abraham), who in turn received the covenant promise of God regarding the future birth of His Son, Jesus. He left Haran, not because it was the easiest thing to do, but because God intended for him to do it. set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. It grows through time and through testing. - From these varying forms of appearance it is evident that the opinion that the Angel of the Lord was a real angel, a divine manifestation, "not in the disguise of angel, but through the actual appearance of an angel," is not in harmony with all the statements of the Bible. in 1971. as an appearance of "the angel of Elohim," and of "the God of Bethel" (Genesis 31:11, Genesis 31:13); and in his blessing on the sons of Joseph (Genesis 48:15-16), "The God (Elohim) before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac did walk, the God (Elohim) which fed me all my life long unto this day, the angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads," he places the angel of God on a perfect equality with God, not only regarding Him as the Being to whom he has been indebted for protection all his life long, but entreating from Him a blessing upon his descendants. When he is commanded to sacrifice Isaac, he must obey with a willing heart of love, yet somehow see through to balance the command with the promise of the seed of a nation and leave the outcome to God and to find in God all sufficiency. But we neither regard this rendering of the psalm as in harmony with the context, nor assent to the assertion that with a double accusative, in the sense of making into anything, is ungrammatical.)<. For unknown reasons, Terah never made it to their destination but stopped and settled in Harran instead. Terah set out on his journey, no doubt, as soon after the call of Abram as the preparatory arrangements could be made. 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 show thee: 2 And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: 3 And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed. Why did Lot offer up his daughters to be gang raped? Genesis 16, where He is mentioned for the first time, contains no distinct statement as to His shape, but produces on the whole the impression that He appeared to Hagar in a human form, or one resembling that of man; since it was not till after His departure that she drew the inference from His words, that Jehovah had spoken with her. When you stop to think about it, Abram had no concrete, tangible proof that a life of blessing lay ahead, outside of Ur, away from his family. The family were in the city of Haran for five years. Moses account of his initial steps of faith makes it evident that much was to be desired, and to be developed in him. When Terah died, Abraham was free to set out from Haran on his way to Canaan. Terah wanted to leave Ur because he was afraid a war would start. He is promised a seed and when that seed is delayed, he must somehow see meaning in that delay and learn faith in God. Thanks for contributing an answer to Biblical Hermeneutics Stack Exchange! How long have you been a Christian, my friend? Terah had still been an idolater, when God called Abe the first time. Why did Terah want to leave Ur? Through all of his experiences he must come to see God as the origin of all that will endure. Stagers, Genesis, p . Wiki User 2012-12-08. Terah, Abraham's father, was grieving for his son Haran. Genesis 2:5). l. 1. c. 6. sect. Stephen clarifies the time that Abram was first called of God. To subscribe to this RSS feed, copy and paste this URL into your RSS reader. Abram was called, that through him all the families of the earth might be blessed (Genesis 12:1-3). - All this occurred as a type for the future, that Israel might know and lay to heart the fact, that bodily descent from Abraham did not make a man a child of God, but that they alone were children of God who laid hold of the divine promise in faith, and walked in the steps of their forefather's faith (cf. The obstacles were largely overcome by the initiative of God in the early stages of the life of Abram. Hence the new form which the divine guidance of the human race assumed in the call of Abram was connected with the general development of the world, - in the one hand, by the fact that Abram belonged to the family of Shem, which Jehovah had blessed, and on the other, by his not being called alone, but as a married man with his wife. But the opinion of the early Church has been vindicated most thoroughly by Hengstenberg in his Christology.). 134 Cassuto, the great Jewish scholar disagrees. (1) Abrams faith was commenced at the initiative of God. And in the land of Kenaan was Melkizedec, the king of Salem, and the priest of the Most High God. Mesopotamia before he dwelt in Charran.(NIV). God told Abram to leave without knowing where the path of obedience would lead, but believing that God was leading as he went. Haran was in the north, where Terah, Abraham's father, had taken him after Terah's father died (Genesis 11:27-32). Copyright 2002-2023 Got Questions Ministries. As a perfectly new beginning, therefore, the patriarchal history assumed the form of a family history, in which the grace of God prepared the ground for the coming Israel. Abrams early history is partly that of his gradual disentanglement from country, kindred and fathers house, a process not completed until the end of chapter 13. Derek Kidner, Genesis (Chicago: InterVarsity Press, 1967), p. 113. Our glorious God appeared to our ancestor Abraham in Mesopotamia before he settled in Haran." Stephen informs us in Acts 7:2 Brothers and fathers, listen to me. We are not inclined to be impressed with Abrams age because of the length of mens lives in olden times, but Genesis chapter 11 informs us that mans longevity was much greater in times past, than in Abrams day. Nahor lived 119 years. This intimates that he would have proceeded with the others to the land of Kenaan if his life had been prolonged, and likewise that they did not leave Haran until his death. He must leave his country, his relatives, and his fathers house. We have already seen that Abram was seventy-five years of age at the death of Terah. This view was adopted by many Romish theologians, by the Socinians, Arminians, and others, and has been defended recently by Hoffmann, whom Delitzsch, Kurtz, and others follow. Abram came from a pagan home. For the election of God was not restricted to the separation of Abram from the family of Shem, to be the father of the nation which was destined to be the vehicle of salvation; it was also manifest in the exclusion of Ishmael, whom Abram had begotten by the will of man, through Hagar the handmaid of his wife, for the purpose of securing the promised seed, and in the new life imparted to the womb of the barren Sarai, and her consequent conception and birth of Isaac, the son of promise. Ur was a large and prosperous city-state in Mesopotamia (present-day southern Iraq). From Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan, Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers, Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament. Men of all nations would be blessed by the Scriptures which, to a great extent, came through the instrumentality of the Jewish people. I do not find such people in the Bible. Abrahams blessing was largely to be seen in his descendants. "A faith, which laid hold of the word of promise, and on the strength of that word gave up the visible and present for the invisible and future, was the fundamental characteristic of the patriarchs" (Delitzsch). The heroes of the Bible are men with like passions (James 5:17) and feet of clay. Abram did not even know where he would settle. As such, it would have been an act flowing from faith. The lesson we may need to learn is this: very often the way God would have us go is the most sensible way that we would have chosen anyhow. More insights from your Bible study - Get Started with Logos Bible Software for Free! Is quantile regression a maximum likelihood method? Since Abram was unwilling or unable to leave his fathers house, God took Abrams father in death (11:32). Can a VGA monitor be connected to parallel port? (Note: In the old Jewish synagogue the Angel of Jehovah was regarded as the Shechinah, the indwelling of God in the world, i.e., the only Mediator between God and the world, who bears in the Jewish theology the name Metatron. Did Abraham receive a call to leave Ur as alluded to in Acts 7:2-4? Terahs migration was partly perhaps a movement of a tribe of the Semites northwards (see Note on Genesis 11:28), made restless by the Elamites, who about this time overran Western Asia; but chiefly it had a religious motive: for Ur was the especial seat of the worship of the moon-god, Sin; and though Terah had not attained to the purity of Abrahams faith, yet neither was he altogether an idolater. With like passions ( James 5:17 ) and feet of clay a defendant obtain... 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