Israelology and Theology of the Old Testament, Part Three

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 Israelology and Theology of the Old Testament, Part Three

by Dr. Daniel E. Woodhead

The Abrahamic Covenant Slide by Randall Price

The Abrahamic Covenant Slide by Randall Price

Abraham:

Approximately 4500 years ago God initiated a covenant with mankind. In Genesis 12 we find God calling one man, Abram (whose name was changed later to Abraham), to relocate with his family from his home of Ur, in Mesopotamia (between the rivers) and to go to a land that He would show him. In Abraham’s day, Ur was a wealthy advanced city in Mesopotamia, with a complex system of government and a well-developed system of commerce. It had trade routes that joined Ur with other great towns to the north and the south. Ur is modern day Tell al-Muqayyar, which is located in southern Iraq, about 220 miles southeast of Baghdad, halfway to the Persian Gulf. The ruins of Ur were discovered and first excavated in 1854-55 by British consul J.E. Taylor. British archaeologist Sir Leonard Woolley directed extensive excavations at Ur from 1922 to 1934 for the University of Pennsylvania and the British Museum. He found that writing was in common use (e.g., issuing of receipts, and making contracts). Schools were found to have trained people for religious, commercial, and governmental work. The curriculum included mathematics, language, geography, botany, and drawing. The city had streets, a drain system, two-story houses, a great ziggurat (which is a temple tower), and other evidences which support the thesis that this was a highly developed civilization.