Genesis 12:1

The Obedience of Abram

12:1 Now the Lord said ¹  to Abram, ² 

“Go out ³  from your country, your relatives, and your father’s household

to the land that I will show you. ⁴ 

Nehemiah 9:7

9:7 “You are the LORD God who chose Abram and brought him forth from Ur of the Chaldeans. You changed his name to Abraham.

Isaiah 51:2

51:2 Look at Abraham, your father,

and Sarah, who gave you birth. ⁵ 

When I summoned him, he was a lone individual, ⁶ 

but I blessed him ⁷  and gave him numerous descendants. ⁸ 

[12:1]  ¹ sn The Lord called Abram while he was in Ur (see Gen 15:7; Acts 7:2); but the sequence here makes it look like it was after the family left to migrate to Canaan (11:31-32). Genesis records the call of Abram at this place in the narrative because it is the formal beginning of the account of Abram. The record of Terah was brought to its end before this beginning.

[12:1]  ² tn The call of Abram begins with an imperative לֶךְ־לְךָ (lekh-lÿkha, “go out”) followed by three cohortatives (v. 2a) indicating purpose or consequence (“that I may” or “then I will”). If Abram leaves, then God will do these three things. The second imperative (v. 2b, literally “and be a blessing”) is subordinated to the preceding cohortatives and indicates God’s ultimate purpose in calling and blessing Abram. On the syntactical structure of vv. 1-2 see R. B. Chisholm, “Evidence from Genesis,” A Case for Premillennialism, 37. For a similar sequence of volitive forms see Gen 45:18.

[12:1]  ³ tn The initial command is the direct imperative (לֶךְ, lekh) from the verb הָלַךְ (halakh). It is followed by the lamed preposition with a pronominal suffix (לְךָ, lÿkha) emphasizing the subject of the imperative: “you leave.”

[12:1]  ⁴ sn To the land that I will show you. The call of Abram illustrates the leading of the Lord. The command is to leave. The Lord’s word is very specific about what Abram is to leave (the three prepositional phrases narrow to his father’s household), but is not specific at all about where he is to go. God required faith, a point that Heb 11:8 notes.

[51:2]  ⁵ sn Although Abraham and Sarah are distant ancestors of the people the prophet is addressing, they are spoken of as the immediate parents.

[51:2]  ⁶ tn Heb “one”; NLT “was alone”; TEV “was childless.”

[51:2]  ⁷ tn “Bless” may here carry the sense of “endue with potency, reproductive power.” See Gen 1:28.

[51:2]  ⁸ tn Heb “and I made him numerous.”