If we compare the Hebrew account of the Creation with the cosmogonies of Berosus and Philo (pp. [257], [353]), and the narrative of Noah's deluge with the description of the flood on the Assyrian tablets and in Berosus ([p. 240 ff.]), we see at the first glance how far asunder the conceptions lie—with what clearness and vigour the Hebrews have succeeded in purifying and exalting the rude fancies of the nations so closely akin to them—the ancient common possession of the Eastern Semitic tribes, from whom the Hebrews were sprung. This power—the patient labour, the serious and thoughtful effort to deepen the traditions of the past into an ethical significance, to sublimate legends into simple moral teaching, and transplant the myth into the region of moral earnestness and moral purpose—to pass beyond the rude naturalism of their kinsmen into the supernatural—from the varied polytheism of Babel and Canaan to monotheism—this it is which gives to the Hebrews the first place, and not among Semitic nations only, in the sphere of religious feeling and development. At a later period the Greeks understood how to breathe life, beauty and nobility into the gods of the Phenicians, whose rites came over to Hellas; they could change Ashera-Bilit, the goddess of prostitution, into the youthful Aphrodite, the goddess of blooming grace, and the highest charm of love; but the Hebrews practised the severer, sterner, and loftier task of carrying religious feeling beyond the life of nature, of conceiving the highest power as morally in opposition to natural impulses and forces, of publishing the supremacy of the intellectual and moral over the natural being.
Adam begot Seth, so we are told in the first book of the Pentateuch, and Seth begot Enos, and Enos begot Kenan, and Kenan begot Mahalaleel, and Mahalaleel begot Jared, and Jared begot Enoch, and Enoch begot Methuselah, and Methuselah begot Lamech, and Lamech begot Noah, and Noah begot Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The earth was full of evil, but Noah walked with God. Then God said to Noah: Make for thyself an ark of gopher-wood, 300 cubits in length, 50 cubits in breadth, and 30 cubits in height. For I will send a flood upon the earth to destroy under the heaven all flesh wherein is the breath of life. But with thee I make my covenant; and thou shalt go into the ark, thou and thy three sons and thy wife, and the three wives of thy sons with thee. And of all living creatures thou shalt bring two into the ark, male and female shall they be. And Noah did as God commanded him. When Noah was 600 years old, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the fountains of the deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened, and there was rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and the waters rose and lifted the ark. And the flood was mighty, and all the high mountains that are under heaven were covered; the water rose fifteen cubits above the tops of the mountains. For 150 days the flood was mighty on the earth. Then God caused a wind to blow, and the waters sank. And in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the ark rested on the mountains of the land of Ararat; and in the tenth month, on the first day, the tops of the mountains appeared. It came to pass after forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark, and sent out a raven; but it flew to and fro. Then he sent out a dove, to see whether the water had retired from the earth. But the dove found no place of rest, and returned to the ark. And Noah remained seven days more, and again sent out the dove. Then the dove came to him at evening, and lo! a fresh olive-branch was in her mouth. And he remained yet seven days, and again sent out the dove, but she returned to him no more. Then Noah opened the door of the ark and looked out, and lo! the earth was dry. And in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the earth was dry. And Noah went out of the ark, and his sons, and his wife, and the wives of his sons, and he built an altar to Jehovah, and took of all clean beasts and birds and offered a burnt sacrifice upon the altar. After the flood sons were born to the sons of Noah. The sons of Shem were Elam and Asshur, and Arphaxad, and Lud and Aram. Arphaxad begot Salah, and Salah begot Eber. Eber had two sons, the name of the one was Peleg, and the name of the other Joktan. Peleg begot Reu, and Reu begot Serug, and Serug begot Nahor, and Nahor begot Terah.
Terah dwelt in the land of his nativity at Ur in Chaldæa, and his sons were Abraham, Nahor, and Haran. Haran begot Lot and Milcah and Iscah, and died before his father at Ur in Chaldæa. Nahor took Milcah to wife, and Abraham took Sarah. And Terah went with Abraham his son, and Lot the son of Haran, from Ur in Chaldæa to Haran and dwelt there. But Jehovah said to Abraham: "Go from thy land, and thy home, and thy father's house, to a land which I will show thee." Then Abraham took Sarah his wife, and Lot, his brother's son, and all their goods, and the souls born to them in Haran, and went forth from Haran. He came unto the land of Canaan as far as Sichem and to the oak Moreh, and there he built to Jehovah an altar; and afterwards he went towards the mountain and pitched his tent between Bethel and Ai, and there he built an altar to Jehovah, and journeyed towards the south. And when the famine was sore in the land, Abraham, and Lot with him, went to Egypt, and Pharaoh, for Sarah's sake, gave Abraham sheep and oxen and asses, and men-servants, and maid-servants, and she-asses, and camels. But Jehovah smote Pharaoh with great plagues, so that he let Abraham and Sarah go, and bade men guide him.
Then Abraham dwelt again at Bethel, and was very rich in flocks, in silver and gold. Lot also had tents and sheep and oxen, and there was a strife between the shepherds of Abraham and the shepherds of Lot. Then Abraham said to Lot: "Let there be no strife between my shepherds and thine, for we are brethren. If thou wilt go to the left hand, I will go to the right." Then Lot lifted up his eyes, and saw the land of Jordan, that it was watered as a garden of the Lord; and he set forth at morning, and pitched his tents at Sodom. But Jehovah said to Abraham: "Lift up thine eyes; the whole land which thou seest I will give to thee and thy seed for ever; rise up and go through the length and breadth of the land, for I will give it to thee." And Abraham pitched his tents under the oaks, which are at Kirjath-Arba (Hebron), and there built an altar to Jehovah.
For twelve years the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah, of Adamah, Zeboiim and Zoar, had served Kedor-Laomer, king of Elam. Then they rebelled; and in the fourteenth year Kedor-Laomer, and the kings who were with him, Amraphel, king of Shinar, and Tidal and Arioch of Elassar, smote the Rephaims at Ashtaroth-Karnaim, the Zuzims at Ham, and the Emims at Shaveh-Kiriathaim, and the Horites on their mountain of Seir, and smote the whole land of the Amalekites and Amorites. The kings of Sodom and Gomorrah also, of Adamah, Zeboiim and Zoar, who had drawn out against them in the valley of Siddim, were put to flight, and fled to the mountains, and all the goods and all the food in Sodom and Gomorrah were taken, and they also took Lot and his goods. When Abraham heard that his brother's son was carried away, he set forth with his servants, 318 in number, and fell upon them by night at Dan, and pursued them as far as Hobah, which is to the west of Damascus, and brought back all the goods and Lot and the people that were captured. The king of Sodom came to him and said: Give me the souls, and take the goods for thyself. But Abraham said: I lift up my hand to Jehovah that I will take nothing of thee, save what my servants have eaten.
Abraham dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, but his wife bore him no son. But he had an Egyptian maid-servant whose name was Hagar. Her Sarah gave him to wife, and Hagar was with child, and the angel of Jehovah announced to her that she should bear a son who would be like a wild ass, and his hand would be against every man and every man's hand against him, and he would dwell to the east of his brethren. And Hagar bore Abraham a son, and Abraham named him Ishmael. Then he received the promise that Sarah also should bear a son, "from whom should arise kings and nations;" and when he was 100 years old, and in the south between Kadesh and Sur, Sarah bore him a son. Abraham named him Isaac, and circumcised him when he was eight days old. The year before he had circumcised Ishmael, for God had said: This is the covenant which thou shalt keep between me and thee, and thy seed after thee, that every male shall be circumcised.
When Isaac grew up and Sarah saw the son of the Egyptian woman, she said to Abraham: Thrust out this woman and her son; Ishmael shall not be heir with Isaac. Then Abraham gave Hagar bread and a bottle of water on her shoulders, and sent her forth with her child. She wandered into the desert of Beersheba, i.e. the well of the seven, and when the water was spent, and the child was fainting with thirst, she laid him down under a bush, and sat down a bow-shot from him, and said: "Let me not see the death of the child." Then Jehovah heard the voice of the child, and His angel called to Hagar out of heaven: "Fear not, rise up, and take the boy in thy hand, Jehovah will make him a great people." And Jehovah opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water, and filled the bottle, and gave her child drink. And Jehovah was with him; he grew up in the desert, and was an archer, and dwelt in the desert of Paran, and his mother took him a wife out of Egypt, and Ishmael begot Nebajoth, and Kedar, and Adbeel, and Mibsam, and Mishma, and Dumah, and Massa, and Hadar, and Tema, and Jetur, and Naphish, and Kedemah, twelve princes. And Ishmael died 137 years old, and his descendants dwelt to the east of his brethren from Shur, which lies before Egypt, to Havilah, and towards Asshur.
Abraham abode a long time in the land of the Philistines. And God tempted Abraham, and bade him sacrifice his only son Isaac, in the land of Moriah, as a burnt offering. But when Abraham had built the altar on the top of the mountain, and laid the wood upon it, and bound Isaac and laid him on the altar, and taken the knife and stretched forth his hand to slay his son, the angel of Jehovah called from heaven, saying: Lay not thine hand on the lad, for now I know that thou fearest God; thou hast not refused Him thine only son. And Abraham saw a ram caught in the thicket, and he sacrificed him.
When Sarah died at Hebron, Abraham spoke to the Hittites among whom he dwelt: I am a stranger and a sojourner among you; give me a burying-place for my people among you, that I may put away my dead from me. Speak for me with Ephron, the son of Zohar, that he give me the cave of Machpelah which is his, at the corner of his field; let him give it to me for a burying-place at its full worth in money. Ephron agreed, and Abraham weighed the money to Ephron, four hundred shekels of silver, current money with the merchant. And thus the field of Ephron at Machpelah, to the east of Mamre, that is Hebron, the field and the cave, and all the trees on the field and round it, were given to Abraham before the eyes of the Hittites, and the eyes of all who went into the gates of the city. And Abraham buried Sarah in the cave of the field of Machpelah.
Then Abraham took another wife, whose name was Keturah, and she bore him Zimram, and Jokshan, and Medan, and Midian, and Ishbak, and Shuah. But Isaac had grown a man, and Abraham said to his servant, the oldest in his house, Eliezer of Damascus: Lay thy hand under my thigh; I charge thee that thou take not to my son a wife from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom we dwell; to my fatherland and my home thou shalt go, and there seek a wife for Isaac. Then the servant took ten camels from the camels of his master, and goods of every kind, and passed over the Euphrates towards Mesopotamia, to the city of Nahor, the brother of Abraham. To Nahor his wife Milcah, the daughter of Haran, had borne eight sons. The youngest was Bethuel, and Bethuel's son was Laban, and his daughter Rebekah. Eliezer came to the city of Nahor at evening, and halted his camels at the well outside the city. Then came a maiden, fair to behold, with her pitcher on her shoulder, to the well. When she had filled her pitcher and come up from the well, the servant went to her and said: Bend down thy pitcher and let me drink a little water. Drink, my lord, she answered, and quickly took the pitcher in her hand, and gave him to drink. Then she said: I will draw also for thy camels, and stepped down again to the well. Eliezer marvelled at her; and when all the camels had drunk, he took a golden ring, half a shekel in weight, and two golden bracelets, ten shekels in weight, and put the ring in her nose, and the bracelets on her arm, and then inquired whose daughter she was, and whether there was room in her father's house to shelter him and the camels. And she answered: I am Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel, the son of Nahor; straw and fodder is in abundance with us, and room for the camels. And her brother Laban came to the well, and led Eliezer to the house, and Laban took the saddles from the camels, spread straw for them, and gave them fodder and brought water for his guest to wash his feet, and food. But Eliezer said: I will not eat till I have given my message. I am the servant of Abraham, and Jehovah has blessed my master, so that he has become great, and he has given him sheep and oxen, and silver and gold, and men-servants, and maid-servants, and camels and asses. And Sarah has borne a son to my master in his old age, and I have sworn to seek a wife for his son from his home and his own people; and Jehovah led me in the right path in order to take the granddaughter of the brother of my master for his son. If ye are willing to plight troth and love with Abraham, say it. Then said Bethuel, Rebekah's father, and Laban her brother: Behold, the maiden stands before thee, take her and go. Then Eliezer brought forth gold and silver ornaments, and garments, and gave them to Rebekah; to her brother also and her mother he gave gifts. And when Laban and his mother sent away Rebekah with her nurse Deborah, and Abraham's servant Eliezer, they blessed Rebekah, and said: Become a thousand times a thousand, and may thy seed possess the gate of thy enemies. When Eliezer returned home, he told all that he had done, and Isaac received Rebekah into the tent of his mother, and she became his wife, and he loved her. And Abraham gave all that he had to Isaac; but to Ishmael and the sons of Keturah he gave gifts, and sent them away from his son Isaac into the land to the East. Then Abraham, after he had lived 175 years, died at a good old age, and his sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah.