genesis 13-15 - boring

There are fifty chapters in the Book of Genesis. In some of these, a lot happens, so much that the details are glossed over. Those sections deserve to be expanded into several chapters. Other chapters, however, contain almost nothing of importance. They are genealogies, or, as in the case of our present subject, devoted almost entirely to a single issue which could easily have been communicated in a couple of verses at the most. The next three chapters are examples of the latter.

In Chapter 13, we are told that Abram and Lot are both rich. Both have lots of flocks, herds, and tents. There is not enough room in Canaan – where they have returned – for both of them. Abram suggests that they separate into two groups. Lot chooses Jordan, which lies to the east. Abram remains in Canaan. God repeats his promise to Abram.

That’s it. That’s what this entire chapter is all about. There is a brief mention here of the wickedness of the men of Sodom (Genesis 13:13), but, since that won’t be important until much later, I will wait until then to discuss it.

Chapter 14 describes the sack of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by a coalition of neighboring armies. No mention of their “wickedness” is made here. Lot had settled in Sodom, and is captured. An escapee from the battle tells Abram about his nephew’s capture, and Abram sets off after him with his army of slaves (Genesis 14:14). Lot is returned to Sodom, along with all the treasures which the attackers had taken. The end.

Chapter 15 at least contains an interesting sequence in which God commands Abram to engage in a bit of extispicy, or divination by examining the entrails of animals. This is noteworthy because it produces a vision in which Abram glimpses the Egyptian captivity.

This is one of the passages that fundamentalist Christians cite when they claim that the Bible is full of prophecies that have been fulfilled. This is dubious, however. The extant Tanakh/Old Testament was compiled long after its original source texts were written. Those texts had been revised over hundreds of years, often to support concepts that were not important when they were first written, but which became important later on. Thus, there is no way to know which came first: the vision, or the Egyptian captivity.

If the Egyptian captivity actually occurred, that is (but we still have a long way to go before we get that far).

…

I must admit that it is around this point that I lose tract of which source is which. That is because the phrase “LORD God” begins to appear. Up until now, I have used the terms “God” and “LORD” as markers for the Priestly and Jahwist sources respectively, but “LORD God” confuses that.

I can say that we start encountering the Elohist source around this time. It exclusively used the term “Elohim” for God, whereas the Priestly source used both “Elohim” and “El Shaddai” (In earlier posts, I stated that the Priestly source used the term “El”; that was an error on my part. “El” comes from the ancient Semitic religion, but you can still see its influence on these later terms.) The Elohist source mostly echoes the content of the Jahwist and Priestly sources, but adds a new spin on some of them. When possible, I will note this; one example is particularly intriguing.