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Genesis 20

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1 And Abraham journeyed thence toward the land of the south, and dwelt between Kadesh and Shur, and he sojourned in Gerar.

2 And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister; and Abimelech king of Gerar sent and took Sarah.

3 And God came to Abimelech in a dream of the night, and said to him, Behold thou wilt·​·die on·​·account·​·of the woman whom thou hast taken, for she is married to a husband.

4 And Abimelech had not come·​·near to her; and he said, Lord, wilt Thou kill also a just nation?

5 Said he not to me, She is my sister? And she herself also Said, He is my brother; in the integrity of my heart and in the innocence of my hands have I done this.

6 And God said to him in the dream, I also know that in the integrity of thy heart thou hast done this; and I also kept· thee ·back from sinning against Me; therefore I did not allow thee to touch her.

7 And now return the wife of the man, for he is a prophet; and he shall pray for thee, and thou shalt live; and if thou return her not, know thou that dying thou shalt die, thou and all that are thine.

8 And Abimelech got·​·up·​·early in the morning, and called all his servants, and spoke all these words in their ears; and the men feared exceedingly.

9 And Abimelech called Abraham, and said to him, What hast thou done to us? And wherein have I sinned against thee that thou hast brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin? Thou hast done with·​·me deeds that ought not to be done.

10 And Abimelech said to Abraham, What sawest thou that thou hast done this word?

11 And Abraham said, Because I said, Surely there is no fear of God in this place, and they will kill me on·​·account·​·of the matter of my wife.

12 And also, truly, she is my sister, being the daughter of my father, only not the daughter of my mother, and she became for me a wife.

13 And it was, as God caused me to depart* from the house of my father, that I said to her, This is thy mercy which thou shalt do with·​·me; at every place whither we shall come, say of me, He is my brother.

14 And Abimelech took flock and herd, and menservants and handmaids, and gave to Abraham; and returned to him Sarah his wife.

15 And Abimelech said, Behold my land is before thee; dwell in that which is good in thine eyes.

16 And to Sarah he said, Behold I have given a thousand of silver to thy brother; behold it is to thee a covering of the eyes to all that are with thee, and with all; and she was vindicated.

17 And Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech, and his wife, and his maidservants; and they gave·​·birth.

18 For restraining Jehovah had therefore restrained every womb of the house of Abimelech, on·​·account·​·of the word of Sarah, Abraham’s wife.

   


Thanks to the Kempton Project for the permission to use this New Church translation of the Word.

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Abraham

  
Représentation d'Abraham, by Joseph Villiet

Abraham (or Abram, as he was named in the beginning of his story) was the ancestor of all the Children of Israel, through his son Isaac, and of the Arabs, through his son Ishmael.

Abraham represents the Divine good or love. His story foreshadows the life of Jesus, and our spiritual lives, too.

His life can be usefully seen as being divided into three periods. The first period includes the unknown early years from his birth in Ur, and his later move to Haran with his father Terah. The second section starts with Abram's being called by Jehovah to go to Canaan. It includes the adventures he had there, and continues until the events of the 17th chapter of Genesis where he is said to be 99 years old, rich, and powerful - but without a son by his wife Sarai. Once again the Lord appears to him, promises that his progeny will become a great nation, institutes the rite of circumcision, and changes his name to Abraham, adding the "ah" sound from Jehovah. The third and last period of his life sees the birth of Isaac, the death of Sarah (whose name was also changed), and the finding of a wife for Isaac from among Abraham's relatives back in Mesopotamia. Abraham is said to be 175 years old when he dies, as recorded in the 25th chapter of Genesis.

What we are here interested in is the deep representation of Abraham because he prophesies or foreshadows the inmost part of Jesus' life after He is born to Mary centuries after the man Abraham lived on the earth. Abraham represents the Divine good or love. The internal sense of the Word tells us that God himself provided the life into an ovum within Mary, so she could provide a natural body and a natural heredity from the Jewish religion, while the soul of Jesus was kept as a direct possessor of divine life. During Jesus' early life, probably up to adolescence, Jesus lived out those representative actions of Abraham in the innermost parts of his mind and spirit. Abraham as he pastured his sheep and ran his large household had no idea at all that this was true, and early in Jesus' life He didn't realize it either. There must have been perceptions as Jesus grew up, witness his visit to the temple when He was 12, but not a complete understanding until He was fully grown. And further, it isn't only Abraham. When Abraham dies, the representation attaches to Isaac, who represents the rational level of the mind, and then to both Jacob and Esau who represent the natural mind as to truth and good in the mind respectively. And then the trials of the twelve tribes, the kings, and all the sayings of the prophets become that same representation. So Jesus could say to the two disciples that He met on the road to Emmaus, "O fools and slow of heart... and beginning at Moses and all the Prophets He expounded to them in all the scriptures all the things concerning Himself." (The following references are chronologic as Abraham gets older, and are in biblical sequence.) And furthermore, the progress of mental and spiritual life in each one of us is a dim and finite image of that represented by Abraham's life if, that is, we are trying to follow the Lord's laws and precepts to love one another. We too have within us a journey to the land of Canaan, a hardworking sojourn in Egypt, a struggle in the wilderness, and a Saul, a David, and an Ahab. We have our home-grown Amalekites and Philistines. The whole of the Old Testament is a picture of how our spiritual life works.

In Genesis 20:7, Abraham signifies celestial truth, or doctrine from a celestial origin. (Arcana Coelestia 2533)

In Genesis 12:4, As ABRAHAM he represents the Lord as to His Human and Divine Essence; as ABRAM he represents the Lord as to His human essence only. (Arcana Coelestia 1426)

In Genesis 17:5, The name was changed by adding the letter H, so that the Divine Human could he represented, for H is the only letter which involves the Divine: it means I AM, or BEING. (Arcana Coelestia 1416[2])

(Odkazy: Genesis 17, 25)