Chapter 12
1Then AO said to Abram, “Leave your country, your kindred and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you.
2I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you. I will make your name great so that you will be a blessing.
3I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you and all the families of the earth will be blessed through you.”
4So Abram departed as AO had directed him and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left Haran.
5And Abram took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot and all the possessions and people they had acquired in Haran and set out for the land of Canaan. When they came to the land of Canaan
6Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the Oak of Moreh at Shechem. And at that time the Canaanites were in the land.
7Then AO appeared to Abram and said, “I will give this land to your offspring.” So [Abram] built there an altar to AO who had appeared to him.
8From there [Abram] moved on to the hill country east of Bethel and pitched his tent with Bethel to the west and Ai to the east. There he built an altar to AO and he called on the name of AO.
9And Abram journeyed on toward the Negev.
10Now there was a famine in the land. So Abram went down to Egypt for a while to live there because the famine was severe.
11As he was about to enter Egypt he said to Sarai his wife, “Look I know that you [are] a beautiful woman
12and when the Egyptians see you they will say, ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me but will let you live.
13Please say you are my sister so that I will be treated well for your sake and on account of you my life will be spared.”
14So when Abram entered Egypt, the Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful.
15When Pharaoh’s officials saw [Sarai], they commended her to [him] and she was taken into the palace of Pharaoh.
16He treated Abram well on her account and Abram acquired sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, menservants and maidservants and camels.
17AO, however, afflicted Pharaoh and his household with severe plagues because of Sarai Abram’s wife.
18So Pharaoh summoned Abram and asked, “What have you done to me? Why didn’t you tell me she was your wife?
19Why did you say, ‘She is my sister’ so that I took her as my wife? Now then here is your wife. Take her and go!”
20Then Pharaoh gave his men orders concerning [Abram] and they sent him away with his wife and all his possessions.