Abraham, Hebrew Avraham, (flourished early 2nd millennium BCE), was the first of the Hebrew patriarchs and a figure revered by the three great monotheistic religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. According to the biblical book of Genesis, Abraham left Ur, in Mesopotamia, because God called him to found a new nation in an undesignated land that he later learned was Canaan. He obeyed unquestioningly the commands of God, from whom he received repeated promises and a covenant that his “seed” would inherit the land. The promised offspring is understood to be the Jewish people descended from Abraham’s son, Isaac, born of his wife Sarah.
Abram, who is later named Abraham (“The Father of Many Nations”), a native of Ur in Mesopotamia, is called by God (Yahweh) to leave his own country and people and journey to an undesignated land, where he will become the founder of a new nation. He obeys the call unquestioningly and (at 75 years of age) proceeds with his barren wife, Sarai, later named Sarah (“Princess”), his nephew Lot, and other companions to the land of Canaan (between Syria and Egypt).
There the childless septuagenarian receives repeated promises and a covenant from God that his “seed” will inherit the land and become a numerous nation. Eventually, he not only has a son, Ishmael, by his wife’s maidservant Hagar but has, at 100 years of age, by Sarah, a legitimate son, Isaac, who is to be the heir of the promise. Yet Abraham is ready to obey God’s command to sacrifice Isaac, a test of his faith, which he is not required to consummate in the end because God substitutes a ram. At Sarah’s death, he purchases the cave of Machpelah near Hebron, together with the adjoining ground, as a family burying place. It is the first clear ownership of a piece of the promised land by Abraham and his posterity. Toward the end of his life, he sees to it that his son Isaac marries a girl from his own people back in Mesopotamia rather than a Canaanite woman. Abraham dies at the age of 175 and is buried next to Sarah in the cave of Machpelah.