Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 01.djvu/72

ABRACADABKA. amulet was to be folded and worn on the bosom for nine days, then Hung backward before sun- rise into a stream flowing eastward. See Abrax- as; Amulet.

AB'RADA'TAS. A king of Susa, who at first fought against Cyrus the Great, but who after- ward, in consequence of the latter's kindness to Pantliea, his wife, who had been captured by the Persians, yielded to Cyrus and became his ally. Abradatas perished in the war against Croesus the Lydian. The story of his romantic ail'ection for Panthea and her suicide after his death appears in the fifth book of Xenophon's Ci/ropcedia.

'''A'BRAHAM. '''The Father of the Hebrews, whose story is given in Genesis xi-xxv. It con- sists of a series of incidents In the patriarch's life, put together in a consecutive narrative and emanating from different literary sources. In Genesis xi : 10 the genealogy of the Sheniites (or sons of Shem) is taken up, leading up to Terah, the father of Abrani, Nahor, and Haran. The home of Terah and his sons is Ur of the Chaldees — a place commonly identified with the site of the mound Mugheir, in southern Baby- Ionia — but after the death of Haran the Tera- hites joui-ney northward to Haran and take up their settlements at that place. Terah dies in Haran, and Abram, accompanied by his wife Sarai and his nephew Lot (the son of Haran), quits Babylonia by divine command and pro- ceeds by a circuitous northern route via Damas- cus to Canaan. He halts at various places, nota- bly Shechem and Bethel, where he erects altars to Yahweh (chap. xii.). Leading a pastoral life, we next find him in Egypt, whitlier he has been driven in consequence of a famine in Palestine. Sarai's beauty attracts the attention of the Pharaoh, and but for Yalnveh's intervention Abram would liave been obliged to give up his wife, whom he had represented to be his sister. Pharaoh obliges Abram to leave Egypt, and he accordingly returns to Bethel with Lot. At this juncture the separation between Abram and Lot takes place in consequence of quarrels between tlie followers of the two chiefs. Lot chooses for himself the rich pasture land of the .Tordan Val- le}', while Abram remains in Canaan proper, though removing to Hebron. He becomes in- volved in a war with the kings of the .Jordan Valley in order to rescue Lot. who had been taken captive. He not only succeeds in this en- terjirise, but aids in restoring the kings of Sodom and Gomoriah to power and magnanimously re- fuses any compensation for his services (chap, xiv). At the time that Abram left Haran he was seventy-five years old. At Damascus he is joined by lOliezer, who becomes his trusted servant, and on whom the succession to Abram's property would fall in the event of Abram remaining childless. This contingency is eliminated by the birth of Ishmael, a son by Hagar, a concubine of Abram, and an Egyptian maid-servant of Sarai. Subsequently, however, when Abram is ninety-nine years old and Snrai ninety, a son, who is called Isaac, is born to them (chap, xvii), and who becomes the heir of »bram in prefereiice to Ishmael. At the time that this son is prom- ised to Abram and Sarai. through the appearance of Vahweh himself to Abram, the names of the patriarch and his wife are changed by the Lord to Abraham and Saran, respectively, the former being interpreted as embodying the promise that the patriarch will become "the father of a mul- titude of nations." The promise of a son to be born to Sarah is confirmed by a visit of Yahweh accompanied by two angels, all three in hu- man form, who partake of Abraham's hospitality and make a similar announcement. The two angels proceeil to Sodom and Gomorrah, while Yahweh remains behind and reveals to Abraham the intended destruction of the cities of the plain because of the wickedness and corruption pre- vailing there. Abraham pleads with Yahweh to save the cities for the sake of the righteous, and Yahweh agrees to do so provided only ten right- eous men are found in the district. As a matter of fact, the cities are destroyed and only Lot and his family are permitted to escape (chap. xvii). Before Isaac is actually born, Abraham is rep- resented as proceeding to the extreme south of Palestine, known as the Xericb, and at Gerar en- counters the King (Abimelech ) .who takes into his harem Sarah, whom Abraham again passes off as his sister, Jehovah warns Abimelech, and Sarah IS released (chap. .x). The birth of Isaac is re- counted in the 21st chajiter. Eight days after his birth he is circumcised— an act which is re- garded as symbolizing the covenant established between Jehovah and those descended from Abra- ham (Genesis xvii : 23-27). Some years later the faith of Abraham is put to a severe trial by the divine command to sacrifice his beloved son (chap. xxii). Abraliam proceeds to carry out the decree, but is withlield from doing so by Jehovah himself, who, satisfied with the test, accepts a ram which providentially makes its appearance. The last three chapters of the nar- rative are taken up with the account of Sarah's death, lier burial in the cave of JIachpelah at Hebron, purchased by Abraham from Ephron the Hittite. the marriage of Isaac and Rebekah, and the death of Abraham, which, however, does not take place until his marriage to Keturah, by whom two sons are born to him. The death of Abraham takes place when he has reached the age of one hundred and seventy-five years, and he is interred by the side of Sarah at Machpelah. Many modern Bible critics regard this cycle of Abrahamic stories as embodying a mixture of early and late traditions, a recast with a view of presenting Abraham as a type of the pious, ob- servant Jew. Besides the biblical stories, other tales were current, or became current among the .Jews of post-exile days, many of which were taken up into that portion of ralibinical literature known as the ilidrash. In this way the biblical narrative was supplemented by incidents in the early career of Abraham, on which Genesis has nothing to say. These stories bring Abraham into association with Ximrod. The historical kernel in the Genesis chapters is quite insignifi- cant. The genealogical lists are fictitious, the names representing in most cases not individuals but clans, of whom some faint traditions have survived. There is, however, no reason to doubt the existence of an ancient hero whose name was preserved in two forms, Abram and Abra- ham, the former representing perhaps a contrac- tion or dialectical variation of the latter, and to whom as a popular personage various sto- ries that had come down from various periods were attached. Of the "historical" Abram or Abraham hardly anything more can be asserted than that his home appears to have been Hebron. The wanderings of the Terahites. among whom Abram is reckoned, reflect the faint recollection