1 Some time later the word ofAdonaicame to Avram in a vision: “Don’t be afraid, Avram. I am your protector; your reward will be very great.”
2 Avram replied, “Adonai, God, what good will your gifts be to me if I continue childless; and Eli‘ezer from Dammesek inherits my possessions?
3 You haven’t given me a child,” Avram continued, “so someone born in my house will be my heir.”
4 But the word ofAdonaicame to him: “This man will not be your heir. No, your heir will be a child from your own body.”
5 Then he brought him outside and said, “Look up at the sky, and count the stars — if you can count them! Your descendants will be that many!”
6 He believed inAdonai, and he credited it to him as righteousness.
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7 Then he said to him, “I amAdonai, who brought you out from Ur-Kasdim to give you this land as your possession.”
8 He replied, “Adonai, God, how am I to know that I will possess it?”
9 He answered him, “Bring me a three-year-old cow, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a dove and a young pigeon.”
10 He brought him all these, cut the animals in two and placed the pieces opposite each other; but he didn’t cut the birds in half.
11 Birds of prey swooped down on the carcasses, but Avram drove them away.
12 As the sun was about to set, a deep sleep fell on Avram; horror and great darkness came over him.
13 Adonaisaid to Avram, “Know this for certain: your descendants will be foreigners in a land that is not theirs. They will be slaves and held in oppression there four hundred years.
14 But I will also judge that nation, the one that makes them slaves. Afterwards, they will leave with many possessions.
15 As for you, you will join your ancestors in peace and be buried at a good old age.
16 Only in the fourth generation will your descendants come back here, because only then will the Emori be ripe for punishment.”
17 After the sun had set and there was thick darkness, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch appeared, which passed between these animal parts.
18 That dayAdonaimade a covenant with Avram: “I have given this land to your descendants — from theVadiof Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates River —
19 the territory of the Keni, the K’nizi, the Kadmoni,
20 the Hitti, the P’rizi, the Refa’im,
21 the Emori, the Kena‘ani, the Girgashi and the Y’vusi.”