G-d speaks to Abram, commanding him to "Go from your land, from your birthplace and from your father's house, to the land which I will show you." There, G-d says, he will be made into a great nation. Abram and his wife Sarai, accompanied by his nephew

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Overview
G-d speaks to Abram, commanding him to "Go from
your land, from your birthplace and from your
father's house, to the land which I will show
you." There, G-d says, he will be made into a
great nation. Abram and his wife Sarai,
accompanied by his nephew Lot, journey to the
Land of Canaan, where Abram builds an altar and
continues to spread the message of a One G-d. A
famine forces Avram to depart for Egypt, where
beautiful Sarai is taken to Pharaoh's palace
Abram escapes death because they present
themselves as brother and sister. A plague
prevents the Egyptian king from touching her and
convinces him to return her to Abram and
compensate the brother-revealed-as-husband with
gold, silver and cattle. Back in the Land of
Canaan, Lot separates from Abram and settles in
the evil city of Sodom, where he falls captive
when the mighty armies of Chedorlaomer and his
three allies conquer the five cities of the Sodom
Valley. Abram sets out with a small band to
rescue his nephew, defeats the four kings, and is
blessed by Malki-Zedek the king of Salem
(Jerusalem). G-d seals the Covenant Between the
Parts with Abram, in which the exile and
persecution of the people of Israel is foretold
and the Holy Land is bequeathed to them as their
eternal heritage Still childless ten years after
their arrival in the Land, Sarai tells Abram to
marry her maidservant Hagar. Hagar conceives,
becomes insolent toward her mistress, and then
flees when Sarai treats her harshly an angel
convinces her to return and tells her that her
son will father a populous nation. Ishmael is
born in Abram's 86th year. Thirteen years later,
G-d changes Abram's name to Abraham ("father of
multitudes") and Sarai's to Sarah ("princess"),
and promises that a son will be born to them
from this child, whom they should call Isaac
("will laugh"), will stem the great nation with
which G-d will establish His special bond.
Abraham is commanded to circumcise himself and
his descendents as a "sign of the covenant
between Me and you."
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Eber and the Hebrews

• Eber was a great grandson of Noah's son Shem and
  the father of Peleg and Joktan. He was an
  ancestor of Abraham and hence of the Israelites.
• Legend says that Eber refused to help with the
  building of the Tower of Babel, so his language
  was not confused when it fell. He and his family
  alone retained the original human language,
  called Hebrew, named after Eber.
• In practice, the name "Eber" is most often
  associated as the root of the word "Hebrew", but
  others also associate the name with region beyond
  or across, opposite side, passage, or
  relationship with G_d. Wikipedia
• Is Abraham the first Hebrew? The Hebrew word for
  "Hebrew" is eevriyt and comes from the root word
  which means "to cross over". A Hebrew is "one who
  has crossed over". The word Eber also comes from
  the same root word making it possible that Eber
  was also considered a "Hebrew". The Bible is the
  story of God and his covenant relationship
  (Hebraicly understood as crossing over from death
  to life) with an ancestral line beginning with
  Adam through his descendants Noah, Abraham,
  Isaac, Jacob and Jacob's descendants who became
  the Nation of Israel" also known as "the
  Hebrews". It is possible that a Hebrew was one
  who had "crossed over" into a covenant
  relationship with God, which would have begun
  with Adam. Ancient Hebrew Research Center

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Abraham and the Chauldians

• Abram was born in Kuta, another name for Ur of
  the Chaldees. R. Hisda said The small side of
  Kutha is Ur of the Chaldees. Talmud - Mas. Baba
  Bathra 91a

Joel C. Slayton (ABD, "Chesed," 1992) " CHESED
(PERSON) Heb kesed. The fourth son of Nahor and
Milcah (Gen 2222). Although it occurs only once
in the Bible, this name has been associated with
the people known in the Bible as the Chaldeans.
The Old Babylonian term kasdu, which became kaldû
in Assyrian documents, is the equivalent of this
term, which translates chaldion. A connection
could be drawn between the clan of Chesed and
these Mesopotamian "Chaldeans."
Possible Birthplace of Abram Located in Southeast
Turkey Katah, Urah, Ur
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Map 2
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The Chauldians

• Abraham, endowed with great sagacity, with a
  higher knowledge of God and greater virtues than
  all the rest, was determined to change the
  erroneous opinions of men. He was the first who
  had the courage to proclaim God as the sole
  Creator of the universe, to whose will all the
  heavenly bodies are subject, for they by their
  motions show their dependence on Him. His
  opposition to astrology provoked the wrath of the
  Chaldeans. Afterward, when he came to Egypt, he
  entered into disputes with all the priests and
  the wise men, and won their admiration and, in
  many cases, their assent to his higher views. He
  imparted to them the knowledge of arithmetic and
  astronomy, which sciences came to Egypt from
  Chaldea only in the days of Abraham. Josephus
  ("Ant." i. 7, 8)
• Abraham's revolt from Chaldean astrology is
  spoken of in Philo ("On Abraham," xvii.), in
  connection with Gen. xv. 5 (compare Gen. R.
  xliv.).
• The Chauldians are noted for the following
• Science and Math
• Mysticism
• Spirituality
• Astronomy
• Astrology
• First to discover Copper Smelting, later Bronze
  and still later Iron Working.

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AbrahamFather of Nations
Abraham
Yitzchak
Yishmael
Jacob
Esau
Arabs
Bnei Israel
Christians
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Break

• QuestionsComments

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?  ????????? ?????? ???-???????, ????-????
?????????? ????????????????? ????????? ???????,
???-???????, ?????? ?????????. 1 Now the LORD
said unto Abram 'Get thee out of thy country,
and from thy kindred, and from thy father's
house, unto the land that I will show thee.
This parshah begins with HaShem's commandment to
Avraham Lech lecha meartzecha, "Go out from your
land." HaShem is telling Avraham to leave his
father's home in Haran and journey to Eretz
Yisrael. But why does HaShem say lech lecha? Why
doesn't He just say "lech - Go"? Lech lecha can
be translated "Go to yourself." HaShem is not
just instructing Avraham to travel. HaShem is
telling him You are now starting your lifetime
journey. You will be passing through many places,
traveling on many paths. Remember, wherever you
go - go to yourself. What does it mean to go to
ourselves? Our real self is our neshamah, which
wants to serve HaShem, fulfill His commandments
and feel close to Him. So lech lecha means that
on all our journeys - wherever we go and whatever
we do - we will really be going towards
ourselves. We will be coming closer to our
neshamah's goal of serving HaShem. Rabbi Menachem
M. Schneerson
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• 1. "Get you, out of your country..." (Beresheet
  121). Rabbi Aba opened the discussion with THIS
  VERSE AND TO EXPLAIN THE REASON WHY AVRAHAM
  MERITED THAT THE HOLY ONE, BLESSED BE HE, WOULD
  SAY THIS TO HIM RATHER THAN TO ANY OTHER PERSON
  OF HIS TIME.
• "Hearken to me, you stout-hearted, that are far
  from righteousness" (Yeshayah 4612),
• MEANS how hard are the hearts of the wicked, who
  see the paths and the ways of Torah, yet do not
  observe them.
• THE PATHS ARE THE INTERNAL ASPECTS THE WAYS ARE
  THE EXTERNAL ASPECTS.
• And the hearts of the wicked are stout, as they
  do not repent and turn back to their Master. THIS
  IS THE REASON WHY they are called stouthearted.
  The verse, "that are far from righteousness,"
  MEANS THAT they keep them selves far from Torah
• THIS IS WHY THEY REMAIN "FAR FROM RIGHTEOUSNESS.
  Zohar Lech Lecha 1

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• From the time that G-d said to our father Abraham
  "Go from your land..." and "Abraham went on,
  journeying southward", began the process of
  birurim -- of extracting the sparks of holiness
  that are scattered throughout creation, buried
  within the material existence.By the decree of
  Divine providence, a person wanders about in his
  travels, as the Cause of All Causes brings about
  the many circumstances and pretexts that bring a
  person to those places where the sparks that
  belong to his or her soul await their redemption.
  (Rabbi Sholom DovBer of Lubavitch)

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• Our age has sought to devour distance and time,
  rendering everything in a constant and immediate
  present. Now this. Now that. Everything today is
  in the present . For so many of us there is no
  yesterday or tomorrow. Its just today!
• All of this makes our spiritual development more
  and more challenging. Spirituality is a path. And
  like a path you have to walk down it one step at
  a time. Your fingers cannot do the walking on the
  spiritual path. You cannot download it from the
  Internet.
• Everything in the physical world is a paradigm,
  an incarnation, of a higher spiritual idea.
  Travel is the physical equivalent of the
  spiritual road. The quest for spirituality
  demands that we travel, but this journey is not a
  physical journey. Many make the mistake of
  thinking that hitchhiking around the world and
  experiencing different cultures will
  automatically make them more spiritual. The truth
  is that wherever you go, there you are.
• Spiritual growth requires the soul to journey.
  Our souls must make the same journey that Avram
  did. The spiritual road requires us to forsake
  the comfortable, the familiar ever-repeating
  landmarks of our personalities, and set out with
  an open mind and a humble soul. We must divest
  ourselves of the fawning icons of our own egos
  which we define and confine us, and journey.
• Life's essential journey is that of the soul
  discovering its true identity. We learn this from
  the first two words in this week's Torah portion.
  "Lech lecha." "Go to yourself." Without vowels,
  these two words are written identically. When G-d
  took Avraham out of Ur Kasdim and sent him to the
  Land of Israel, He used those two identical
  words "Lech lecha", "Go to yourself."
• Avraham experienced ten tests in his spiritual
  journey. Each was meant to elevate him to his
  ultimate spiritual potential. When G-d gives us a
  test, whether it's the death of a loved one or a
  financial reversal or an illness, it's always to
  help us grow. By conquering the obstacles in our
  spiritual path, be it lack of trust in G-d or
  selfishness or apathy, we grow in stature. We
  connect with the fundamental purpose of the
  journey, to journey away from our negative traits
  and reach and realize our true selves. Rabbi
  Yaakov Asher Sinclair

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The Trials

• Rashi
• 1) Abraham hid underground for 13 years
  from King Nimrod, who wanted to kill him.
• 2) Nimrod flung Abraham into a burning
  furnace.
• 3) Abraham was commanded to leave his
  family and homeland.
• 4) Almost as soon as he arrived in Canaan,
  he was forced to leave to escape a famine.
• 5) Sarah was kidnapped by Pharaoh's
  officials
• 6) The kings captured Lot, and Abraham was
  forced to go to war to rescue him.
• 7) God told Abraham that his offspring
  would suffer under 4 monarchies.
• 8) At an advanced age, he was commanded to
  circumcise himself and his son.
• 9) He was commanded to drive away Ishmael
  and Hagar.
• 10) He was commanded to sacrifice Isaac.

• Rambam
• 1) Abraham's exile from his family and
  homeland.
• 2) The hunger in Canaan after God had
  assured him that he would become a great nation
  there.
• 3) The corruption in Egypt that resulted in
  the abduction of Sarah.
• 4) The war with the 4 kings.
• 5) The marriage to Hagar after having
  despaired that Sarah would ever give birth.
• 6) The commandment of circumcision.
• 7) Abimelech's abduction of Sarah.
• 8) Driving away Hagar after she had given
  birth.
• 9) The very distasteful command to drive
  away Ishmael.
• 10) The binding of Isaac on the altar.

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The Trials

• Throughout Jewish literature, the Sages make
  frequent reference to the ten trials of Abraham.
  Through them Abraham was accorded special status
  as servant of G-d and progenitor of the Jewish
  People.
• There is a fascinating unifying thread running
  through many of the tests of Abraham. To some
  degree, each time the issue wasn't just the
  physical inconvenience -- traveling to Egypt,
  purchasing a burial plot, etc. It was the sense
  that it ran contrary to everything G-d had
  promised Abraham -- and everything Abraham might
  well have expected for being G-d's trusted
  servant. Abraham and Sarah dedicated their lives
  and very beings to the teaching of Gd's reality
  to mankind. G-d in turn promised them success,
  recognition, children, and the Land of Israel.
  Yet none of these blessings were realized until
  years later, if at all in their lifetimes.
• It's quite natural for someone to feel that if he
  or she is serving G-d properly, the least G-d
  could do is respond with health, success and
  honor. And Abraham and Sarah were as justified as
  anyone in this regard. Yet their lives were far
  from serene -- often on account of their beliefs
  Nimrod's attempt at Abraham's life, Sarah's
  abductions, Abraham and Sarah's years of
  childlessness. The L-rd is a G-d of reward and
  punishment, isn't He? That's certainly what
  Abraham and Sarah had been teaching the rest of
  the world! So why had they not received their own
  due?
• Yet such complaints were never heard from
  Abraham's lips -- nor even expressed in his
  heart. If G-d's will were that Abraham and Sarah
  serve Him through suffering and exile -- or that
  they return the one son G-d had blessed them with
  -- they would do so without any sense of hurt or
  betrayal. G-d's will was their will. None other
  existed. Their devotion to G-d was complete. They
  were in it for G-d, with no thought of their own
  personal goals or agendas.
• Thus, in passing G-d's trials, Abraham
  demonstrated that he was not serving G-d with
  even the slightest consideration of personal gain
  -- nor even because teaching the world about G-d
  was what he liked doing. Had that been the
  case, he was certainly prepared to sacrifice it
  all along with the sacrifice of his son. The
  binding of Isaac -- the most difficult and final
  test of Abraham -- would have ruined Abraham's
  life -- not only through the loss of his beloved
  son but in that it would have flown in the face
  of everything he and Sarah had spent their lives
  preaching. After devoting his life teaching of a
  just and moral G-d - - rather than -- as much of
  the world then believed -- an angry god who must
  be appeased with human sacrifice -- how could he
  ever continue his works after apparently lapsing
  and offering a human himself? But Abraham was
  willing to give up everything -- his sacred
  life's works along with the entire unborn Jewish
  People -- for the simple yet profound reason that
  it was G-d's will. Rabbi Dovid Rosenfeld

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?  ???????????, ?????? ???????, ????????????,
???????????? ??????? ???????, ????????. "I will
make you into a big nation I will bless you, and
make you famous and youwill be a blessing."
(122)
In Pirkei Avot (12) we learn that the world
stands on three pillars 1) The study of Torah,
2) avodah - the service of G-d, and 3) gemilat
chassadim - acts of kindness, tzedakah. The
patriarchs each epitomize one of these pillars.
Avraham chessed (2133), Yitzchak avodah
(2463), Yaakov Torah (2527). According to
Rashi, the pasuk is projecting the history of
Klal Yisrael. There will be a time when the major
relationship between the Jews and Hashem will be
through the study of Torah (Elokei Yaakov). Other
times it will be through tefillah - prayer
(Elokei Yitzchak), and there will be a period
when it will be through chessed - tzedakah
(Elokei Avraham). However, the "concluding
phase" of galut and the coming of Mashiach will
not be dependent on all three pillars, but in
zechut of tzedakah alone, which is personified by
Avraham. Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson)
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The Covenant
?  ?????????? ????????, ??????? ?????????
?????????? ???????, ???????? ?????

• 2 And I will make My covenant between Me and
  thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly.'
• 3 And Abram fell on his face and God talked with
  him, saying
• 4 'As for Me, behold, My covenant is with thee,
  and thou shalt be the father of a multitude of
  nations.
• 5 Neither shall thy name any more be called
  Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham for the
  father of a multitude of nations have I made
  thee.
• 6 And I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I
  will make nations of thee, and kings shall come
  out of thee.
• 7 And I will establish My covenant between Me and
  thee and thy seed after thee throughout their
  generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a
  God unto thee and to thy seed after thee.
• 8 And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed
  after thee, the land of thy sojournings, all the
  land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession
  and I will be their God.'
• 9 And God said unto Abraham 'And as for thee,
  thou shalt keep My covenant, thou, and thy seed
  after thee throughout their generations.
• 10 This is My covenant, which ye shall keep,
  between Me and you and thy seed after thee every
  male among you shall be circumcised
• 11 And ye shall be circumcised in the flesh of
  your foreskin and it shall be a token of a
  covenant betwixt Me and you. Beresheet 17

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Journeys 1
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????? ???????

• In the beginning God Created the spiritual world
  and the material world.
• The Zohar teaches that each of us was created by
  a Supernal Spark engraved with the name of HaShem
  which was inserted into our Souls at the moment
  of conception. This is the tether that binds us
  to HaShem. Not in a tether to the material world
  but to HaShem in the Spiritual World.
• Torah teaches that we are here to live, learn,
  work, do correction and do Chesed for the sake of
  HaShem.
• To do so requires that we all take a journey from
  the Material World to the Spiritual.

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Journeys 2

• Abram journey to Canaan was not only to inherit
  land but was really for Abram to come closer to
  HaShem. He does this with ten trials each one
  more difficult. Each trial requires that he start
  at the bottom to reach the top of those levels so
  that he could progress to the next level. This
  journey is an Educational and Spiritual process
  to unite Abram to the Creator.
• Isaacs journey is to his near death but in
  passing his test Isaac is elevated to the level
  of a Holy Korbin.
• Jacob flees from Esau and is forced to work in
  indentured servitude for Laban. He does so and
  becomes the father of Bnei Israel.
• Joseph the spark of hope in the eye of Jacob is
  sold into slavery by his brothers to become the
  Visor to the Pharaoh.
• Moses born a Hebrew is raised in Pharaoh's home
  to be forced to flee Mitzraim where he is
  elevated to the level of being the greatest of
  all our Prophets.
• Our ancestors were enslaved in Mitzraim and
  journeyed to Sinai where there are elevated to
  the Nation of HaShems Priests.

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Journeys 3

• HaShem keeps his Covenant but we the Jewish
  People fail and are brought low in the eyes of
  HaShem.
• Our Holy Temple built by Solomon is destroyed and
  our People are enslaved in Babylon. When we are
  at our lowest HaShem remembers His Covenant and
  we are restored to Our Land. We are permitted to
  rebuild our Temple. This Temple is a shadow of
  the first.
• Five Hundred Years pass and a new Emperor enters
  the stage. Herod rebuilds our Temple to a new
  material glory but pure simple hatred destroys
  our Temple.
• Our People are once again enslaved, killed and
  tortured. Our Land is destroyed and a Pagan
  Temple is built where the Temple once stood. We
  are dispersed throughout the world. Even our City
  of Jerusalem is renamed Ari Capitolina. Jews are
  forbidden to enter the City.
• Our enslavement is not for 70 years but until
  1948 and continues to some degree today.
• Our Jewish People are murdered and chassed out of
  every country culminating in the Shoah.
• HaShem remembers his Covenant and miraculously
  just three years after six million Jews perish we
  are brought back home in Our Land with a new
  Country we call Israel.
• Today we the Jewish People have once again
  largely forgotten HaShem. We have once again
  broken our word. Yet HaShem is still there
  watching and waiting patiently for us.

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Journeys 4

• The Torah is not just the blueprint to creation
  it is also the road map to our Spiritual journey
  to come closer to the Creator.
• Our Prophets tell us that in the future a great
  war will occur in which most of our material
  world will be destroyed.
• HaShem will keep His word and in spite of all
  odds, will send our Messiah who will save the
  Jewish People and once and for all times, bring
  Peace to Our People, so that we may at last serve
  Him.

May it be Your Will, HaShem, that the Holy
Temple be rebuilt speedily in our days and grant
us our share in Your Torah. Shabbat Shalom