Abram to Abraham
Every year Israel honours the millions of Jews who returned to the land from every corner of the earth. They call it Aliyah Day, a national holiday. This is also the time when reading and meditation of Genesis 12 is common, especially verse 1 where God tells Abram, “Go from your land, from your birthplace and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you.”
For many Jews that meant leaving the country of birth, their careers, native languages, and moving to the land of Israel. That changed everything- where children eventually grew up, the languages their grandchildren would speak, their family story for generations; it changed the destiny of individuals and families forever. That is Abram to Abraham’s transformation.
In the Bible, when God calls, and the person chooses to respond to God’s call, God transforms that person and often gives him a new name. After Jacob’s wrestle with the angel, God gives him a new name, Israel. (Genesis 32:28). Abram called to leave the country of his birth, eventually becomes Abraham. We would expect that God would give Abram a new name the moment he left home. Abram obeyed God and walked away from everything that was familiar to him. Yet Abram arrives in the land and remains Abram through famine, war, and years of waiting for land and a son. Only twenty-four years later, at the age of ninety-nine does God give him a new name, Abraham. (Genesis 17:5)
Why this long wait? Wasn’t the decision to leave home itself worthy of a new name and identity?
To understand this, we need to understand the meaning of the two names, Abram and Abraham. In Hebrew, Abram is Avram (read as Av-ram), “father of Aram.” Aram was Abram’s home, in Mesopotamia, where he was born and grew up. (Genesis 24:4,10). His name identified him to the land of his birth, he was a “son of Aram,” a leader among his own people.Abraham is Avraham, and God explains his name: av hamon goyim, “the father of a multitude of nations.” (Genesis 17:5). Abram belonged to one nation, Abraham belonged to the entire world, all nations.
The new name is a new identity, and identity does not change overnight.
Abram left Aram in a single day. But getting Aram out of Abram took twenty-four years.
How did Abram’s identity change? Through various tests. But why test Abram at all? God already knew what was in his heart.
God tested Abraham “to bring the matter from potential into reality.” The “father of nations” was always hidden inside Abram. The tests did not create his greatness. They brought it out, one test at a time.
Leaving his homeland was only the first test.
Soon after Abram arrived, a famine drove him down to Egypt (Genesis 12:10).
Then came war against four mighty kings to rescue his nephew Lot (Genesis 14).
And for decades, he waited for the son God promised him (Genesis 15:2-3).
Each test asked Abram the same question: who are you now?
Test by test, the man from Aram fell away, and a new man took his place. Only then did God give him the name that matched the man he became.
Abraham’s tests are being replayed in our generation, one by one.
The first test comes before the journey even begins.
The Bible tells us almost nothing about Abram’s life before God called him. But it does include one strange detail: Abram’s brother Haran “died in the lifetime of his father Terah, in the land of his birth, in Ur of the Chaldeans” (Genesis 11:28). Why did Haran die so young? And why does the Bible bother to tell us where? In Hebrew, ur means fire. Later, God tells Abram: “I am the Lord who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans” (Genesis 15:7). Literally. God brought Abram out of the fire.
Ancient Jewish teaching fills in the gaps in the biblical narrative. Abram grew up in a city of idol worshippers. His own father, Terah, sold idols in a shop. Abram became convinced that the idols were worthless and that one God created the world, so he smashed the idols in his father’s shop. Terah handed his son over to Nimrod, the king. When Abram refused to bow to the king’s gods, Nimrod ordered him thrown into a fiery furnace.
Abram’s brother Haran stood in the crowd and made a calculation. If Abram survives, I will say I am with Abram. If Nimrod wins, I will say I am with Nimrod. God miraculously saved Abram from the flames of the furnace, and he walked out unscathed. Then everyone turned to Haran: whose side are you on? Seeing that Abram survived, Haran answered, “I’m with Abram.” They then threw Haran into the furnace, and he burned to death. That, the Sages (ancient Jewish teachers) teach, is how Haran died in Ur.
Abram and Haran stood before the same fire, but they asked different questions. Abram asked: what is true? Haran asked: who is going to win? Abram searched for the truth, found it, and was willing to die for it. Haran never cared about the truth at all. He only wanted to end up on the winning side.
Haran is a picture of opportunism. But the God of the Bible is not an opportunist, He is the God of truth, righteousness, and justice.
Notice when this test comes. Abram faced the furnace in Ur, long before God told him to go to the Promised Land. Before he could take a single step of the journey, he first needed to decide what he believed, and whether he would pay the price for it.
The same test comes first for the seed of Abraham. Long before any Jew packs his bags for Israel, he faces a “furnace of fire” in the land where he lives. Will he stand up for the truth that Israel are a nation with a God-given mission, and that the Land of Israel belongs to them, even when that truth costs him friends, invitations, and promotions? Non- Jews like us Indians who love Israel face the same fire. On college campuses, at the office, and in churches, standing with Israel today comes with a price. Many people, like Haran, wait to see which side is winning. The true children of Abraham are willing to walk into the fire.
Then comes the test of the journey itself. Abram was not the first in his family to set out for Canaan. “Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot and his daughter-in-law Sarai, and they set out together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan. But when they came to Haran, they settled there” (Genesis 11:31). Terah began the journey and stopped halfway. He never saw the Promised Land. He died in Haran (Genesis 11:32).
Every generation has its Terahs, and ours has millions of them. Their “someday” never comes.
There is always one more reason to stay: the job, the mortgage, the grandchildren, the fear of starting over in a new language. Their hearts are in Jerusalem, but their homes are in London and Australia.
Terah set out for Canaan, which is more than most people ever do. But the Bible remembers Abram, not Terah, because Abram found the courage to leave everything familiar behind and dive into the unknown. Starting the journey is easy. Finishing it is the test.
Then comes war. Four powerful kings from the east invade the region, crush the armies of five local kings, and carry off Abram’s nephew Lot along with everything he owns (Genesis 14:1-12). A survivor escapes and brings the news to “Abram the Hebrew” (Genesis 14:13).
This is the first time the Bible calls Abram a Hebrew, and the timing is no accident. The Hebrew word is Ivri, from ever, “the other side.” The entire world stood on one side, and Abraham stood alone on the other.
Think about what Abram is up against. These four kings are the superpowers of the ancient world, led by Chedorlaomer, king of Elam. For twelve years they ruled the region. When the local kings rebelled, the eastern armies swept through the land and crushed everyone in their path: the giants of Ashteroth-karnaim, the Horites, the Amalekites, the Amorites, and finally the king of Sodom and his four allies (Genesis 14:4-10). Not one nation could stand against them. And Lot is not even on Abram’s side. He chose to leave Abram and settle among the wicked people of Sodom (Genesis 13:11-13). Any sensible man would mourn his nephew and stay home.
But Abram does the insane thing. He arms 318 men from his own household, a shepherd’s militia, and chases the most terrifying army on earth all the way to Dan in the far north. He attacks at night, routs them, and brings Lot and all the captive’s home (Genesis 14:14-16).
That is what makes Abram a Hebrew. Every voice of reason stood on one side of the river: you cannot win, this is not your fight, stay home. Abram stood alone on the other side, trusting that the God who called him to this land would fight for him. After the battle, Melchizedek, king of Salem, said it plainly: “Blessed be God Most High, who delivered your enemies into your hand” (Genesis 14:20). Abram did not win because his army was bigger. He won because he was willing to stand alone with the God of covenant. (El-Berith)
And then comes the hardest test of all. At one hundred years old, Abraham finally becomes the father of Isaac, the son God promised him. Then God speaks: “Take your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I will show you” (Genesis 22:2). Abraham rises early in the morning, saddles his donkey, and walks for three days toward the mountain, with Isaac at his side. In the end, God stops his hand. But Abraham climbed that mountain ready to give up the most precious gift of his life.
Abram did not receive his new name when he arrived in the land. He earned it, one test at a time: in the furnace, on the road, on the battlefield and on the mountain. Only then did God call him Abraham.
The same is true if you are a born-again believer today. Salvation is not the end of the journey. It is the beginning. The furnace, the war, the sleepless nights are not signs that something went wrong. They are the tests of Abraham, and they are turning you into the person you were always meant to be.
As we pass these tests, we are bringing the promise of Abraham’s name to life. God did not call him the father of one nation. He called him av hamon goyim, the father of a multitude of nations.
