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The Lord appeared to Abram and said: To your descendants I will give this land. So Abram built an altar there to the Lord who had appeared to him.(A) From there he moved on to the hill country east of Bethel, pitching his tent with Bethel to the west and Ai to the east. He built an altar there to the Lord and invoked the Lord by name. Then Abram journeyed on by stages to the Negeb.[a]

Abram and Sarai in Egypt.[b]

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Footnotes

  1. 12:9 The Negeb: the semidesert land south of Judah.
  2. 12:10–13:1 Abraham and Sarah’s sojourn in Egypt and encounter with Pharaoh foreshadow their descendants’ experience, suggesting a divine design in which they must learn to trust. The story of Sarah, the ancestor in danger, is told again in chap. 20, and also in 26:1–11 with Rebekah instead of Sarah. Repetition of similar events is not unusual in literature that has been orally shaped.

The Lord appeared to Abram(A) and said, “To your offspring[a] I will give this land.(B)(C) So he built an altar there to the Lord,(D) who had appeared to him.

From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel(E) and pitched his tent,(F) with Bethel on the west and Ai(G) on the east. There he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord.(H)

Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.(I)

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Footnotes

  1. Genesis 12:7 Or seed