4 So Abram departed, as the LORD had spoken unto him, and Lot went with him: and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran. compass, and makes it to be emphati-ests, yet the patriarch implicitly put himself under the conduct of that providence whose summons had called him forth, and following its leadings bade defiance to difficulty and danger. We cannot fail to observe in this remarkable event (1.) The display of the divine sovereignty. Why was Abraham thus distinguished above all other of the sons of men, to be called out from a nation of idolators, and made such a signal blessing to the world? The Scripture affords us no reason to conclude that he was better than his associates. He and all his family were idolaters, and so were all around him. Yet he was selected from among them, and made the friend and favourite of heaven. What account can be given of this? Can it be traced to any thing but the sovereign will and pleasure of Jehovah ? Even granting-what can by no means be proved to have been the fact-that he was more faithful to the monitions of natural conscience than the mass of the heathens of Chal cally in Christ the appointed and preeminent seed of Abraham. In him was the gospel of salvation to be preached to all nations, to Gentiles as well as to Jews, and the very communication of such tidings could not but be a blessing to all the families and tribes of the earth, even though it should be supposed to be made effectual only to a part of them; which is all that is necessarily to be inferred from the words. The passage contains a clear intimation of what God himself, whose judgment is according to truth, regards as the source of the truest and richest blessings to the children of men. It is not wealth, fame, power, sensual pleasure, or mental endowments, but the gift of his own Son as a Saviour, the bestowment of the Holy Spirit, the pardon of sin, peace of conscience, and the high and purifying hopes connected with eternal life. This is the inheritance that makes us truly rich, and utterly vain, foolish, and fatal is it to seek for real blessedness from any oth-dea, and that he did not go to the same er source. extent in upholding a false worship, yet he cannot well be conceived to have been so far superior to his countrymen in moral qualities as to have entitled him to such a distinction as he received. So that in any view we are still compelled to recognise the discriminating grace of God in his call, and to say in regard to it, 'Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight.' (2.) The self-denying zeal of Abraham. He undoubtedly felt the attachment which all men usually feel to their native land. It was the same tri 4. So Abram departed as the Lord had said unto him. No sooner did Abraham receive the divine command than he obeyed it. When acting in the ordinary affairs of life, and from mere worldly considerations, prudence may dictate delay, and the propriety of consulting friendly advice; but when the call is evidently from above, when the direction is clearly from God, to be dilatory is to be disobedient. Faith is prompt in compliance and makes haste to execute the will of our heavenly Master. Though the journey to be un-al to him as to others to leave the dertaken was above three hundred miles scenes of his childhood and the abode in length, and rendered formidable by of his kindred. At the age of seventydeserts, high mountains, and thick for- five the spirit of adventure was doubt 17, 'My power hath gotten me this wealth;' Heb. 'hath made.' Eccl. 12. 12, 'Of making many books there is no end;' i. e. of the business of col.. lecting or amassing books there is no less in a great measure quelled, his hab. Yet bidden to forsake all and follow Christ, part with father and mother, brethren and sisters, country and kindred, and renounce every enjoyment that may stand between us and duty. Abram's making souls therefore is doubtless to be understood of his enlarging his household establishment, of his gradually gathering around him a train of domestics and followers who were disposed to cast in their lot with him some from one motive and some from another, and to whom he probably imparted those great religious truths respecting God and his worship which had obtained a lodgment in his own mind. Though the sense of making proselytes is not conveyed by the words in their primary meaning, yet they are expressly thus rendered in the Jerusalem Targum, and the Chaldee Paraphrase has, 'All the souls which he had subdued unto the law; and the fact that Abraham is afterwards said to have had three hundred and eighteen trained (Heb. catechized) servants in his house, as well as his acknowledged character as a pious man, makes the | הנפש אשר עשו .Heb 5. All their substance. Heb. 5 their acquisition which they had acquired; a term applied in a general way to money, cattle, or effects of any kind.-¶ And the souls that they had gotten. the soul (collect. sing. for souls, i. e. persons) which they had made. The original word for made () very frequently bears the sense of acquisition, accumulation, equivalent to the Eng. usage, when we say 'a man makes money,' i. e. acquires or amasses wealth. Thus Gen. 1. 12, 'The fruit tree yielding fruit;' Heb. 'the fruit tree making fruit.' Luke, 19. 18, 'Lord, thy pound hath gained five pounds;' Gr. hath made five pounds.' Deut. 8. supposition altogether probable. The true sense of the phrase at any rate so nearly approximates to this, that we cannot hesitate to adduce the example of Abraham as an admonition to us, that wherever the providence of God shall place us, there we are to labour to be 'makers of souls,' to gain proselytes to our heavenly master, to increase to the utmost the number of those who shall devote themselves to his fear and service, 6. And Abram passed through the | pears luxuriantly embosomed in the most land Heb. in the land. The delightful and fragrant bowers; half import is not so much that of passing concealed by rich gardens and by statein a direct line from one point to anoth-ly trees collected into groves all around er, as of passing to and fro from place the bold and beautiful valley in which to place, or sojourning after the manner it stands.'- Unto the plain of of the nomades till a district has been Moreh. If the place here designated thoroughly traversed. It was thus were any where in the vicinity of Sichthat Abraham passed through the land em, the geographical features of the of promise, surveying his destined inher- country would seem to preclude the itance in its length and breadth, till in idea of its having been a 'plain;' for the course of his wanderings he came there is scarcely a more broken and to Sichem, where he probably made mountainous locality in the whole resomewhat of a prolonged stay.-T gion of Palestine. Accordingly the Unto the place of Sichem. That is, Heb. 13 ailon moreh is diversthe spot on which Sichem was after- ly rendered by eminent critics' the oak wards built, for it is named here by an- of Moreh,' or 'the terebinth (turpentine) ticipation, the town not having been tree of Moreh :' implying in either case, yet founded. The name occurs else- not a single tree of the kind, but a where in the form of Sechem, Sychem, plantation or grove of them, probably and Shechem; and in the New Testa- called 'Moreh' after the name of the inment the place is called Sychar. There dividual by whom the place was first is not the least doubt of its identity owned or occupied; just as in ch. 13. with the present town, the name of 18, the 'plain of Maire' is supposed to which is variously spelt Nablous, Nap- be so called from the name of a man. lous, Napolose, and Naplosa; all from Whether the genuine import of the orithe ancient Greek Nearolis Neapolis, ginal be 'oak' or 'terebinth,' is a point i. e. new town or new city. It occu- which lexicographers do not enable us pies a most pleasant situation in a nar- to decide.- -T The Canaanite was row valley in the ancient province of then in the land. It was very pertinSamaria, between the mounts Gerizim ent to the writer's scope, in speaking and Ebal, which press it so closely on of Abraham's traversing the country, each side as to leave no room to add to to mention who were then its possesits breadth, though it might be indefi- sors. It is true indeed that the Canaannitely extended lengthwise. It con- ite was in the land also when Moses sists of two long streets, and has a wrote the history, but the inference population which Mr. Buckingham es- which some, in a spirit of cavil, would timates at rather less than 10.000, draw from this expression, viz. that the mostly Mohammedans. It is upon the Canaanite of course was not in the land whole a flourishing place, considering when Moses wrote, is by no means the general misery of the country, and well-founded. Nothing was more natis indebted for some part of its pros- ural than that Moses should advert to a perity to the concourse of pilgrims to circumstance so well calculated to try visit the well of Jacob in the vicinity, the faith of the patriarch as that of findwhere Christ discoursed with the wo- ing himself surrounded by a profane nian of Samaria. There is nothing in and abandoned race, hostile to his relithe Holy Land finer,' says Dr. Clarke, gion, and disposed to shew him no fa'than the view of Napolose from the vour. Yet this was to be the land of heights around it. As the traveller de- his inheritance; or rather that of his scends towards it from the hills, it ap- posterity; and it is easy to see, that • altar unto 7. And the LORD appeared un- | there builded he an to Abram, and said, Unto thy the LORD, who appeared unto seed will I give this land: and him. m ch. 17. 1. n ch. 13. 15. & 17. 8. Ps. 105. 9, 11. o ch. 13. 4. the secret chambers of the soul, and by unknown channels to infuse strength, peace, confidence, and refreshing joy into the hearts of his servants, who are disposed to make sacrifices and encounter perils for his sake. The Scriptures teem with assurance to such that they, like Abraham, shall not fail to find their reward even in the present life. The case before us is but another demonstration of the truth, that in the sorest trials God often makes the sweetest discoveries of himself.- -T Unto thy seed will I give this land. The Most High unfolds his counsels and promises gradually; rewarding one degree of faith with such intimations of mercy as will beget another. He at first signified his purpose of merely while the inquietude and annoyance arising from the presence of these wicked tribes would increase his longing for that heavenly country to which he looked forward, it was a great triumph of faith to hold fast the assurance that in despite of all opposing probabilities his seed should one day be the peaceful occupants of the territory before him. 7. And the Lord appeared unto Abram. Although Moses and the other sacred writers make frequent mention of these theophanies or divine appearances, yet as they have no where expressly described the manner of them, we are left on this subject very much to our own conjectures. A reference to various other passages where a similar event is described, leads to the belief that such manifestations were vouch-shewing to Abraham a distant land in safed for the most part in dreams and visions of the night, when supernatural revelations were made in such a way as to carry the evidence of their divinity along with them. But until we know more of the nature of spirits and of the mode of spiritual communications, we must be content to abide in comparative ignorauce on this whole matter. Certain it is that that almighty power which has reared our bodies from the dust, which has formed the eye and planted the ear, and whose inspiration hath given us understanding, can avail itself of any avenue that it pleases to reach the sentient spirits of his creatures, whether in their sleeping or waking moments, and impart the knowl-seat in the affections; its primary influedge of his will. To the pious and humble mind it will be matter rather of devout admiration and praise, than of curious research, that the Father of our spirits and the God of all consolation is thus pleased to manifest his presence in which he was to sojourn. He now speaks of giving it, but not immediately to himself, but to his seed; doubtless for a farther trial of his faith. This promise is still farther amplified in a subsequent chapter, ch. 15.—¶ And there builded he an altar, &c. As an evidence and a pledge of the grateful and adoring sentiments to which the divine appearance had given rise. There was something in the nature or circumstances of the manifestation that exercised a constraining power upon his pious feelings, aud prompted him, by some outward testimonial, to evince his sense of the favour conferred. The essence of religion undoubtedly has its ence, its throne, its conquests, are emphatically there; but its legitimate fruits will invariably shew themselves in outward acts of worship. We, as well as Abraham, may cherish a grateful inward sense of the mercies of heaven, 8 And he removed from thence, on the east and there he builded unto a mountain on the east of an altar unto the LORD, and P callBeth-el, and pitched his ten hav-ed upon the name of the LORD. ing Beth-el on the west, and Hai p ch. 13. 4. mountain. See Note on Gen. 19. 30. - Having Beth-el on the west and Hai on the east. Called Bethel by anticipation; the place being first so nam but his example should teach us the propriety of adding suitable external indications of the views which we entertain. On comparing this incident with the events related in the com-ed by Jacob on his journey from Beermencement of the previous chapter, we preceive a striking contrast between the conduct of the men of the world, and that of the Lord's servants. The former no sooner find a fruitful plain, than they embark in building a city and a tower to perpetuate their fame. The first concern of the latter is to raise an altar to God. It was thus that the new world was consecrated by Noah, and now the land of promise by Abraham. But there was still more in this act of the patriarch. The rearing an altar in the land was in fact a form of taking possession of it on the ground of a right secured to the exercise of his faith, and on the same authority the Christian, in spite of all opposing considerations from enemies without and within, assures himself of a title to the heavenly Canaan —It may be remarked, that from the circumstance of this being the first place where Abraham erected an altar after entering the promised land, it seems to have acquired subsequently a peculiar sanctity and perhaps became an established seat of worship, after the Israelites had conquered Canaan; for here it is plain the sanctuary stood in the time of Joshua (See Note on Josh. 24. 1, 25, 26); and that it continued to be a distinguished spot for some ages afterwards, the incidents mentioned Judg. 9. 6, put beyond a question. 8. Removed from thence unto a mountain. Heb., properly mountainwards, towards the more mountainous district; not to any one particular sheba to Haran, its name having been |