History of Israel: The Beginning...Abraham

The Bible tells amazing personal stories, but what about the bigger picture? What was Israel's place in the world during Bible times? This episode is the first in the series looking at the history of Israel and it's place in the ancient world. This will give us context to when these events took place.

The first episode is all about Abraham with a little about Isaac and Ishmael. There's also some discussion about the formation of kingdoms and how it differed in the land of Canaan. While these are personal stories, they set the stage for what is to come in later episodes.

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Transcript

The sun beat down upon the man as he walked ahead of the caravan. Behind him, a cacophony of noise rose up to the dark blue sky. Sheep...goats...camels...donkeys all gave voice to the current situation. And, yes, there were human voices too. Lots of them asked questions for which the man really had no answer. The main one being: Where are we going?

The man knew. He knew because he heard the voice of God tell him where to go. He had told everyone, but very few had heard of Canaan. It seemed so far away! Why not just stay in Harran?

Suddenly he sensed someone come alongside him. A hand grabbed his arm and he looked to see his wife walking next to him, giving him a knowing smile. She knew how hard it was to make decisions like this. Well, at least one person is with me, he thought.

As the sun lowered in the western sky, the man, Abram, gave the command to stop. Everyone became busy setting up tents, gathering firewood, and finding water. His wife, Sarai, was directing where to set up their tent. Abram turned and looked south. Soon, he knew, they would be in Canaan...the land God had promised to him and his offspring.

Hello again everyone and thank you for listening to this episode of Bible Backdrop. Today, we’re going to start a new series looking at the history of Israel. Much of the Bible focuses on individual stories, which is great for personal learning and lessons. That being said, it’s sometimes helpful to take a look at the bigger picture. What was happening in and around the nation of Israel? What were the other countries that, more often than not, were at war with them? As always, we look to set this up so that you have a better understanding of scripture.

Today, we start with the man who is seen as the father of the Jewish people...Abraham. First, he was called Abram which means “exalted father” but God later changed his name to Abraham which means “father of many nations.” As related in the book of Genesis, Abraham was from Ur of the Chaldeans. Where was this city? If you look at a modern map of Iraq, it was close to where the Euphrates spills into the Persian Gulf. This area was part of what most historians call the Fertile Crescent. Many believe this is where civilization first got started. 

According to the Bible, Abraham’s father, Terah, was going to move his family to the land of Canaan. Why he was going to do this is not known. It could have been political upheaval or maybe even food related. The city may have been overcrowded and he wanted land to spread out. Either way, he and his family set off for Canaan. But you don’t go directly west to get there. That would take them through a mostly untamed wilderness and desert. That was basically a death sentence. To travel to Canaan from Ur, they moved northwest into what is modern day Turkey. Terah decided that he had enough traveling and settled in the city of Harran which is in southern Turkey. There he lived out his days and was buried.

After Terah passed away, God calls Abraham to take his people and complete the journey to Canaan. Abraham obeys and leads his family to the new country. However, Abraham does not settle in one place there. He and his followers live as Bedouins. This means that he did not live in one place or in a city, but constantly moved as necessary to find the resources needed to survive. The Bible describes the flocks and herds he had, so grass and water were very important. It also notes that he had retainers and his nephew, Lot, also came with him. So they were definitely quite a crowd and needed a lot of pasture and water. 

During this time of wandering, Abraham is forced to go to Egypt due to a famine. There he runs into some trouble (of his own making). Let’s take a short aside here. As this is ancient history, civilizations are just now taking shape. Kingdoms are starting to form during this time. Egypt was one of these kingdoms. Scholars believed it could have been anywhere between the Old Kingdom and the Middle Kingdom in Egyptian history; sometime between 2100-2000 BC. The leader of Egypt in the book of Genesis carries the title of Pharaoh, so there is a well organized political and religious system that expands over quite a bit of land area. To the east, where Abraham is originally from, the Babylonian and Assyrian kingdoms are starting to take shape. Both of these will show up again in another episode. To the north, in modern day Turkey, another kingdom has formed...the Hittite kingdom. They are mentioned often in the Bible and are descendants of Heth who was a great-grandson of Noah. They will not reach ascendancy for several hundred years, but the Hittites are already making their mark. In terms of power and technological advancement, they rivaled the Egyptians. They also had a very methodical and detailed record keeping service. It appears, according to Genesis 23, that they had even made inroads into Canaan. Eventually, though, all good things come to an end and the Hittites started their descent around 1200 BC with some scholars believing that 3 years of extreme drought may have destroyed their economy. Afterwards, there were repeated attacks from different groups and they finally succumbed to the inevitable when they were annexed by the Assyrian Empire. During Abraham’s time, though, they were a growing power in the area.

What about the rest of the lands, especially Canaan? Well, Canaan is not the name of a country...it’s the name of the land. The land of Canaan was mostly ruled by city-states. There was no central power connecting them, thus making a kingdom. Each city ruled themselves and they all had a king. Mostly, they ruled their own city and maybe the surrounding area and that was it. This becomes important when we later talk about Joshua and the conquest.

Now back to Abraham. After getting in trouble with Pharaoh, he and his family are forced to leave Egypt. He goes back to Canaan and God appears to him again and promises that he and his wife, who is renamed to Sarah, will have a son and that his descendants will number the stars in heaven. Sarah at the time was barren and it appeared that she would never have children. So to try and make things move along, she gives Abraham an Egyptian slave, named Hagar, to have as a wife and to bear children through her. Now, before anyone gets upset, this was actually common during the time as we’ll see when we talk about Jacob. The consequences of this decision, however, will be far-reaching. Hagar does indeed get pregnant and now looks down upon Sarah. She’s not happy about that, so she mistreats Hagar who then runs away. An angel appears to Hagar and tells her to go back to Sarah and that she will have a son who will also become a mighty nation. She goes back and gives birth to a son...Ishmael. Later, after Isaac is born, he and his mother are sent away but God spares them and promises to make a mighty nation from him. So why tell this story? Many people believe that the Arabs are descendants of Ishmael. Later, in the book of Judges, the Midianites are also called Ishmaelites. They may have been a tribe descended from Ishmael as he had 12 sons. As God said, Ishmael would live to the east of his brothers and would always be striving against them. 

God’s promise comes true for Abraham as his son, Isaac, is born through his wife Sarah. In the next episode, I’ll go into some more of the story of Isaac and his two sons, Jacob and Esau.

There’s one more story, though, that we need to discuss. Before Isaac is born, God appears to Abraham and tells him his plans for Sodom and Gomorrah. Knowing his nephew, Lot, lives there he asks God if he would spare the city if 10 righteous people were found there. Apparently, there weren’t 10 righteous people between the 2 cities. That’s pretty bad. God does, however, send two angels to get Lot and his family out. The story is recorded in Genesis 19 along with what happens next. After escaping the city, Lot’s wife dies because she looks back while the city is burning contrary to the angel’s commands not to do so. So Lot and his two daughters make their way to the caves in some nearby mountains. The daughters fear that this is a permanent situation and that they will not be married and bear children which would have been a disgrace. So they come up with a plan. On two separate occasions, they get their father drunk and sleep with him to get pregnant. Remember earlier when I told you not to get upset about Abraham and Hagar? Yeah, you can get upset now. This was pretty abhorrent behavior, but goes to show the belief of the importance of having children to continue the family line. Both girls conceive and have a child: One is called Moab and he becomes the father of all Moabites; the other is named Ben-Ammi and he is the father of the Ammonites. They will both play a significant role as adversaries of Israel.

So I know you’re probably thinking that these are a lot of personal stories for an episode that’s supposed to look at things from a higher level, but this needs to be done to set the stage for future episodes. It helps to know where these nations come from and why they are important to Israel’s history. 

On that note, I think I’ll leave it here for now. On the next episode we’ll take a closer look at Isaac, Jacob and Esau. If you are enjoying Bible Backdrop, please leave a 5-star rating and review. If you want to get in touch with the show, you can e-mail me at BibleBackdrop@gmail.com. Word of mouth is still the best way for this podcast to grow, so tell a friend and have them subscribe. You can now also get Bible Backdrop on YouTube! Just search for Bible Backdrop and click the bell to subscribe and be notified when a new episode drops. Thank you again for listening and have a great week!