Kejadian 13:14-17

13:14 After Lot had departed, the Lord said to Abram, ¹  “Look ²  from the place where you stand to the north, south, east, and west. 13:15 I will give all the land that you see to you and your descendants ³  forever. 13:16 And I will make your descendants like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone is able to count the dust of the earth, then your descendants also can be counted. ⁴  13:17 Get up and ⁵  walk throughout ⁶  the land, ⁷  for I will give it to you.”

Kejadian 15:2

15:2 But Abram said, “O sovereign Lord, ⁸  what will you give me since ⁹  I continue to be ¹⁰  childless, and my heir ¹¹  is ¹²  Eliezer of Damascus?” ¹³ 

[13:14]  ¹ tn Heb “and the Lord said to Abram after Lot separated himself from with him.” The disjunctive clause at the beginning of the verse signals a new scene.

[13:14]  ² tn Heb “lift up your eyes and see.”

[13:14]  sn Look. Earlier Lot “looked up” (v. 10), but here Abram is told by God to do so. The repetition of the expression (Heb “lift up the eyes”) here underscores how the Lord will have the last word and actually do for Abram what Abram did for Lot – give him the land. It seems to be one of the ways that God rewards faith.

[13:15]  ³ tn Heb “for all the land which you see to you I will give it and to your descendants.”

[13:16]  ⁴ tn The translation “can be counted” (potential imperfect) is suggested by the use of יוּכַל (yukhal, “is able”) in the preceding clause.

[13:17]  ⁵ tn The connective “and” is not present in the Hebrew text; it has been supplied for purposes of English style.

[13:17]  ⁶ tn The Hitpael form הִתְהַלֵּךְ (hithallekh) means “to walk about”; it also can carry the ideas of moving about, traversing, going back and forth, or living in an area. It here has the connotation of traversing the land to survey it, to look it over.

[13:17]  ⁷ tn Heb “the land to its length and to its breadth.” This phrase has not been included in the translation because it is somewhat redundant (see the note on the word “throughout” in this verse).

[15:2]  ⁸ tn The Hebrew text has אֲדֹנָי יֱהוִה (’adonay yehvih, “Master, Lord”). Since the tetragrammaton (YHWH) usually is pointed with the vowels for the Hebrew word אֲדֹנָי (’adonay, “master”) to avoid pronouncing the divine name, that would lead in this place to a repetition of אֲדֹנָי. So the tetragrammaton is here pointed with the vowels for the word אֱלֹהִים (’elohim, “God”) instead. That would produce the reading of the Hebrew as “Master, God” in the Jewish textual tradition. But the presence of “Master” before the holy name is rather compelling evidence that the original would have been “Master, Lord,” which is rendered here “sovereign Lord.”

[15:2]  ⁹ tn The vav (ו) disjunctive at the beginning of the clause is circumstantial, expressing the cause or reason.

[15:2]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “I am going.”

[15:2]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the son of the acquisition of my house.”

[15:2]  sn For the custom of designating a member of the household as heir, see C. H. Gordon, “Biblical Customs and the Nuzu Tablets,” Biblical Archaeologist Reader, 2:21-33.

[15:2]  ¹² tn The pronoun is anaphoric here, equivalent to the verb “to be” (R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 23, §115).

[15:2]  ¹³ sn The sentence in the Hebrew text employs a very effective wordplay on the name Damascus: “The son of the acquisition (בֶּן־מֶשֶׁק, ben-mesheq) of my house is Eliezer of Damascus (דַּמֶּשֶׁק, dammesheq).” The words are not the same; they have different sibilants. But the sound play gives the impression that “in the nomen is the omen.” Eliezer the Damascene will be Abram’s heir if Abram dies childless because “Damascus” seems to mean that. See M. F. Unger, “Some Comments on the Text of Genesis 15:2-3,” JBL 72 (1953): 49-50; H. L. Ginsberg, “Abram’s ‘Damascene’ Steward,” BASOR 200 (1970): 31-32.