Genesis 11:10-26

A Chosen Nation

Image Caption: Abram looks up at the star-filled night sky.Source: (Google Gemini) [https://gemini.google.com/app/]

He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, "So shall your offspring be." (Genesis 15:5)

Postdiluvian Vertical Genealogy ⟡ Abram's Way of Redemption

It was during the last days of Ur III that Terah's family would emerge to relate their story. Even before the rise of the Old Babylonian kingdoms of Isin and Larsa (2017 to 1794 BC), Terah's family would settle in Padan-Aram (now Syria), from which Abram would travel to the Canaanite Levant.

Mesopotamia entered the era when law codes extended the influence of city-states over vast regions. In time the social impact of such law codes would reach into surrounding cultures, including those of the Levant. The oldest known law code, that of the Sumerian Code of Ur-Nammu (ca. 2100 to 2050 BC), would be followed by the Sumerian Code of Lipit-Ishtar, ruler of the First Dynasty of Isin (ca. 1934 to 1924 BC), then by the Old Babylonian Code of Eshnunna (ca. 1930 BC) and Code of Hammurabi (ca. 1792 to 1750 BC).

Israel as a nation was yet unknown. It would be generations before Joseph's family would rise to power in 12th Dynasty Egypt (1991 to 1782 BC) and his heirs continue rule into the Second Intermediate Period (1782 to 1550 BC) — especially in the 14th and 15th Hyksos Dynasties at Avaris. For the verses of Genesis under consideration, the stage for God's plan of world redemption was being set.

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