Page:A Jewish Interpretation of the Book of Genesis (Morgenstern, 1919, jewishinterpreta00morg).pdf/39

The Book of Genesis damental Jewish doctrine and Jewish virtue of absolute faith in God.

In this way these writers of the eighth, seventh and sixth centuries B. C. made use of many of the ancient Abraham legends and traditions. They wove them together into one great cycle of stories, united by one common theme. This was the thought that God tried Abraham repeatedly. For, as has been said, Abraham was to them less a single, his- torical person, than the prototype of all Israel. In the first group of stories, in chapters I-XI, they had told how, after mankind had again departed from God, God had determined to provide for their ultimate regeneration by selecting one people to receive His law and become the messenger of His truth unto all men. This people was Israel. The words of XII, 1-2, spoken by God to Abraham, but really meant by these authors to apply to all Israel, "Get thee out of thy country and from thy kindred and from thy father's house, unto the land that I will show thee . . . and be thou a blessing . . . and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed", are the connecting link between these two groups of stories. They tell, simply and clearly, of God's selection of Abraham and Israel for this glorious mission. The blessing they were to bring to all the families of the earth was the knowledge of God and His law. But selection alone was not enough. God's service is never easy. His chosen servant must possess many virtues, faith, obedience, willingness to serve, self-restraint, readiness to sacrifice self for others, all-embracing love for fellowmen. Before they could become truly God's servant and go forth into the world to fulfill their divine mission, these Biblical writers sought to teach, Abraham and Israel had to be repeatedly tried by God, and their possession of these indispensable qualities and virtues had to be tested and proved. This thought of God's trial of Abraham and of Israel to prove their fitness for their great, eternal, universal mission, is