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13 [a]Then the Lord said to Abram: Know for certain that your descendants will reside as aliens in a land not their own, where they shall be enslaved and oppressed for four hundred years.(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 15:13–16 The verses clarify the promise of the land by providing a timetable of its possession: after four hundred years of servitude, your descendants will actually possess the land in the fourth generation (a patriarchal generation seems to be one hundred years). The iniquity of the current inhabitants (called here the Amorites) has not yet reached the point where God must intervene in punishment. Another table is given in Ex 12:40, which is not compatible with this one.

22 She conceived and bore a son, whom he named Gershom;[a] for he said, “I am a stranger residing in a foreign land.”(A)

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Footnotes

  1. 2:22 Gershom: the name is explained unscientifically as if it came from the Hebrew word ger, “sojourner, resident alien,” and the Hebrew word sham, “there.” Stranger residing: Hebrew ger, one who seeks and finds shelter and a home away from his or her own people or land.