From Genesis 11: 26 to 25: 11, Abram, later renamed Abraham, is the central figure. About 2000 years later, St. Paul referred to Abraham in these words: • Abraham believed God and because of his faith, God accepted him as righteous' (Romans 4: 9). St. Paul was quoting from Genesis 1- : 6. In Luke 3: 8, we find John the Baptist saying to those who came out to the wilderness to be baptized by him: 'Don't start saying among yourselves that Abraham is your ancestor.' John the Baptist meant that those who came to him were not to pretend that they had no sin even though the man they regarded as their ancestor was remembered as good and righteous.

Abraham and his immediate descendants-his son, his grandson and his great grandsons, who are given the name of Patriarchs-were the ancestors of those were later called the Israelites, the descendants of Jacob as renamed Israel. The title 'Patriarch' means the head of an extended family.

From Genesis 25: 12 to 36, Jacob, the grandson of Abraham, is the chief figure, and then the interest is on Joseph and his brothers, the sons of Jacob. The Patriarchal traditions, therefore, take up a large part of the Genesis, from the last part of chapter 11 to chapter SO. The Jewish people have never forgotten the man who left Haran, near the upper reaches of the Euphrates river, and took a long journey to the land of Canaan' obedience to the voice of God who had spoken to him: The Lord said to Abram, "Leave your native land, your relatives and your father's home, and go to a country that I am going to show you. I will give you many descendants, and they will become a great nation. I will bless you and e your name famous, so that you will be a blessing" ‘(Genesis 12: 1-2).

As in African tradition, stories of ancestors were respected and preserved and it is not difficult to understand how the stories of Abraham, Isaac Jacob and Joseph were handed on orally from generation to generation before they were eventually written down. We said earlier in this book that although there is no evidence outside the Bible for the existence and experiences of the Patriarchs, the stories about them fit authentically into what is now known of the cultures and background of the Middle East in the first half of the second millenium before Christ. A number of years ago, before the results of modern archaeology were fully understood, there were some liberal scholars who queried whether Abraham and his immediate descendants were real people at all.

The opposite point of view is to maintain that the stories are accurate records of exactly what took place, down to every detail such as the words of conversations. Anyone who has listened to African story tellers recounting traditions of earlier people and events will know that the same story may be told with variations which are a response to the mood of the audience, but which do not affect the basic reliability of the story. The story teller will speak for his characters, interpreting what took place as vividly as he can. As the Patriarchal stories were handed on, many details were preserved which reflect authentically the background from which they come, and which were finally preserved in their written form.

An ancient statement in Deuteronomy 26: 5 says this: 'My father was a wandering Aramaean, a homeless refugee, who took his family to Egypt to live. They were few in number when they went there but they became a large and powerful nation.' The word' Aramaean' means 'man of the plain of Aram', and Paddan Aram was the area around the two tributaries of the Euphrates near Haran. The Aramaean referred to in Deuteronomy 26:5 is Jacob, or Israel, the grandson of Abraham. We know that Abraham sent his servant to find a wife for Isaac his son, and the servant went back to Abraham's kinsmen where he found Rebecca, described as an Aramaean (Genesis 25: 20). So we can describe the kinsmen of Abraham as Aramaeans, as we can Abraham and his immediate descendants. The Aramaeans were part of the ethnic group called the Amorites which moved slowly into the whole area along the Euphrates and Tigris and into Syria and Palestine.

How was it possible for a group of Aramaeans to settle in Egypt and for tradition to maintain that one of them (Joseph) became a powerful man amongst the Egyptians? Egypt's history provides a clue. For one and a half centuries, from about 1720 to 1550 B.C., Egypt was ruled by foreigners of Semitic origin who were nicknamed the Hyksos, a word meaning 'foreign chiefs' in Egyptian. The Hyksos were strong warriors, using horses and chariots in their armies and fighting with powerful bows and arrows. They were overthrown around 1550 B.C. and power returned to the Egyptians, but in the period of Hyksos rule, other Semitic people such as the 'wandering Aramaean' might have been able to settle in Egypt without difficulty.

There is a very ancient Egyptian story of an Egyptian official called Sinuhe who left Egypt because of trouble and went to Syria where he stayed with friendly Amorites, marrying one of their daughters. This story dates from about 1900 B.C. and provides the kind of background into which the stories of Abraham, Laban and Jacob could be set.

There are many references in the very ancient writings of Nuzi, Mari, Ras Shamra and other places to people who are given the general name of 'Hapiro'. There has been much discussion amongst scholars about the significance of this word which seems to describe not an ethnic group large class of semi-nomadic Semitic people who moved around with herds, sometimes settling peacefully but sometimes attacking and raiding cities. The Patriarchal kind of life, illustrated in the stories of Genesis, would fit in with the evidence about this class of people who lived in the early part of the second millenium B.C.

But however much evidence we can find for authenticity in the Patriarchs ties, it is the religious significance of these stories that gives place of importance in the Bible. It is with Abram being called by God to move into a strange land that salvation history begins.

The important Biblical theme of election, or being chosen by God, begins with Abraham's story. Many centuries later, the writers of the New Testament looked back to Abraham and saw something very important in the story of this man who responded to the voice of the God who had spoken to him. Abram responded to God's voice by acting in obedience d faith although he was unable to see beyond his immediate actions.

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