Discovery BoxGenesis 17:5 
Context17:5 No longer will your name be 1 Abram. Instead, your name will be Abraham 2 because I will make you 3 the father of a multitude of nations.
Genesis 27:12
Context27:12 My father may touch me! Then he’ll think I’m mocking him 4 and I’ll bring a curse on myself instead of a blessing.”
Genesis 44:33
Context44:33 “So now, please let your servant remain as my lord’s slave instead of the boy. As for the boy, let him go back with his brothers.
1 tn Heb “will your name be called.”
2 sn Your name will be Abraham. The renaming of Abram was a sign of confirmation to the patriarch. Every time the name was used it would be a reminder of God’s promise. “Abram” means “exalted father,” probably referring to Abram’s father Terah. The name looks to the past; Abram came from noble lineage. The name “Abraham” is a dialectical variant of the name Abram. But its significance is in the wordplay with אַב־הֲמוֹן (’av-hamon, “the father of a multitude,” which sounds like אַבְרָהָם, ’avraham, “Abraham”). The new name would be a reminder of God’s intention to make Abraham the father of a multitude. For a general discussion of renaming, see O. Eissfeldt, “Renaming in the Old Testament,” Words and Meanings, 70-83.
3 tn The perfect verbal form is used here in a rhetorical manner to emphasize God’s intention.
4 tn Heb “Perhaps my father will feel me and I will be in his eyes like a mocker.” The Hebrew expression “I will be in his eyes like” means “I would appear to him as.”
