Bede

So Abram departed as the Lord had directed him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left Haran. It is clear from this number of Abraham's years that he left Haran while his father was still alive, as was explained above. There is no doubt that the number seventy-five is mystical, since in it he received the promise of divine blessing and left Isaac, the heir of the same blessing, when he was dying. To speak briefly, seventy, because it is seven times ten, represents the perfection of good actions, when we fulfill the commandments of the Decalogue through the grace of the Holy Spirit, which the prophet describes as sevenfold. To these are added five, so that in all the senses of our body, we may fulfill the same divine commandments with the help of the Spirit’s grace. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left Haran at the command or promise of the Lord and entered the Promised Land; to show that he himself, through the help of the Spirit, having anathematized the errors of Babylonian conduct, would keep God’s commandments; and this in all that he did with his body, whether living, hearing, tasting, or touching, so that there might be nothing in his body that was not enlightened and aided by the gift of the Spirit to obey the heavenly commands. And he marked that all his heirs of the promise should live in a similar manner. It is also to be imitated by all the sons of the promise, among whom we are, that he was ordered to leave his land, his kindred, and his father’s house. For we depart from our land when we renounce the pleasures of the flesh; from our kindred, when we strive to strip ourselves of all the vices with which we were born, as far as is possible for humans; from our father’s house, when we contend to leave the world itself with its prince the devil out of love for heavenly life. For we are all born into the world as sons of the devil because of the guilt of original transgression; but through the grace of regeneration, we belong to the seed of Abraham and become the sons of God, as our Father in heaven says to us, that is, to His Church: "Listen, daughter, and see, and incline your ear, forget your people and your father’s house" (Psalms 45:10). Thus it is well that Haran, from which Abraham departed, is interpreted as Wrath. Canaan, to whose land he was invited, is called the Changed or Merchant. Therefore, not only did Abraham and his brother Lot leave Haran to go to the land of Canaan, but all the elect who are born through the laver of regeneration certainly depart from Haran and come to the land of Canaan; and all the chosen, with the wrath of original sin repudiated in the state of their life and having abandoned the habit of vices, apply themselves to virtues and labor in the most blessed commerce of temporal works to attain eternal rewards; they spurn earthly riches to receive heavenly ones; they disdain the joys of human reign to deserve a share in the kingdom of God. For this is the land that the Lord promised to show His followers: because it cannot be discovered by human wisdom how to walk the way of good deeds, but His guidance must be sought in all things, as the Psalmist says: "You held my right hand, you guided me according to your will, and took me with glory" (Psalms 73:23-24).

Therefore, Sarai took his wife, and Lot his brother's son, and all the substance that they had gathered, and the souls that they had made in Haran; and they went forth to go into the land of Canaan. The phrase "the souls that they had made" is used to mean the children they had begotten. For in the Scriptures, a man is sometimes indicated by the name of the soul alone, sometimes by the name of the flesh alone. By "soul," as it is said: "The soul that sinneth, it shall die" (Ezekiel 18:20); by "flesh," as in the Psalm: "Unto thee shall all flesh come" (Psalm 65:3), since neither flesh without the soul can come to God, nor can the soul sin without the flesh, but the whole man is signified by one part. Nor do those who believe that as the flesh is generated from flesh, so the soul is generated from the soul have any support from this sentiment: for by the term "soul," as we have said, the whole man is understood. However, that they made souls, that is, procreated souls in Haran, should be understood not of Abraham and Lot, but of their household and servants: for the sacred history following this testifies that the patriarchs themselves still remained without children.

And when they had come to it, Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him. It is read above that while Abram was still living in Haran, the Lord spoke to him, promising manifold blessings, commanding him to leave there and come into the land that He would show him. When he did this and willingly obeyed the divine commands, he was immediately deemed worthy of greater grace from God, so that not only would he enjoy His speech, as before, but also merit His vision. When, through the same divine vision and speech, he knew that this was the land promised to him for possession, he quickly, as a man devoted to God, built an altar there to dedicate and consecrate it for offering sacrifices to Him. But because sacred history is full of mystical types, it should be noted that the Lord’s appearance and the erection of the altar are recorded as having taken place at Shechem and at the oak of Moreh. What illustrious valley, if not humility, is figuratively understood? When called by the Lord from the labors and burdens of this world, we must have humility as the first among virtues, as He Himself says: "Learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light" (Matthew 11:29). The place Shechem mystically fits this bearing of the burden because it translates into shoulders in Latin, for it is necessary that with the humility of mind we take up the burdens of good works to be carried. When we diligently strive to do this, we will immediately merit the grace of the Lord's visitation and consolation, so that we may gradually be able to ascend to higher degrees of virtues. Hence rightly, about the advancements of Abram’s journeys, which signify the progression of good works, it is added:

Now there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down to Egypt to sojourn there. After receiving the promises of blessing, after entering the land of promise, after building an altar to the Lord there, after invoking His name, Abraham is tested by famine, and such a great famine that he left the land which he had received in promise as soon as he saw and visited it. But Isaac and Jacob, and his sons, also left the same land of promise, driven by similar necessity. As the Psalmist sings, they passed from nation to nation and from one kingdom to another people (Psalm 105:13). This was believed to have happened not by chance, but by divine providence, so that both they and all the heirs of the same promise would understand that they received the gifts of divine blessing in such a way that in this life they would endure labor and temporal affliction, but in the future, they would expect everlasting rest and happiness. This was also to illustrate that the land of Canaan was promised to Abraham and his seed in such a way that it signified more the inheritance of the heavenly fatherland, of which it is written: "The righteous shall inherit the land and dwell upon it forever" (Psalm 37:29). This is clearly not said about the land of this world, which is common to both the righteous and the wicked, since it is narrated that it will be possessed forever by the righteous alone. Therefore, the land of Canaan is promised to Abraham and his seed, and after the long toil of Egyptian servitude, it is restored by Joshua as a leader, to mystically suggest that the heavenly fatherland promised to us will be restored through Jesus Christ our Lord after the affliction of present exile. But even in that land of Canaan, the children of the promise never ceased laboring or fighting against enemies, so they would understand, as we have said, that they should seek another fatherland beyond this one, where they will truly enjoy heavenly blessing and eternal rest. This divine providence also aligns with the fact that Abraham, while sojourning in Egypt, was endangered because of his wife; but he was helped by divine protection so that he would not be harmed, thus making it clear that not only general worldly evils, such as famine, disease, and captivity, would just men endure along with the reprobates in this life, but they would also suffer specific tribulations from the reprobates themselves, from which they would receive rewards in the future unknown to the reprobates. It follows.

And when he was about to enter Egypt, he said to Sarai his wife: "I know that you are a beautiful woman, and that when the Egyptians see you, they will say that you are his wife, and they will kill me and keep you alive: therefore, please say that you are my sister, so that it may go well with me because of you," and so on until it was said, "The Lord, however, struck Pharaoh with great plagues and his house because of Sarai, Abram's wife; and Pharaoh called Abram and said to him: What is this you have done to me? Why did you not tell me that she was your wife? Why did you say she was your sister, so that I took her as my wife?" Abraham did not lie because he said his wife was his sister, for she was also that, being a close relative; likewise Lot was called his brother, though he was his brother's son. Thus, he concealed that she was his wife but did not deny that she was his sister, entrusting the defense of his wife’s chastity to God and avoiding human deceit as a man, since if he did not avoid danger as much as he could, he would tempt God rather than hope in Him. Indeed, what Abraham trusted in the Lord came to pass, for Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, who had taken her as his wife, being gravely afflicted, returned her to her husband. It is therefore far from us to believe that she was defiled by another’s embrace, for it is much more credible that Pharaoh was not permitted to do this because of great afflictions. It can also be said that, according to the book of Esther, wherever any woman who pleased the king was prepared for him, she was anointed with myrrh oil for six months, and for another six months used various ointments and perfumes, and only then entered the king. It could be that after Sarai pleased the king, and while she was being prepared to enter him for a year, and Pharaoh had given many gifts to Abraham, and Pharaoh was afterwards struck by the Lord, she still remained untouched by his embrace.

Abram went up therefore from Egypt, he and his wife, and all that he had, and Lot with him, to the southern region. He does not mean the southern region of Egypt, but of the promised land: for indeed he did not travel southward from Egypt, which whoever does, goes farther from the promised land: but leaving all of Egypt, part of which he had visited, he first ascended to the southern region of the promised land, which was nearest. It should also be noted according to the letter that Abraham is remembered as having previously descended into Egypt, and now ascending from Egypt, because certainly the land of Egypt is considered inferior not only to the land of Canaan but also to other regions of the world, just as conversely the region of the Scythians is said to be elevated higher than other parts of the earth: which can be easily inferred from the courses of the rivers flowing into it from elsewhere and flowing out from it. It fits however most aptly with the typical senses that the land of Canaan should be higher than Egypt, because this indeed represents the promise of the heavenly homeland, while that signifies the oppressions and labors of present life. For this the Lord both promised and gave as an inheritance to his people Israel: but in that land both Abraham encountered peril, though protected immediately by the Lord, and his progeny were for a long time oppressed by a severe servitude, although they themselves were at last miraculously redeemed and led out from there. Therefore the land of promise is higher than the boundaries of Egypt, although situated nearby, because even if the just and the reprobate appear to live a common life outwardly in this age, yet with the great sublimity of a devoted mind, the citizens of heaven surpass all the lovers of this world. Therefore what is said about Abraham that he went up from Egypt, and came with all his own to the southern region, signifies typically that he himself while living in the flesh, and all the elect, that is the children of the same promise, thus for a time turn their thoughts to caring for bodily necessities in the lowest things, so that soon, having fulfilled the same care of the body, they may recall the whole intention of the mind to contemplate the things that are above, and seek to be renewed by the fervor of love and the light of heavenly grace from the Sun of righteousness: for this is mystically to go up from Egypt to the southern region, after fulfilling the necessities of the flesh, to ask diligently from the Lord for progress in the light of the heavenly and of charity. For with such a desire and purpose of mind it is no doubt that we make our journey to the heavenly homeland: whence it is aptly added.

To the place where he had previously pitched his tent between Bethel and Ai: at the place of the altar which he had made formerly, and he called upon the name of the Lord. It is noteworthy that blessed Abraham, progressing in his chosen journey, is said to have returned from Bethel either from the south or through the south, yet it is not added that he entered the same city; but he is said to have reached the area between this place and Ai, and there he invoked the Lord. This place of prayer is mentioned to be situated on a mountain, because obviously, the elect, still restrained by the bond of flesh and set in the progress of virtues, strive with the whole intention of their mind to reach the house of heavenly habitation, hasten to it with continuous steps of good works; but they cannot yet enter it, nor can they see its King and citizens in their beauty: however, between the acceptance of faith by which they are consecrated to the Lord, and the entrance to the kingdom in which they desire to see Him, they climb the height of good action as a peak of a lofty mountain. For Ai indeed, or Aggai, as the ancient translators rendered the name of that city, is interpreted as Question or Festival: which name, evidently, most fittingly suits the time when each of the faithful is consecrated to the Lord with the saving sacraments: about which the Apostle admonishes saying: Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption (Eph. 4:30). For what great festivity of mind it is to be redeemed from the power of darkness, and by the illumination of the Holy Spirit to be made a seal of the true King? Which city of invincible faith can also rightly be called Question: for by this the elect have learned either to seek the Lord from whom they have strayed farther away, or the Lord Himself, as a good shepherd, has shown Himself to have sought them as His sheep, according to what He says: The Son of man came to seek and to save the lost (Luke 19:10). Moreover, the saints build on the aforementioned mountain of good conversation an altar to the Lord, nothing else surely than their body and soul, in which they also invoke His name, knowing that without the help of His name they could neither begin the path of righteousness, nor complete the course of a good intention. We have thus carefully explicated these things about the place of Abraham's altar, lest anyone might think that blessed Moses, out of mere interest in the history rather than with a view to spiritual understanding, wanted to describe so diligently the place of his tent and altar or his repeated prayer. Where it is also noteworthy that Abraham is not described to have made an altar or invoked the Lord in Egypt, nor in Chaldea, nor in Haran, but solely in the land of Canaan, which he received in promise: because evidently, only within the unity of the Catholic faith, only in the hope of the heavenly promise, can we accomplish perfect works and offer vows worthy of God. Bethel itself, which was formerly called Luz, was named Bethel by Jacob, when, sleeping there, he saw heavenly miracles and hosts; the city, like Ai, is located approximately twelve miles from Jerusalem for those traveling to Neapolis.

Therefore, Lot, having lifted up his eyes, saw all the region around Jordan, which was all watered before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, like the paradise of the Lord and like Egypt as you go towards Zoar. And Lot chose for himself the region around Jordan and moved eastward; and the rest up to the point where it says: but the men of Sodom were wicked and great sinners before the Lord. He praises the fertility of the land and at the same time notes the impiety of the inhabitants, so that they may be understood to be deserving of greater damnation, for they turned the greatest gifts of God not to the fruit of piety but to the increase of luxury: where also it is silently added to the praises of blessed Lot, because in that land, living among those natives, neither the wealth of the rich soil nor the example of the inhabitants could in any way corrupt the integrity of his purity. However, concerning which sins the Sodomites were subject to, except for that abominable one which Scripture mentions later, the prophet Ezekiel sufficiently explains, speaking to Jerusalem: Behold, this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: pride, fulness of bread, and abundance, and idleness were in her and in her daughters; and they did not strengthen the hand of the poor and needy, and they were haughty and committed abomination before me (Ezekiel 16:49). From all these, blessed Lot was free, as testified by the sacred history, which declares that he received the angels as guests and that through them he was rescued from the perishing impious ones; and the judgment of blessed Peter the apostle proves, where it is said: And righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked, was delivered (2 Peter 2:7). For he was righteous by sight and hearing, dwelling among them who day by day tortured his righteous soul with their lawless deeds. For what good merit could be lacking in him, whom the apostolic voice declares righteous? In him, those present could hear nothing but the fame of righteousness, for the deeds and sight of the wicked known to his pure eyes and ears were nothing but torture and affliction. That which is said about him moving from the east to Haran also signifies Mesopotamia, from where he had already long ago physically departed, led by Abraham; but because a reader might doubt whether his mind was still held by love for his kindred and homeland or whether, like Abraham, he had perfectly departed from his country and kindred and from his father's house, Scripture took care to specifically intimate even concerning him that he departed not only in body but in mind from those places and inhabitants, and because of his faith and hope in divine blessing, he consented to remain a perpetual guest and sojourner wherever Abraham chose. For that Haran, a city located to the east of the promised land, is testified by Scripture, which later says: Then Jacob set out and came to the land of the east, when he had indeed journeyed from Bethel to Haran.

And the Lord said to Abram after Lot had separated from him: Lift up your eyes, and look from the place where you are northward and southward and eastward and westward: all the land that you see I will give to you and to your offspring forever. Some manuscripts have "unto the age," which both translate from the one Greek term Aeonion, αἰὼν. Therefore, if it is read as "unto eternity," it rightly raises the question of how Abraham's offspring can possess that land eternally, whereas human life in this world cannot be everlasting. But if it is read as "unto the age," and thus understood, as we faithfully hold, that the beginning of the future age will commence from the end of the present, no question will arise: because even if the Israelites were expelled from Jerusalem, they still remain in other cities of the land of Canaan, and will remain until the end, and that entire land is inhabited with Christians, and they themselves are the seed of Abraham. It can also be mystically understood to have been said to blessed Abraham, "all the land that you see I will give to you and to your offspring forever"; because the region of the heavenly homeland, which that land of promise prefigured, is thus possessed in full by all the elect, namely the seed of Abraham, so that they remain in it without end, according to what is said of the fire of the burnt offering in Exodus: This is a perpetual fire that shall never go out on the altar. For neither could that material fire, by which sacrifices were burnt in the tabernacle, be perpetual, since even the tabernacle itself, the very altar, and the priesthood have long been taken away. But the fire of love, by which the elect are inflamed to offer sacrifices of prayers or good deeds to God, never fails on the altar, that is, from their hearts which were represented by that Mosaic altar: because in this life they fervently love with divine love, and in the future, seeing God more perfectly, they love Him with all their heart, with all their soul, with all their strength. And you will find many such things in the ceremonies of the law, which although they were said to be done or to remain with perpetual right, are yet proven not to have been perpetual except when spiritually understood.

And he built an altar to the Lord. And this is the third altar that Abraham built: for the first he built near the place of Shechem, the second between Bethel and Ai. In all of these, it should be noted that nowhere is a sacrifice offered by him, but only the invocation of the name of the Lord is recorded in Scripture; nor in the following Scriptures is it found that he offered any victim or sacrifice to God, except for one ram, which he offered as a burnt offering to the Lord in place of his son, in which the passion of the Mediator between God and men is most clearly figured. Nor is it read that Isaac, his son, offered any victim to God, but only built an altar to the Lord. Similarly, Jacob, though he made an altar at the Lord's command, is not found to have slain any victims, except when, leaving the land of promise, he was about to enter Egypt because of Joseph. Then indeed, arriving in Beersheba, having slain victims there, he is reported to have received a divine oracle; but there both the species and the number of the victims are omitted: nor is any sacrifice offered to God by the fathers found from then until the time of the Passover which was sacrificed in Egypt with the blood of the lamb. Why is it, then, that from the time the promise was made to Abraham until the time the law was given, no victims were offered, except for only one, which the father sacrificed in place of his son in the figure of God the Father, who did not spare his own Son but delivered him up for us all, and that afterward, in the law, such an abundance of victims did not cease to be offered daily, except because it was clearly foreshadowed that the grace and truth promised to Abraham and his seed were to be given to the world not through the offerings of victims, but through the passion of Christ? By whose faith and sacraments of the passion not only we but also those righteous ones who preceded the times of his passion were saved. And this figure is supported by the fact that Melchizedek, the priest of God Most High, who was in the times of the patriarchs, is read to have offered not the blood of victims but bread and wine to the Lord, and to have presented not the form of the legal priesthood, but of the evangelical: who also blessed Abraham himself, to whom and in whom the blessing of all nations was promised, so that it was evident through all things that the promise given to the fathers was to be fulfilled not through the ceremonies of the Mosaic law, but through the grace of the Lord's passion.

Now it came to pass in those days that Amraphel, king of Shinar, Ariok, king of Pontus, Chodorlahomor, king of the Elamites, and Thadat, king of the nations, made war against Bera, king of Sodom, and against Birsha, king of Gomorrah, and the rest. It is recounted how Chodorlachomor, king of the Elamites, that is, the Persians, waging war against the Pentapolis with allied kings, won a victory, and how many nations were slain by him on his march to that contest. It is not to be supposed that the sacred author of Scripture recorded these only for the sake of historical study but rather to commend to us the grace of heaven. For it teaches us through the victory of Abraham, who overcame so many kings with a few men, what the power of faith is, with which he himself was armed, and how great the grace of divine blessing was, with which he was endowed. Because in the same way, the saints, later to be born, would, through this faith, overcome kingdoms, perform righteousness, and obtain promises. But there is also another very important and by no means negligible reason why the battle of the kings, the initial flight of the Sodomites, and their subsequent capture is written, for it is established that they, too, were subsequently utterly overthrown by heavenly wrath. Seeing their wickedness, God first chastised them with hostile slaughter and captivity. But then, through his faithful servant, he delivered them from that captivity with all the things that were taken, and this was for the sake of the blessed Lot, who served God faithfully among them, so that aided by such a gift of divine protection and delivered from their miseries, they might learn, leaving their errors, to serve God and follow his example in good works, by whom and through whom they were saved by God's grace. But because they neither wished to be corrected by divine chastisements nor by gifts to abandon their iniquity, but rather daily added new crimes to their old wickedness, it remained that they be damned by heavenly wrath permanently. This kind of correction and punishment continues to this day, indeed until the end of the age, against the impious and sinners, for those who care neither for heavenly benefits nor chastisements are subsequently condemned by heavenly vengeance. In this way, the world itself will finally meet its end, when men throughout the whole earth, ungrateful for heavenly gifts and insensitive to chastisements, will suddenly be swept to eternal destruction by the whirlwind of the last judgment. And indeed, it is mentioned that all these came together in the wooded valley which is now the Salt Sea, anticipating where the battle took place. For it is explained later what the cause of the duel was and by what route the hostile army, after causing massive destruction, came there: so that the greater the power of the adversaries is shown, the mightier the faith of Abraham appears, by which he easily broke all their strength. The wooded valley is the region where at that time Pentapolis, that is, the province of Sodom and neighboring cities, was located. Now, however, after being overflowed following the fire with waters from the Jordan, it is called the Salt Sea or the Dead Sea in sacred Scripture, but by Greek historians it is called the Asphaltite Lake, that is, the lake of bitumen, and it is located between Jericho and Zoar.

And the Horites in the mountains of Seir. Indeed, these mountains, along with the neighboring regions, were possessed by the sons of Esau, who was also called Seir, because he was hairy, after the Horites were expelled. However, it seems likely that it was not he (i.e., Esau) himself, but another Seir from whom the mountains of Seir took their name: namely, the patriarch of the Horites, from whose lineage Esau took a wife. The Scripture says in the following: "Esau took wives from the daughters of Canaan, Ada the daughter of Elon the Hittite, and Oholibamah the daughter of Anah the son of Zibeon the Hivite" (Genesis 36:2). What this lineage was or from where it originated is revealed shortly after, when, enumerating the lineage of Esau, it concludes thus: "These are the chiefs of Oholibamah the daughter of Anah, wife of Esau, these are the sons of Esau, and these are their chiefs. He is Edom"; and immediately a new title is attached, which says: "These are the sons of Seir the Horite, inhabitants of the land, Lotan, Shobal, and Zibeon." And soon after: "And these are the sons of Zibeon, Aiah and Anah. This is Anah who found the hot springs in the wilderness while he was pasturing the donkeys of Zibeon, his father, and he had a son Dishan and a daughter Oholibamah." Therefore, when Esau had a wife from the lineage of the Horites, Oholibamah the daughter of Anah the son of Zibeon the son of Seir, it is established that the mountains of Seir, where the Horites were struck down, did not take their name from Esau who began to possess those places long after he was born, but from Seir the patriarch of those same Horites.