Chapter 12

¹And the Lord said to Abram: Go forth out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and out of they father's house, and come into the land which I shall shew thee. ²And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and magnify thy name, and thou shalt be blessed. ³I will bless them that bless thee, and curse them that curse thee, and IN THEE shall all the kindred of the earth be blessed: ⁴So Abram went out as the Lord had commanded him, and Lot went with him: Abram was seventy-five years old when he went forth from Haran. ⁵And he took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother's son, and all the substance which they had gathered, and the souls which they had gotten in Haran: and they went out to go into the land of Chanaan. And when they were come into it, ⁶Abram passed through the country into the place of Sichem, as far as the noble vale: now the Chanaanite was at that time in the land. ⁷And the Lord appeared to Abram, and said to him: To thy seed will I give this land. And he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him. ⁸And passing on from thence to a mountain, that was on the east side of Bethel, he there pitched his tent, having Bethel on the west, and Hai on the east; he built there also an altar to the Lord, and called upon his name. ⁹And Abram went forward, going, and proceeding on to the south. ¹⁰And there came a famine in the country; and Abram went down into Egypt, to sojourn there: for the famine was very grievous in the land. ¹¹And when he was near to enter into Egypt, he said to Sarai his wife: I know that thou art a beautiful woman: ¹²And that when the Egyptians shall see thee, they will say: She is his wife: and they will kill me, and keep thee. ¹³Say, therefore, I pray thee, that thou art my sister: that I may be well used for thee, and that my soul may live for thy sake. ¹⁴And when Abram was come into Egypt, the Egyptians saw the woman that she was very beautiful. ¹⁵And the princes told Pharao, and praised her before him: and the woman was taken into the house of Pharao. ¹⁶And they used Abram well for her sake. And he had sheep and oxen, and he asses, and menservants and maidservants, and she asses, and camels. ¹⁷But the Lord scourged Pharao and his house with most grievous stripes for Sarai, Abram's wife. ¹⁸And Pharao called Abram, and said to him: What is this that thou hast done to me? Why didst thou not tell me that she was thy wife. ¹⁹For what cause didst thou say, she was thy sister, that I might take her to my wife? Now therefore, there is thy wife, take her, and go thy way. ²⁰And Pharao gave his men orders concerning Abram: and they led him away, and his wife, and all that he had.