ABRAHAM or (Genesis xi. 26–xvii. 5) ABRAM is the progenitor of the chosen people, the "seed" of the "promised land," Canaan (Gen. xii. 7; xiii. 15; xv. 18, etc.). He was the first of the three Patriarchs. He was extolled as "the Friend of God" (Isa. xli. 8; 2 Chron. xx. 7; cf. James ii. 23, and also the Mohammedan tradition), and as the "Father of the Faithful" (cf. Rom. iv. II). To the present day the Jews trace their descent from him and from his progeny; who in accordance with the promise were to be as numerous as "the stars in the sky" (Gen. xv. 5) and "the sand on the sea shore" (Gen. xxii. 17). On the other hand in the New Testament it is declared that God can raise up children unto Abraham from stones (Matt. iii. 9), possi bly an allusion to the myth of Deucalion and Pyrrha or to an Aramaic play upon words (b`din "sons," abnin "stones"). To rest in Abraham's bosom, the bosom of the progenitor of the race, was the summit of eternal peace (Luke xvi. 22 seq.).
The stories in Gen. xi.
II belong to a larger whole. The basic conception upon which they are chosen and brought together is a single one. Despite all human opposition and despite all apparent despair and hopeless ness, God holds forth his promise and brings to realization his scheme of salvation. Abraham, the bearer of this promise, is the pattern of peaceful and childlike faith, who stands firm against all dangers and disappointments. From the first his difficulties were exceedingly great.
He had to leave his home and people and, following the course of the sun, go on into a foreign land, the very name of which has not been told to him by God (Gen. xii. I). The mighty Canaan ites prevent his peaceful establishment (Gen. xii. 6), so he tarries in Shechem (xii. 6), Bethel (xii. 8), Hebron (xiii. 18), Gerar (xx. I) and Beersheba (xxi. 33). At the very beginning he is compelled by a famine to leave Canaan and to go into Egypt, where his wife Sarai (Sara) is in danger through his untruth (Gen. xii. 10-20, cf. xx. 1-18, where the scene is Gerar). Hardly has he again settled in Canaari when dissensions among the shep herds bring a new danger, and he has to part from his only kins man Lot. In calm trust in God, Abraham leaves the choice of locality to Lot (xiii. 9), who chooses the fruitful land on the other side beyond the borders of the promised land. Further difficulties arise when Lot falls into captivity (ch. xiv.) and, finally, into extreme danger, at the destruction of Sodom (ch. xix.). Nevertheless here also Abraham's trustful confidence pre vails, and he receives the promise of God in the form of .a cove nant (chs. xv. and xvii.). There was to be born a son to the aged and childless couple and Abraham believed: his calm, childlike trust represents the just relation between man and God. This is the real meaning of the famous verse (Gen. xv. 6) with which, in the New Testament, the profoundest thoughts of the Christian doctrine of justification are connected (Rom. iv. 3; Gal. iii. 6).
A new side-issue is Abraham's marriage with Hagar, for the offspring of that union, Ishmael, cannot be heir (Gen. xvi., cf. xxi. 8, seq.). Finally Isaac, "the son of promise," is born (xxi. 1, seq.), and Abraham by means of a covenant with the king of Gerar gets a footing near the borders of the promised land (xxi. 22 seq.). Then comes the severest test of his faith: the son of the promise must be willingly sacrificed! Even this test Abra ham stands and God renews the promise (ch. xxii.), and yet towards the end of his days all that he has acquired as his estate is a grave (ch. xxiii.) This tomb of the Patriarch near Hebron is the sign that one day the whole territory shall belong to his descendants. Isaac, it is true, is still without an heir when Abra ham dies in a good old age ; and the old man's last thoughts con cern themselves with the marriage of his son with a woman from his far-off home (ch. xxiv.). For Isaac is the heir, not Ishmael, or the children of Keturah; and Abraham has gained nought in the land of Canaan but a grave and his belief in the Promise.
Thesestories do not form a unity. The isolated stories whose concrete perspicuousness and brevity are unsurpassed are woven into a garland of sagas. They were collected in three or four larger works and finally put together in their present form, from the above-mentioned point of view. (See BIBLE, OLD TESTAMENT and GENESIS.) To the latest work, the so-called Priestly Codex (P.), are ascribed Gen. xi. 27, 31, 32; xii. 4b, 5; xiii. 6, Hi), 12; xvi.
3, 15, 16; ch. xvii.; xix. 29; xxi. ib, 2b-5; ch. xxiii.; xxv. As the work of the Elohist (E) are reckoned chs. xv. and xxiv. ( ?) in part, and nearly all chs. xx., xxi. and xxii. The rest belongs to the works of the two Jahwists (L, i.e., the older "Lay-source" [so Eissfeldt] and J). The accuracy of this analysis is, however, in some details doubtful. More important is the fact that the stories, despite many noticeable duplications (cf. ch. xii. io seq. and ch. xx., chs. xv. and xvii., chs. xvi. and xxi.), agree in all essentials. The etymological explanations of names and word-plays are of funda mental importance as stylistic criteria.
Thestyle and content of the stories de viate from strictly historical writing. The narrative does not concern itself with the political, social and economic events and conditions in the life of the peoples (with the sole exception of ch. xiv., on which see below), but with family idylls, delineated with an artist's love, the details of which, however, are beyond the reach of the historian. The question, therefore, of the real historical worth of the details is difficult to decide. On the other hand, scepticism as to the historicity of the patriarch himself goes too far. Some would suppose that the figure of Abraham owes its origin merely to the imagination of the poet; or that Abraham is merely a personification of the people who derived themselves from him, and that the sagas and legends concerning him and other patriarchs are only a reflection of later tribal his tory. According to other scholars, the heroic figure of Abraham is based on a Canaanite god who was worshipped in the holy trees of Shechem and Hebron. In this case the Israelites are supposed to have taken over the cult-centres and the rites ; al though, judging from their hatred of the earlier peoples, it is not very likely that they humanized their gods and heroes and regarded them as the progenitors of their own people. All these explanations, however, have an air of unreality about them. From beginning to end all that Abraham does and suffers is pe culiar to individuals. Mythical outlines are wholly wanting, even miracles are not ascribed to him (in contrast, for example, to Moses). Even his human failings are not disguised (his untruth, xii. 13; xx. 2; his frailty, xvi. 6; his doubts, xvii. 17). Were his shape devised with something of the idea of establishing Israel's right to Canaan, one would look for some other sort of figure. According to the later sagas—some of which have been preserved —the Patriarchs were mighty heroes who conquered the land with signs and miracles, and held firmly to the later sacrificial and food laws. It is just the unfavourable traits in the characters of the Patriarchs and the undesirable traits in their lives, and the consciousness of a difference between the patriarchal and the Mosaic period as regards the idea of God and the cults, that must rest on an historical foundation.
The double name is peculiar, Abram means "the father is exalted" or "the exalted father"; the word "Patriarch" is really nothing more than a Greek translation of this name. Lesser known bearers of the name were called Abiram (Num. xvi., etc.). Ab-raham is the new name which the patriarch received from God from the moment of the solemn covenant (Gen. xvii. 5). A new name—mostly with a slight variation (cf. Sarai-Sara, Hosea-Joshua, Eliakim-Jehoia kim, Saul-Paul)—indicates a new period in the life of the bearer. This name is explained in Gen. xvii. 5 as "Father of a Multi tude'," which in Hebrew would be Ab-hamon; but the second part of the compound is preferably compared with an Arabic word for "crowd" (ruhcim). This explanation is however prob ably a popular etymology : it is most probable that the two names Abram and Abraham mean precisely the same thing. Abram may be the Accadian (Babylonian) and Abraham the Amorite (Ca naanite) form of the same name. It is among the Amorite peo ples in Babylonia during the first dynasty that names are found like Abaram, Abam-rama, and probably even Aba-raham (cf . for the last form Lutz, Early Babylonian Letters from Larsa [1917], No. 15). Thus it seems that this name was in use in Abraham's old Babylonian home, the regions of Ur and Larsa.
For determining the date of Abraham the 14th chapter of Genesis is the starting point. In this noteworthy chapter are given the names of kings and lands, and Abraham appears as a war-like hero. The identification of these kings with the great Babylonian king Hammurabi and those of his time would seem to be erroneous. It is probable that the chapter deals with a punitive expedition undertaken by two princes of the middle Euphrates (Amraphel ; i.e., Amur-apil and Arioch or Ariaka) in the service of the allied kings of Khatti (Tid'al ; i.e., Tidtalia, Dudhalia). They were beaten by the attack of a much smaller number of Hebrews under Abraham : it was the unforgettable first military exploit of this people on Canaan ite soil. Now, of these kings we know from the cuneiform inscrip tions that Tidal (I.) was the founder of a dynasty of the king dom of the Hittites (Khatti), and that he lived somewhere about 1550 B.C. (or at the latest 1450 B.c.). It is therefore probable that we must place the time of Abraham about this date. With this agrees the little that we know of the political life of the dark age after the downfall of the Hyksos kingdom. The biblical chronology does not actually contradict this late dating, for the dates in Gen. xxi. 5; xxv. 26; xlvii. 9; Exod. xii., 4o and I Ki. vi. I belong to an artificial scheme, whereby precisely 12 centuries elapse from the birth of Abraham to the building of Solomon's temple. To make up these 12 centuries the length of a generation was reckoned first as ioo years, then as 4o. But the older literary sources in the Old Testament give another picture ; above all, the genealogical tables present good ancient evidence. On the basis of statements such as are found in Gen. xv. 16; xxxvi. 31– 39 (cf. Num. xx. 14) ; Gen. 1. 23 Exod. vi. 16-20, Ruth iv. 18-22, the period between Abraham and David must at the most be reckoned as 600 years, probably much shorter.
From the historical point of view Abraham's journey from Mesopotamia to Canaan is directly bound up with the wandering of the Moabites, Ammonites and Edomites to the south-west and southern Canaan, and with the wanderings of the Aramaeans to Syria. An invasion by the non-Semitic tribes of the Mitanni and Kharri (about 1600 B.c.) expelled these Hebrews and Ara maeans from their old homes on the middle Euphrates, in a south westerly direction. In the course of this migration individual Hebrew families (viz., Abraham and his kindred) came to Canaan; but there was no intention in the first instance of con quering this ancient land of culture.
It has been shown that Abra ham's journey from Ur (Gen. xi. 28) via Harran (xi. 31) to Canaan was merely a part of a greater movement of peoples. But, according to Biblical tradition, this journey had a precise objective and aim ; God's direct command already contained a religious motive (Gen. xii. I seq.). Abraham is no leader of a Bedouin tribe seeking plunder and conquest ; his significance lies rather in the field of religion. He is not, in the first instance, the progenitor of the people but the founder and leader of a religious movement. Like Mohammed, some 2,000 years later, he stood at the head of a great movement among the Semitic peoples and tribes. Naturally, his adherents were bound to each other firmly by blood ties. Abraham's religion was characterized by abstrac tion and was yet personal. The one great God, throned in Heaven, honoured without priests and Temple, the Almighty and all-com prehending One, to whom the faithful have personal access— this is Abraham's God so far as we can gather from our sources. And that is more important for us than the question of the details of the tradition. While Abraham's forefathers in Mesopotamia, served other gods (Josh. xxiv. 2), "The God who redeemed Abra ham" was the same as the God of Moses (cf. Exod. iii. 6, 13 seq.) and of Elijah (I Ki. xviii. 36). According to the Old Testa ment, Abraham was the founder of the Israelite faith, and Moses the founder of the nation's thought and reformer of the cultus. BIBLIOGRAPHY.—See GENESIS, and the article by S. A. Cook in the previous edition of this encyclopaedia. Kittel, Geschichte des V olkes Israel, vol. i., pp. 270-290; Wilke, War Abraham eine geschichtliche Person? 1907 ; Gressmann, Sage and Geschichte in den Patrlarchener zahlungen in the Zeitschrift d. Alt. Test. Wissenschaft, 191o, pp. 1-31; on the word-plays and the form of the stories see Bohl, Journal of the Palestine Oriental Society, 1926, pp. 196-212 ; on the Chronology, Albright, "The historical background of Genesis xiv." Journ. of the Society of Oriental Research, 1926, pp. 231-269. The present writer has discussed the views taken above, in the Zeitschrift der Alt. testa ment Wissenschaft, 1916, pp.
;
PP. 148-153; also in a
commentary on Genesis (in Dutch), 2 vols. (1923-25) , and in a paper (Dutch), The Period of the Patriarchs (1925). (F. M. T. B.)
