“Genesis 15:7-11”

Tuesday, November 26, 2019

“And He said to him, ‘I am the Lord who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to possess it.’ He said, ‘O Lord God, how may I know that I will possess it?’ So He said to him, ‘Bring Me a three year old heifer, and a three year old female goat, and a three year old ram, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon.’ Then he brought all these to Him and cut them in two, and laid each half opposite the other; but he did not cut the birds. The birds of prey came down upon the carcasses, and Abram drove them away.”

---End of Scripture verses---

“I am the Lord…” (verse 7) This is the first of many times that the Lord invokes a declaration of His divine identity. When He does this, He follows with a solemn affirmation of absolute truth and authority. He is not so much introducing himself, but emphasizing that He is not one to be doubted or trifled with. The Lord used this expression to proclaim His absolute power to Moses and the children of Israel in Exodus 20:2-3 when issuing the Ten Commandments. “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before Me.” As He reminded His liberated children that it was He who brought them out of the land of Egypt, so He declared to Abram that it was by the strong arm of the Lord that he was “brought…out of Ur of the Chaldeans…” As He called and delivered Israel out of Egypt to give them the Promised Land, so He called and brought their forebear out of Ur to “give” him “this land to possess it” in anticipation of that later inheritance.

“O Lord God, how may I know that I will possess it?” (verse 8) Since God would only truly grant this land as a possession to future generations of his offspring, Abram requests some sort of assurance of its fulfillment or understanding of how the implementation of this promise would unfold. “The Lord now directs him to make ready the things requisite for entering into a formal covenant regarding the land. These include all the kinds of animals afterward used in sacrifice. The number three is sacred, and denotes the perfection of the victim in point of maturity. The division of the animals refers to the covenant between two parties, who participate in the rights which it guarantees. The birds are two without being divided.” (Barnes’ Notes on the Bible)

“The text does not explain the elaborate ritual that is followed. Clearly no sacrifice is involved, for there is no altar, no mention of the sprinkling of blood as in Exodus 24:8, and no suggestion that the animals are either eaten or burnt. The meaning of the ceremonials is to be sought elsewhere. The Hebrew term for covenant-making is k-r-t, literally ‘to cut a covenant; (v. 18)… The cutting up of the animal was a crucial element in the treaty-making procedure. Its retributive meaning is suggested by the only other biblical parallel. When, in the days of Jeremiah, the nobility of Jerusalem proclaimed a wholesale emancipation of slaves during the Babylonian siege, only to reverse themselves later, the prophet thundered: ‘Lo! I proclaim your release—declares the Lord—to the sword, to pestilence, and to famine; and I will make you a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth. I will make the men who violated My covenant…which they made before Me, [like] the calf which they cut in two so as to pass between the halves…they shall be handed over to their enemies, to those who seek to kill them. Their carcasses shall become food for the birds of the sky and beasts of the earth…’ (Jer. 34:17-20). The cutting of the animals is thus a form of self-imprecation in which the potential violator invokes their fate upon himself… The fate of the animal is explicitly projected upon the violator.” (Nahum Sarna)

“The birds of prey came down upon the carcasses, and Abram drove them away.” (verse 11) “The birds of prey, regarded as unclean, swooping down threatened to carry off the pieces of flesh. This would have interrupted the ceremony with an evil omen, polluted the sacrifice, and impaired the covenant. Abram drives away the birds of ill omen. In the context, these birds evidently symbolized the Egyptians, who threatened, by enslaving Israel in Egypt, to frustrate the fulfilment of the Divine promise to the seed of Abram. The chasing away of the birds typified the surmounting of all obstacles.” (Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges)

Remember that verse one tells us “the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision…” The text gives no clear indication as to when this vision ended, and these verses with the severed animals and birds of prey may be a continuation of it. But whether Abram literally prepared the animals for the invocation of the covenant and chased away actual birds of prey, or it all came to pass in the course of divinely induced reverie, the validity of the covenant is not affected in the slightest. The great God of heaven declared these things to be true, and “it is impossible for God to lie.” (Hebrews 6:18)

Please read Genesis 15:12-16 for tomorrow.

Have a great day!

- Louie Taylor

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