Monday, May 26, 2014

Avraham and Lot

In the document about Avraham, find the life of Avraham, son of Shem, and Lot, son of Yafeth. Two chapters are not included, Bereshit 17 (about the Brit Mila) and 23 (about buying the burying plot in Chevron), and a relatively small number of verses are similarly omitted, because of the priestly editor.

Lot is described as fathering Moab and Ammon. Avraham gets from HaShem a very important promise regarding the land, around which everything circles. Avraham's sons divide into two groups. From Sarah his wife, almost taken by the Egyptian Paraoh, there is Yitzchak, his miraculous son, who almost was not born, and almost died prematurely. Yitzchak finds his wife Rivka in a special, almost supernatural, fashion. Yitzchak and Rivka are the subject of the next Torah chapter. And there is Yishmael, as well as other brothers, who are described as taking hold from near Mitsrayim to near Assyria.