15:1
Some time later, the word of Yahweh came to Abram in a vision: Do not be afraid, Abram! I am your shield and shall give you a very great reward.
15:2
'Lord Yahweh,' Abram replied, 'what use are your gifts, as I am going on my way childless? . . .
15:3
Since you have given me no offspring,' Abram continued, 'a member of my household will be my heir.'
15:4
Then Yahweh's word came to him in reply, 'Such a one will not be your heir; no, your heir will be the issue of your own body.'
15:5
Then taking him outside, he said, 'Look up at the sky and count the stars if you can. Just so will your descendants be,' he told him.
15:6
Abram put his faith in Yahweh and this was reckoned to him as uprightness.
15:7
He then said to him, 'I am Yahweh who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldaeans to give you this country as your possession.'
15:8
'Lord Yahweh,' Abram replied, 'how can I know that I shall possess it?'
15:9
He said to him, 'Bring me a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old she-goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove and a young pigeon.'
15:10
He brought him all these, split the animals down the middle and placed each half opposite the other; but the birds he did not divide.
15:11
And whenever birds of prey swooped down on the carcases, Abram drove them off.
15:12
Now, as the sun was on the point of setting, a trance fell on Abram, and a deep dark dread descended on him.
15:13
Then Yahweh said to Abram, 'Know this for certain, that your descendants will be exiles in a land not their own, and be enslaved and oppressed for four hundred years.
15:14
But I shall bring judgement on the nation that enslaves them and after this they will leave, with many possessions.
15:15
For your part, you will join your ancestors in peace; you will be buried at a happy old age.
15:16
In the fourth generation they will come back here, for until then the iniquity of the Amorites will not have reached its full extent.'
15:17
When the sun had set and it was dark, there appeared a smoking firepot and a flaming torch passing between the animals' pieces.
15:18
That day Yahweh made a covenant with Abram in these terms: 'To your descendants I give this country, from the River of Egypt to the Great River, the River Euphrates,
15:19
the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites,
15:20
the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim,
15:21
the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.'
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