Memphis, House of Aaron.
Since writing the foregoing, my dear Sesostris—for such is the familiar title, notwithstanding the present difference in our rank and position, that you condescendingly permit me to make use of in addressing you—since writing the foregoing, I say, I have been studying the traditions of my fathers, the Hebrews of old. In them I have found the following prophecies; and you will observe how confidently God, the Almighty, is recognized and spoken of as the one true God:
"Our father Abram, the Syrian, having been born in the great kingdom of Chaldea, served idols, as did all other men—the knowledge of the one God, being yet veiled under the multiplicity of gods. Abram, being just, and possessing those virtues and excellencies which elevate man, it pleased the one great and mighty God, only and true—who made all things in heaven above, in the earth beneath, and in the seas that are thereunder—to make Himself known unto him, as he was one day uttering a prayer to the sun. Suddenly, he beheld a hand across the disk of the sun, and the earth was instantly covered with night. While Abram wondered and trembled, the mighty hand was removed, and the day was restored. Then came a voice from above the sun—
'O man, and son of man that is clay! dost thou worship the creature, and know not the Creator? I am the Creator of the sun, the heavens, the earth, and man upon the earth! Worship me, who alone can create light, and who maketh darkness! I am God, and will not give my glory to a creature! The sun is but clay, and thou, O man, art clay also! Give me thine heart; worship me, the Maker both of thee and of the sun!'
"Then Abram saw the hand again cover and extinguish the sun; but lo, instead of night, the universe was lighted by the brightness of the hand, which shone with the splendor of a thousand suns, so that our father fell upon his face, as if dead, before its consuming splendor. When he rose again, the sun shone as before, and he fell prostrate upon the ground and said:
"'Lord God of the sun, Creator of all things, what is man, that thou displayest thy glory and revealest thyself to him? I am as a worm before thee! Teach me what thou wouldst have me to do!'
"Then a still, small voice answered:
"'Arise, go forth from this Chaldea, thy country, unto a land flowing with milk and honey, which I will show thee; and there I will make of thee a great nation, who shall bear thy name; for I will make thy name great, and a blessing to all men; and those who bless thee I will bless, and those who curse thee, I will curse; and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed!'"
This remarkable tradition then goes on to say, O Sesostris, that the Chaldean hastened to obey God, and going into the city of Haran, where he dwelt, gathered his substance, and took his wife, and nephew, and all his servants, and departed from the land—being then five-and-seventy years old. By a sign, the Lord God went before him through many lands, until he crossed over the river of the king of Sodom into Palestine, when the Almighty, taking him into a high mountain, showed him all the land, from the lake and fair valley of Gomorrah and Sodom to the great sea westward, and from Libanus on the north to the desert of Arabia on the south, saying:
"'Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art, northward and southward, and eastward and westward, for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it and to thy seed after thee! Arise, walk through the land, in the length of it and in the breadth of it, for I will give it to thee; for the whole earth is mine!'"