Discovery BoxGenesis 12:1 
Context12:1 Now the Lord said 1 to Abram, 2
“Go out 3 from your country, your relatives, and your father’s household
to the land that I will show you. 4
Genesis 13:8
Context13:8 Abram said to Lot, “Let there be no quarreling between me and you, and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen, for we are close relatives. 5
Genesis 13:11
Context13:11 Lot chose for himself the whole region of the Jordan and traveled 6 toward the east.
So the relatives separated from each other. 7
Genesis 24:38
Context24:38 but you must go to the family of my father and to my relatives to find 8 a wife for my son.’
Genesis 25:18
Context25:18 His descendants 9 settled from Havilah to Shur, which runs next 10 to Egypt all the way 11 to Asshur. 12 They settled 13 away from all their relatives. 14
Genesis 31:3
Context31:3 The Lord said to Jacob, “Return to the land of your fathers 15 and to your relatives. I will be with you.” 16
Genesis 31:23
Context31:23 So he took his relatives 17 with him and pursued Jacob 18 for seven days. 19 He caught up with 20 him in the hill country of Gilead.
Genesis 31:25
Context31:25 Laban overtook Jacob, and when Jacob pitched his tent in the hill country of Gilead, Laban and his relatives set up camp there too. 21
Genesis 31:46
Context31:46 Then he 22 said to his relatives, “Gather stones.” So they brought stones and put them in a pile. 23 They ate there by the pile of stones.
Genesis 31:54
Context31:54 Then Jacob offered a sacrifice 24 on the mountain and invited his relatives to eat the meal. 25 They ate the meal and spent the night on the mountain.
1 sn The
2 tn The call of Abram begins with an imperative לֶךְ־לְךָ (lekh-lÿkha, “go out”) followed by three cohortatives (v. 2a) indicating purpose or consequence (“that I may” or “then I will”). If Abram leaves, then God will do these three things. The second imperative (v. 2b, literally “and be a blessing”) is subordinated to the preceding cohortatives and indicates God’s ultimate purpose in calling and blessing Abram. On the syntactical structure of vv. 1-2 see R. B. Chisholm, “Evidence from Genesis,” A Case for Premillennialism, 37. For a similar sequence of volitive forms see Gen 45:18.
sn It would be hard to overestimate the value of this call and this divine plan for the theology of the Bible. Here begins God’s plan to bring redemption to the world. The promises to Abram will be turned into a covenant in Gen 15 and 22 (here it is a call with conditional promises) and will then lead through the Bible to the work of the Messiah.
3 tn The initial command is the direct imperative (לֶךְ, lekh) from the verb הָלַךְ (halakh). It is followed by the lamed preposition with a pronominal suffix (לְךָ, lÿkha) emphasizing the subject of the imperative: “you leave.”
4 sn To the land that I will show you. The call of Abram illustrates the leading of the
5 tn Heb “men, brothers [are] we.” Here “brothers” describes the closeness of the relationship, but could be misunderstood if taken literally, since Abram was Lot’s uncle.
6 tn Heb “Lot traveled.” The proper name has not been repeated in the translation at this point for stylistic reasons.
7 tn Heb “a man from upon his brother.”
sn Separated from each other. For a discussion of the significance of this event, see L. R. Helyer, “The Separation of Abram and Lot: Its Significance in the Patriarchal Narratives,” JSOT 26 (1983): 77-88.
8 tn Heb “but to the house of my father you must go and to my family and you must take a wife for my son.”
9 tn Heb “they”; the referent (Ishmael’s descendants) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
10 tn Heb “which is by the face of,” or near the border. The territory ran along the border of Egypt.
11 tn Heb “as you go.”
12 sn The name Asshur refers here to a tribal area in the Sinai.
13 tn Heb “he fell.”
14 tn Heb “upon the face of all his brothers.” This last expression, obviously alluding to the earlier oracle about Ishmael (Gen 16:12), could mean that the descendants of Ishmael lived in hostility to others or that they lived in a territory that was opposite the lands of their relatives. While there is some ambiguity about the meaning, the line probably does give a hint of the Ishmaelite-Israelite conflicts to come.
15 tn Or perhaps “ancestors” (so NRSV), although the only “ancestors” Jacob had there were his grandfather Abraham and his father Isaac.
16 sn I will be with you. Though Laban was no longer “with him,” the
17 tn Heb “his brothers.”
18 tn Heb “him”; the referent (Jacob) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
19 tn Heb “and he pursued after him a journey of seven days.”
20 tn Heb “drew close to.”
21 tn Heb “and Jacob pitched his tent in the hill country, and Laban pitched with his brothers in the hill country of Gilead.” The juxtaposition of disjunctive clauses (note the pattern conjunction + subject + verb in both clauses) indicates synchronism of action.
22 tn Heb “Jacob”; the proper name has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.
23 sn The Hebrew word for “pile” is גַּל (gal), which sounds like the name “Galeed” (גַּלְעֵד, gal’ed). See v. 48.
24 tn The construction is a cognate accusative with the verb, expressing a specific sacrifice.
25 tn Heb “bread, food.” Presumably this was a type of peace offering, where the person bringing the offering ate the animal being sacrificed.
