Genesis 28:10

Jacob’s Dream at Bethel

28:10 Meanwhile Jacob left Beer Sheba and set out for Haran.

Genesis 11:27

The Record of Terah

11:27 This is the account of Terah.

Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran. And Haran became the father of Lot.

Genesis 11:26

11:26 When Terah had lived 70 years, he became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

Genesis 11:32

11:32 The lifetime ¹  of Terah was 205 years, and he ²  died in Haran.

Genesis 11:28

11:28 Haran died in the land of his birth, in Ur of the Chaldeans, ³  while his father Terah was still alive. ⁴ 

Genesis 27:43

27:43 Now then, my son, do what I say. ⁵  Run away immediately ⁶  to my brother Laban in Haran.

Genesis 29:4

29:4 Jacob asked them, “My brothers, where are you from?” They replied, “We’re from Haran.”

Genesis 12:4

12:4 So Abram left, ⁷  just as the Lord had told him to do, ⁸  and Lot went with him. (Now ⁹  Abram was 75 years old ¹⁰  when he departed from Haran.)

Genesis 11:31

11:31 Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot (the son of Haran), and his daughter-in-law Sarai, his son Abram’s wife, and with them he set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. When they came to Haran, they settled there.

Genesis 11:29

11:29 And Abram and Nahor took wives for themselves. The name of Abram’s wife was Sarai, ¹¹  and the name of Nahor’s wife was Milcah; ¹²  she was the daughter of Haran, the father of both Milcah and Iscah.

Genesis 12:5

12:5 And Abram took his wife Sarai, his nephew ¹³  Lot, and all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired ¹⁴  in Haran, and they left for ¹⁵  the land of Canaan. They entered the land of Canaan.

Genesis 12:1

The Obedience of Abram

12:1 Now the Lord said ¹⁶  to Abram, ¹⁷ 

“Go out ¹⁸  from your country, your relatives, and your father’s household

to the land that I will show you. ¹⁹ 

[11:32]  ¹ tn Heb “And the days of Terah were.”

[11:32]  ² tn Heb “Terah”; the pronoun has been substituted for the proper name in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[11:28]  ¹ sn The phrase of the Chaldeans is a later editorial clarification for the readers, designating the location of Ur. From all evidence there would have been no Chaldeans in existence at this early date; they are known in the time of the neo-Babylonian empire in the first millennium b.c.

[11:28]  ² tn Heb “upon the face of Terah his father.”

[27:43]  ¹ tn Heb “listen to my voice.”

[27:43]  ² tn Heb “arise, flee.”

[12:4]  ¹ sn So Abram left. This is the report of Abram’s obedience to God’s command (see v. 1).

[12:4]  ² tn Heb “just as the Lord said to him.”

[12:4]  ³ tn The disjunctive clause (note the pattern conjunction + subject + implied “to be” verb) is parenthetical, telling the age of Abram when he left Haran.

[12:4]  ⁴ tn Heb “was the son of five years and seventy year[s].”

[11:29]  ¹ sn The name Sarai (a variant spelling of “Sarah”) means “princess” (or “lady”). Sharratu was the name of the wife of the moon god Sin. The original name may reflect the culture out of which the patriarch was called, for the family did worship other gods in Mesopotamia.

[11:29]  ² sn The name Milcah means “Queen.” But more to the point here is the fact that Malkatu was a title for Ishtar, the daughter of the moon god. If the women were named after such titles (and there is no evidence that this was the motivation for naming the girls “Princess” or “Queen”), that would not necessarily imply anything about the faith of the two women themselves.

[12:5]  ¹ tn Heb “the son of his brother.”

[12:5]  ² tn For the semantic nuance “acquire [property]” for the verb עָשָׂה (’asah), see BDB 795 s.v. עָשָׂה.

[12:5]  ³ tn Heb “went out to go.”

[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.