Hundreds of miles southeast of Hebron, in the land of the Sumerians, in the region known as Chaldea, six miles from the banks of the Euphrates River, was the ancient city known as Ur of the Chaldeans.
For eight hundred years Ur had been a center of learning, agriculture, and the worship of gods. And for eight generations, Abram’s ancestors had lived here—almost since the time of Noah. It made Abram dizzy just thinking about all those funny-sounding names that he had had to recite over and over.
“Shem was the son of Noah and the father of Arphaxad,” he would say. “Arphaxad was the father of Shelah, Shelah was the father of Eber, Eber was the father of Peleg, Peleg was the father of Reu, Reu was the father of Serug, and Serug was the father of Nahor…who was the father of you, Father!”
Terah laughed loudly and picked up his son in his arms. Abram, his youngest son, didn’t have to do much to please him. He is a gift from Jehovah, thought Terah, as he looked at his bright-eyed son, born to me in my one hundred and thirtieth year! Abram’s two older brothers, Haran and Nahor, were already married with families of their own.
“Come, let’s go for a walk, shall we, Abram? You can tell me all that you learned today in school,” said Terah, holding out his hand to his son.
Abram scurried after his father, knowing their walk would be a short one, as Terah tired easily. “Are we going to the ziggurat again, Father?”
“Only if you want to, Abram,” Terah answered.
Abram winked at his father, knowing all walks ended at the most famous landmark in the city of Ur.
Holding Terah’s bony hand tightly, Abram stayed close to his father as they made their way along the narrow, dusty streets of Ur. Often they would be forced to the side of the road to allow donkeys, sheep, and goats to pass through, led by their owners. Donkeys, strong animals that they are, were used to carry heavy loads from one place to another. Watching out for animals was one thing, but people were quite another! Despite their best efforts, Terah and Abram almost collided with several women balancing heavy clay jars on their heads.
As Abram walked along, he loved to look at the beautiful homes of Ur. These were not simple dwellings but two-story houses with balconies and courtyards hidden from the street. Occasionally, women draped with colorful robes would come out of the houses, their bronze and silver jewelry gleaming in the late afternoon sun.
The homes are beautiful, Abram thought, but they cannot compare to the temples of Ur. Temples dedicated to Hurki, the ancient moon god. In stories told by the old men of the city, Ur got its name from Hur, another name for Hurki. Because of the night sky in Chaldea, long ago Ur had become the center of moon worship.
Abram went to school in one of the temples, a building he was quick to point out to his father. “Yes, Abram, I know. Did you practice your cuneiform today?”
Abram rolled his eyes in answer. Cuneiform (say: kyoo NEE a form) was the Sumerian form of writing that contained hundreds of symbols or signs instead of letters. “I even brought my tablet home to show you, Father,” Abram answered, secretly hoping his father would not remember when they returned home. On one side of each student’s stone “tablet” was written the day’s assignment by the teacher; on the other side, the student tried to copy what the teacher had done. Abram’s side never seemed to please the demanding teachers.
But in mathematics, Abram showed much talent. On another stone tablet, used only for mathematics problems, Abram, even at his young age, was learning how to find the square roots of numbers. He was also learning simple geometrical formulas, like how to find the area of a piece of farmland.
In Ur, education was valued almost as much as the worship of gods. The famed ziggurat was built, in fact, to honor the moon god. So impressive was the ziggurat that Abram seemed to pull Terah along a little faster when at last he could see the towering structure.
The ziggurat was a four-sided pyramid built up in stages to a height of around seventy-five feet.
Constructed of brick, the pyramid was then covered in mud and on top of the mud grass grew and trees were planted. From the bottom to the top was a flight of one hundred steps.
Terah and Abram could see the priests and other government workers busily going about their business atop the ziggurat. The priests accepted offerings to Hurki at the ziggurat, offerings that were then put in storerooms inside the vast structure. Father and son sat nearby and watched as cattle, sheep, sacks of barley, cheese, and wool were all accepted as gifts to the moon god. The priests then handed the worshipers pieces of papyrus on which they had written a description of the gift.
Abram looked at his father and knew exactly what he was going to say. Terah cleared his throat. “Never forget, my son, that we worship Jehovah, the God of our ancestors, the One who saved Noah and his family from the great flood. You may see these fancy buildings and riches, but there is only one God whom we can trust and who can save.” What Terah didn’t say was how hard it was to worship his God living in a city such as Ur of the Chaldeans.
In a while Terah stood slowly and Abram knew that was the signal to go. But when, after again dodging donkeys and goats, they reached their home, Abram knew immediately that something was very wrong. A crowd had gathered outside, with those in the back standing on tiptoe for a better view. Inside the house, even from several feet away, Abram could hear the sounds of loud crying.
When one villager saw Terah, he exclaimed, “It’s Haran, Terah! Go to him quickly.”
But Terah and Abram were too late. Haran, Terah’s oldest son, was already dead, and his wife and son, Lot, were huddled around his body. Terah knelt beside them, tears flowing down his cheeks. He was an old man, but he did not expect one of his sons to die before him.
In the months and years that followed, Lot, who was a few years younger than Abram, followed Abram wherever he went. As Abram and Lot became teenagers and young men, they both married young women who had been “promised” to them when they were young children. Most marriages of that time were arranged by both sets of parents many years before the actual marriage would occur.
Abram had known Sarai since she was a young girl. With her long, coal black hair and sapphire blue eyes, she was the most beautiful girl in all of Ur and he had loved her for many years. He knew they would be happy together. As more years passed, his only worry was his father, now very old and very sad since Haran’s death.
One night as Abram sat on the roof of the family home, Terah joined him.
“I have been praying for a long time, Abram, and I know God has a plan for our family,” Terah said.
Abram stared at his white-haired father, his tanned face with its many lines, one for almost all his years on earth. “What has God told you?”
“We must leave this wicked land, this land with all these temples to the moon god, and go to Canaan, the land God will lead us to,” he said.
Canaan? Abram shook his head. Ur had been their family’s home for so long! How could they leave the only place they knew? Couldn’t they just stay and worship God as they had been doing?
Terah hugged Abram tightly. “God has told me, Abram, and we must go.”
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