Kejadian 15:18

15:18 That day the Lord made a covenant ¹  with Abram: “To your descendants I give ²  this land, from the river of Egypt ³  to the great river, the Euphrates River –

Kejadian 15:2

15:2 But Abram said, “O sovereign Lord, ⁴  what will you give me since ⁵  I continue to be ⁶  childless, and my heir ⁷  is ⁸  Eliezer of Damascus?” ⁹ 

1 Raja-raja 18:21

18:21 Elijah approached all the people and said, “How long are you going to be paralyzed by indecision? ¹⁰  If the Lord is the true God, ¹¹  then follow him, but if Baal is, follow him!” But the people did not say a word.

Yeremia 46:25

46:25 The Lord God of Israel who rules over all ¹²  says, “I will punish Amon, the god of Thebes. ¹³  I will punish Egypt, its gods, and its kings. I will punish Pharaoh and all who trust in him. ¹⁴ 

[15:18]  ¹ tn Heb “cut a covenant.”

[15:18]  ² tn The perfect verbal form is understood as instantaneous (“I here and now give”). Another option is to understand it as rhetorical, indicating certitude (“I have given” meaning it is as good as done, i.e., “I will surely give”).

[15:18]  sn To your descendants I give this land. The Lord here unconditionally promises that Abram’s descendants will possess the land, but he does not yet ratify his earlier promises to give Abram a multitude of descendants and eternal possession of the land. The fulfillment of those aspects of the promise remain conditional (see Gen 17:1-8) and are ratified after Abraham offers up his son Isaac (see Gen 22:1-19). For a fuller discussion see R. B. Chisholm, “Evidence from Genesis,” A Case for Premillennialism, 35-54.

[15:18]  ³ sn The river of Egypt is a wadi (a seasonal stream) on the northeastern border of Egypt, not to the River Nile.

[15:2]  ⁴ 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]  ⁵ tn The vav (ו) disjunctive at the beginning of the clause is circumstantial, expressing the cause or reason.

[15:2]  ⁶ tn Heb “I am going.”

[15:2]  ⁷ 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]  ⁸ tn The pronoun is anaphoric here, equivalent to the verb “to be” (R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 23, §115).

[15:2]  ⁹ 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.

[18:21]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “How long are you going to limp around on two crutches?” (see HALOT 762 s.v. סְעִפִּים). In context this idiomatic expression refers to indecision rather than physical disability.

[18:21]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the God.”

[46:25]  ¹² tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God of Israel.” For the significance of this title see the note at 2:19.

[46:25]  ¹³ tn Heb “Amon of No.”

[46:25]  sn The Egyptian city called No (נֹא, no’) in Hebrew was Thebes. It is located about 400 miles (666 km) south of modern-day Cairo. It was the capital of Upper or southern Egypt and the center for the worship of the God Amon who became the state god of Egypt. Thebes is perhaps best known today for the magnificent temples at Karnak and Luxor on the east bank of the Nile.

[46:25]  ¹⁴ tc Heb “Behold I will punish Amon of No and Pharaoh and Egypt and its gods and its kings and Pharaoh and all who trust in him.” There appears to be a copyist slip involving a double writing of וְעַל־פַּרְעֹה (vÿ’al-par’oh). The present translation has followed the suggestion of BHS and deleted the first one since the second is necessary for the syntactical connection, “Pharaoh and all who trust in him.”