Sarah's burial cave.  (The gate was added later.) Sarah died at 127 years of age, and it was hard on Abraham.    After mourning a while, he realized that, like a lot of people, he hadn’t given much thought to estate planning.   He asked the Hittites if they could help him out, and one among them said, “Sure, we can provide your wife’s lot.”   Abraham glowered at the one-liner. “Aren’t you the card?” he said saltily. “Oh, sorry… too soon?” Ignoring the matter, Abraham went on with his request.   “I like your cemetery, but really, what I had in mind was more of a cave, specifically the cave owned by Ephron, son of Zohar.   Any chance you guys could help me persuade him to give me that cave?” It turned out Ehron was there among the Hittites when Abraham asked, and he was only too happy to do it.   “Look, Abraham, the land and the cave retail at around 400 shekels, but you can have it gratis.   Go ahead and salt your wi...

The bustling town of Sodom. After God gave Abram this land, peace reigned, except for the dozen or so kings who were at war with each other.   To fund their wars, Sodom was pillaged, and Lot land was cleaned out of its livestock and its women, leaving only a vacant… a vacant… well, I just can’t think of the right word here, but basically, he was broke.   When Uncle Abram found out about this, he raised a militia and went to get it back.   He did get it, too, except for the percentages he doled out to everyone he met who worshiped the same God he did.   When the king of Sodom asked not for goods but for people, Abram turned him down flat. God liked the way Abram snubbed the king of Sodom.   “I keep telling you, Abram,” said God, “this nation thing is going to work out.   I’m going to come down hard of the king of Sodom, but you, you’re getting all this land, which is completely empty except for ten nations of people who are already living ther...

The happy couple on their road trip west of Eden. This is a story that starts with temptation.   However, since it was God who was doing the tempting, no one generally speaks ill of it.   The temptation was this: “Abram, get out of town and I’ll give you a nation that no one will ever speak ill of without suffering for having done so, and that no one will do harm to without suffering for it.”   Since it’s always a good idea to listen to someone who claims that God told him to get a crowd of people together and head out into the desert, Abram had no trouble getting a nice crowd around him.   And at age 75, he was in the prime of his life, all set to wander around the desert. The destination was Canaan, which was to be the land of the Israelites.   The Israelites would be the true inheritors of this land, because no one else was living there.   Except the Canaanites.   At this time, though, the Israelites were still the Hebrews, ready to t...