HISTORY OF ABRAHAM

Abraham or Avraham (at first Abram, or Ibrahim in Arabic) is a central figure in Hebrew mythology as developed in the biblical Book of Genesis. Abraham was the mythical hero and “father” of all three of the monotheistic “Abrahamic” religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Genesis 11–50 is a combination of several versions of the story of Abraham and his immediate descendants, told by the so-called Yahwist contributor to the Bible (Torah), who was writing in Judah in about 950 B.C.E. under the early monarchy; the so-called Elohist author, writing in about 850 B.C.E.; and the writers of the priestly tradition of c. 550–400 B.C.E. The story takes us up to the myth of Moses and the Exodus.

A man called Tehar, who had several sons, including Abram, was said to have decided to move from Ur, the ancient city in Mesopotamia, to Canaan. Tehar was accompanied by his grandson Lot and by Abram and Abram’s wife, Sara’i (the name of an Arabian great goddess), who was childless and barren. The group traveled northeast and stopped in Haran, where Tehar, now 205 years old, died. It was in Haran that Abram’s god, Yahweh, came to the 75-year-old Abram and urged him to move on to Canaan, where “I shall make you into a great nation” (12:2).

So Abram journeyed down to Shechem, where there was a sacred tree (probably sacred to the Canaanite goddess Asherah), at which point Abram built an altar to Yahweh. He did the same thing in Bethel, as he moved south, following a tradition of building altars to his tribal god on sites sacred to others.

Famine caused the group to move to Egypt, but after some time they returned to Canaan with a great deal of wealth and livestock. As the land could not support the people of both Abram and Lot, Lot moved to the Jordan plain near Sodom. Yahweh again spoke to Abram, giving him the land of Canaan, and Abram moved around in the land and eventually erected an altar to Yahweh in Hebron. After Abram had assisted an alliance of tribes in a successful war and accepted no booty, Yahweh once again appeared to him and promised that after 400 years of oppression his descendants would possess all of the land of Canaan from the Nile to the Euphrates.

As Sara’i was childless and knew that Abram required a son, she gave him her Egyptian slave girl Hagar as a concubine, and soon a son, Ishmael (Ismail), was born. When Sara’i, now jealous, mistreated Hagar, Yahweh promised the slave that her son would be “like the wild ass... at odds with all his kin” (16:12).

According to the priestly authors of Genesis, Yahweh came to Abram when the patriarch was 99 years old and announced that Abram was now to be called Abraham, the “father of many nations.” Yahweh would be his and his descendants’ god. This was a solemn covenant between Yahweh and his people, whose sign of having accepted the covenant would be circumcision, a sign of community and of exclusivity, as the uncircumcised would be “cut off from the kin of his father” (17:14). Both Abraham and Ishmael immediately had themselves circumcised.

Yahweh told Abraham that Sara’i was now to be called Sarah (“princess”) and that in spite of her old age she would give birth to a child, Isaac. As for Ishmael, he too would be fruitful and would father a great nation. Three men—presumably angels—appeared to Abraham and confirmed that Sarah would soon give birth to a son.

For a while Abraham lived in Gerar, among the Philistines, and there Sarah gave birth to Isaac. Sarah demanded that Abraham expel Hagar and Ishmael from his entourage. This he did, since Yahweh informed him that although Ishmael would be the father of a great nation, Isaac would be his true heir.

When Isaac was still a boy, Yahweh tested Abraham’s loyalty by demanding that he sacrifice his son to him. Abraham agreed, but at the last minute Yahweh provided a sheep as a substitute for the child.

Sarah died in Hebron at the age of 127. Abraham died there at the age of 175. He was buried by Isaac and Ishmael in a cave in Hebron bought previously from its Hittite owners.

In the Jewish aggadah and midrash (literature that elaborates on canonical sources) and elsewhere, myths and legends about Abraham’s life suggest his connection to the heroic mono myth, the universal hero-type. As in the story of Jesus, legends hold that Abraham was born in a hidden place—in this case a cave—where he was watched over by angels. The child was abandoned by his fearful mother, but the angel Gabriel brought him milk from God. As in the Christian story, Abraham’s birth had been prophesied to a jealous king, who feared the boy’s power, and a massacre of boy children was ordered. Like many heroes, such as the Buddha, the legendary Abraham was able to walk about and speak almost immediately after his birth.

Abraham’s son Isaac, through whom Yahweh renewed the covenant with the Hebrews, would marry Rebekah, and she would give birth to Jacob and Esau. The promise of the land of Canaan for the Hebrews was again made to Jacob, he having been renamed Israel by God. Jacob’s most famous son, by his wife Rachel, was Joseph of the many-colored coat. Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph all possessed heroic qualities and were much favored by their god.

The whole Abrahamic myth serves as a bridge between ancient times and the actual presence of the Hebrews in Canaan and as a mythological justification for the particular role of Israel and the Jews in history. It serves particularly as a justification for the belief in *monotheism and for claims of exclusivity and land rights that by extension and mythical adjustment have been taken up at various times by Christians and Muslims as well.

These myth-fed claims on the part of the Abrahamic religions are very much alive in the turmoil that characterizes the Middle East today.

By David Leeming in "The Oxford Companion to World Mythology", Oxford University Press, UK, 2005. Digitized, adapted and illustrated to be posted by Leopoldo Costa.