Baring-Gould Sabine
Legends of the Patriarchs and Prophets
But Abraham said, “Behold the power of my God!” and he bade a dead man who had been four years in his grave, rise and bring him a white cock, a black raven, a green pigeon, and a gayly-colored peacock. The dead man rose and obeyed. Then Abraham cut up the birds, but preserved their heads; and lo! from the heads new bodies sprouted.
“Now,” said Abraham, “do the same.”
But Nimrod could not.
“If thou art a God,” said Abraham again, “command the sun to rise to-morrow in the west and set in the east.”
But this he could not do.300
Nimrod was highly incensed, and ordered that Abraham should be at once precipitated into the fire. When he was brought before the king, say the Rabbis, the soothsayers recognized him as the boy at whose birth they had warned the king that one was come into the world who would be the father of a great nation which would subdue that of Nimrod, and would possess the whole earth and heaven.
“This is the man against whom we cautioned you,” they said; “his father Terah must have deceived you, O king, and not have given you up the right child.”
Terah, on being questioned, owned the truth.
“Who gave you this advice?” asked the king; “confess it, and your life shall be spared.”
Out of fear Terah told a lie, and said that Haran, his other son, had suggested the deception.
“For having given this advice,” said Nimrod, “Haran shall perish along with Abraham. Cast them both into the flames.” Abraham and Haran were now to be stripped and their hands and feet bound by ropes, and then they were to be thrown into the fire. But the servants of Nimrod who approached the brothers were caught by the flames which, like the tongues of serpents, shot out, curled round them, drew them into the fire, and consumed them.
Then Satan appeared to Nimrod, and instructed him how to make a catapult which would throw stones to a distance, and by means of which Abraham and Haran could be projected into the midst of the fire.
Haran was undecided in his mind whether to worship God or idols; sometimes he sided with Abraham, and sometimes with Terah. Now, the moment Haran was shot into the flames, his heart failed him, and he cried out that he would worship idols if his life were spared. But it was too late, he was burnt to ashes. But Abraham was unharmed. The cords which bound him were consumed, but for three days and nights he walked about in the flames, and felt no inconvenience.301
Then the king cried aloud. “Abraham, servant of the God of Heaven, come forth from the furnace to me.”
And Abraham came forth. Then the king said to him, “How is it that thou art not consumed?” And Abraham answered, “The Lord God of Heaven and Earth, whom I serve, hath delivered me.”
Instantly the flames were extinguished, and the wood burst forth into flower and fruit; and the pile was like a grove of flowering shrubs to look upon, and Angels descended and took Abraham and seated him in the midst.
The Arabic version of this part of the story is something different.
Nimrod could not see into the fire, so he ascended a high tower in his palace, and from the top looked down into the furnace, and saw that in the midst was a garden with flowers and a fountain of sparkling water, and Abraham seated on the grass beside the spring, conversing with an angel.302
Nimrod now loaded Abraham with presents, amongst which were two slaves named Oni and Eliezer; according to some, the latter was a son of the tyrant. Many followed Abraham home, and brought their children to him, and said, “Now we see that the God in whom thou trustest, is the only true God; teach our children the truth, that they may serve Him in righteousness.” Thus three hundred persons accompanied Abraham home, most of whom were servants of the king, and of noble race.
Here follows in the Mussulman account the story of Nimrod’s attempt to reach heaven in a box, to which were attached four vultures. His object was, says Tabari, to kill the God of Abraham. He went up along with his vizir. After a night and day in the air, the king said to his vizir, “Open the window of the box towards the earth and tell me what you see.” He did so, and replied, “I see the earth.” After another day and night, he again looked out and saw the earth still; on the third day, at the king’s command he looked out and saw nothing. Then said Nimrod, “Open the window towards heaven and look out.” He did so and saw nothing. Then Nimrod shot three arrows into the sky, and they fell back with blood on them. So Nimrod said, “I have killed the God of Abraham.” But whence the blood came is unsettled. Some say that the arrows hit a bird which flew higher than the vultures; but others, with more probability, say they struck a fish, which was being carried by the wind, that had caught it up with the rain out of the sea.303
Abraham now married the daughter of his brother Haran, named Sarai or Jisha, “the seeress,” because she was endowed with the spirit of prophecy, say some, or, say others, because she was so beautiful that every one wanted to see her. At the time of his marriage, Abraham was aged fifty; others, however, suggest twenty-five.
Two years later, Nimrod was visited with a dream. He saw himself and all his army in a valley, near the furnace into which he had cast Abraham. A man resembling the latter stepped out of the furnace and approached the king, holding a naked sword. When Nimrod recoiled, the man cast an egg at his head; the egg broke and became a mighty river, which swept all his hosts away, saving only three men; and on looking at them, the king saw that they wore royal robes, and exactly resembled himself. Then the stream retreated into the egg, and when all the water was gathered into it, from the egg hopped out a chicken, which seated itself on Nimrod’s head, and pecked out one of his eyes.
Next morning the king sent for his soothsayers to explain the dream, and this was their interpretation; “Hear, O king! this dream presages to thee great misfortune, which Abraham and his posterity shall bring upon thee. The time will come when he will war with his forces against thee and thy forces, and will overcome them and put them to the sword. Thou alone wilt escape with three of thy confederates; but a messenger of Abraham will cause thy death. Therefore, O king! remember that thy council of wise men foretold this fifty-two years ago, in the stars at Abraham’s birth. As long as Abraham lives thou art in jeopardy. Wherefore could he be suffered to live any longer?”
Nimrod believing what was said, sent a servant to assassinate Abraham. But Eliezer, the slave, whom Nimrod had given to the patriarch, had been with the councillors when this advice was given, and he fled and told Abraham before the emissary of the tyrant arrived; and Abraham left his house and took refuge with Noah and Shem, and remained hidden with them for the space of one month.
Here Terah sought him in secret; and Abraham addressed him a long discourse on the vanity of idol-worship and the evil of serving the godless tyrant Nimrod. And Noah and Shem supported him.
Then Terah, who grieved over the death of his son Haran, consented to all that Abraham had said, and he went forth with Abraham and his wife Sarah, and Lot his grandson, the son of Haran, and all his household, and they settled at Charan, where the land was fruitful and well watered. The dwellers in Charan associated themselves with Abraham, who instructed them in the knowledge and fear of the Lord.
2. THE CALL OF ABRAHAM, AND THE VISIT TO EGYPT
For three years Abraham dwelt in Charan, till God called him to go further with his wife Sarah, and to take up his abode in Canaan; but Terah and Lot remained at Charan. Abraham reached Canaan and pitched his tent among the inhabitants of that land; and on the spot where God promised that He would give him all that pleasant country for his inheritance, he erected an altar to the Eternal One.
For fifteen years he had dwelt in Canaan, and Abraham was now aged 70, when, on the 15th day of the first month (Nisan), on the self-same day on which, in after years, the children of Israel went out of Egypt, the voice of God came to him saying, “I am the Lord that brought thee out of the furnace of Chaldæa; to thee will I give this land to inherit it.” And he said, “Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it? Shall my descendants be faithful and true, and serve Thee the living God, or will they rebel against God, against Thee, as did the men before the Flood, and as did the men of Shinar who builded the tower?”
Then God bade him take an heifer of three years old, or a she-goat of three years old, and a ram, and a turtle-dove, and a young pigeon. And he took all these and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another; but the birds divided he not.304 And God said to him, “When, in after days, thy descendants shall build me a temple, in it shall these five kinds of victims be offered to me.”
“But,” said Abraham, “should the temple be destroyed, what then shall they do?”
“Then,” answered the Most Holy, “They shall offer to me in spirit, and I will pardon their sins.” The beasts and birds also signified the races over which his seed was to reign; the beasts he divided, and they betokened the Gentile races, from which they were to purge away their idolatry; but the birds divided he not; for the birds signified the elect nation.
Then came ravens and vultures down upon the carcases, but Abraham drove them away (ver. 11); a symbol of the protection which God would accord to the people, for His promise sake, and the sake of their father Abraham, when the powers of evil, or mighty princes, menaced them.
And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abraham (ver. 12), and he saw the four realms, – the horror-awakening Babylonian, Medo-Persian, Syro-Grecian, and Roman empires. And God said to Abraham (ver. 13), “Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years. But in the fourth generation thy seed shall come hither again, after I have plagued the nation that has held them in bondage with 250 plagues.”
“Is this decree spoken to punish me for my crimes?” asked Abraham.
“No,” answered the Almighty: “Thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age (ver. 15); and Terah, who now bewails his former idolatry, has a share in the eternal happiness; also Ishmael, thy son, who shall be born to thee, will, in thy lifetime, repent and return to good, and the profanity of thy grandson Esau shalt thou not see.”
And when the sun was set, it was dark, and the various periods of futurity passed before the eyes of the seer. He beheld a smoking furnace (ver. 17); this was the flaming Gehinom, Hell, where sinners shall expiate their iniquities. Then he saw a burning lamp: that was the Law given on Sinai, and it passed between those pieces; that is, he saw Israel go through the Red Sea.
Then said the voice of God to the patriarch, “I have showed thee the Temple-worship, Law, Bondage, and Hell. I must tell thee that in the times to come, through the sins of thy children, the Temple will be destroyed, and the Law will be disregarded.
“Choose now, whether thou wilt have for their punishment, Bondage or Hell.”
And Abraham after long hesitation answered, “I choose Hell;” for he thought, “It is better to fall into the hands of God, than into the hands of men.”
But the Lord answered and said, “Not so; thou hast chosen wrongly, for from Bondage there will come deliverance, but from Gehinom, never.”
After that, Abraham returned to the land of Charan, and dwelt there many years; and he instructed the men, and Sarah the women, in the true religion. And when his father Terah was dead, God called him again, and bade him go forth to the land which God had promised him; and he went obediently, and Lot his brother’s son accompanied him. And he reached the land of Canaan, and pitched first his wife’s tent, and then his own, on the plain between Gerizim and Ebal; and he erected three altars in thanks to God for His call, for His having brought him into the promised land, and for having cast down his enemies before him. Then he went south, and pitched on the spot where stands Jerusalem.
And now a famine came upon the land; this was the third famine since the world was formed, and it was sent to prove Abraham. He murmured not, but went down with Sarah his wife, and his servants.
When he reached the River of Egypt (Wadi el Arisch), Abraham rested some days. As Abraham and Sarah walked together by the water-side, Abraham saw for the first time, reflected in the water, the beauty of Sarah; for he was so modest that he had never lifted his eyes to her face, and knew not what she was like, till he saw her in the water. Then, when he saw how beautiful she was, he persuaded her to pass as his sister in Egypt, for he feared lest he should be slain for her sake; but as a further precaution he shut her up in a chest.
On the frontier, the Custom-house officers insisted on his paying the customs, due for the box, and required that it should be opened. Abraham offered to pay for the box as if it contained gold dust or gems, if only they would not enforce their right of search.
“Does it contain silk?” asked the officers.
“I will pay the tenth, as of silk,” he answered.
“Does it contain silver?” they further asked.
“I will pay for it as silver.”
“Nay, then it must contain gold.”
“I will pay for it as gold.”
“Maybe it contains the most rare and costly gems.”
“I will pay for it as for gems.”
In the altercation the chest was violently broken open, and lo! in it was seated a beautiful woman, so beautiful that her countenance illumined all Egypt; and the news reached the ears of Pharaoh. All this occurred in the night of the 15th of the month Nisan.
Abraham and Sarah were sorely troubled, and prayed to God to protect them. Then the angel of the Lord was sent to watch over Sarah, and the angel comforted her with these words, “Fear not; God has heard thy petitions!”
Pharaoh asked Sarah who that man was who accompanied her, and when she answered “My brother,” Pharaoh bade him to be brought before him, and he gave him rich gifts.
And Pharaoh asked Abraham, “Who is this woman?” He answered “She is my sister.” This say the Mussulmans, is the third lie that Abraham told; but it was not a lie, but a justifiable falsehood.
Pharaoh was filled with love for Sarah, and he offered her as his present for her hand, all his possessions of gold and silver and slaves, and the land of Goshen. And when he pressed his suit upon her with great vehemence, she cried to God and told him she was already married; then he was smitten with paralysis, and great plagues afflicted all his servants. But Pharaoh sent for Abraham, and returned him Sarah, his wife, and dismissed him with costly presents, and he gave to Sarah also his daughter, Hagar, to be her servant.
“Truly, my daughter, it is better,” said Pharaoh, “to be servant in a house which God has taken under His protection, than to command elsewhere.”
After a three months’ sojourn in Egypt, Abraham returned to Canaan.
According to Tabari, Hagar loved Sarah greatly. On their way back to Canaan the provisions failed, and Abraham went out one day to get food, with a sack on his back; but the day was hot, so that he laid down and went to sleep. He did not awake till evening, and then he returned, but was ashamed to appear with the sack empty before his wife, so he filled it with sand. On reaching the tent he put the sack under his head and went to sleep again. Very early in the morning Sarah said to Hagar, “What has Abraham in his sack? open it and look.” So Hagar untied it, put in her hand and drew out flour. She and Sarah baked cakes of the flour, and woke Abraham and bade him eat. Then, full of wonder, he asked where they had obtained meal. They told him, and he understood that God had wrought a miracle.305
Now Abraham’s flocks and herds, and those of Lot, pastured together. Abraham’s cattle were muzzled that they should not feed in the lands of the neighbouring people; but Lot’s cattle were not muzzled. And when Abraham’s shepherds complained of this to those of Lot, the latter answered, “Your master is old, and has no children; soon he will die, and then all will belong to our master Lot.”
But Abraham spake to Lot and said, “Thy ways and my ways do not agree: we must part; do thou go to the left, and I will go to the right.” So they separated; and Lot departed from Abraham, and from the way of righteousness, and from the living God; but Abraham camped in Mamre.
3. THE WAR WITH THE KINGS
After the failure of the Tower of Babel, and the people had been scattered over the whole earth, Chedorlaomer, one of Nimrod’s chief captains, had left his service, and had established a kingdom of his own in Elam. He speedily brought into subjection all the Canaanitish peoples that dwelt in the fertile valley of Jordan, – Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zebojim, and Zoar, and made them tributary to himself. These cities bore his yoke for twelve years, and then they rebelled. Five years after did Nimrod, who is also called Amraphel in the sacred text,306 march against Chedorlaomer, but Nimrod was defeated, along with his allies, Arioch, king of Ellasar, and Tidal, king of many confederate nations; and obliged to enter into alliance with his former general, Chedorlaomer, and agree to assist him in bringing back the revolted cities – Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zebojim, and Zoar – to their allegiance.
Consequently a huge army of confederates, under Chedorlaomer, Nimrod or Amraphel, Arioch, and Tidal, overran the plain and valley of Jordan, and slew all the giants that were there. The country before them was a garden, and behind them it was a desert.
They resolved also to defeat, and utterly to destroy Abraham, the servant of the Most High; for Nimrod (Amraphel) remembered the perils to which his soothsayers had assured him he was exposed so long as Abraham lived.
The rulers of the five cities – Bera (Ruffian), king of Sodom; Birsha (Evil-doer), king of Gomorrah; Shirrab (Covetous one), king of Admah; Shemeber (the Strong one), king of Zebojim; and the king (a nameless one) of Bela (the engulfing city) – went forth in battle array, and met the host of Chedorlaomer in the great plain of Siddim, from whose canals and fountains the Salt Sea, or Dead Sea, was afterwards formed; and there they were utterly routed, and fled in precipitate haste to the mountains and to the desert.
The king of Sodom alone escaped unharmed of all the five kings, by a miracle which God wrought, to exhibit His power to the dwellers in the plain, who had begun to doubt the truth of Abraham’s deliverance out of the burning, fiery furnace.
The conquerors took the spoils of Sodom, and carried away Lot, who was like Abraham in face, thinking that they had taken Abraham captive; and they placed him in chains.
Abraham was, in prophetic spirit, performing all the sacred rites, and preparing the unleavened cakes for the Paschal feast, for it was the Eve of the Passover, when the only giant who escaped the overthrow of the Rephaim by Chedorlaomer and his confederate kings, – Og, who was afterwards king of Basan, and who had been saved alive in the Flood of Noah, – came in haste to announce to the Patriarch the captivity of Lot.
Now Og had long cast his lustful eyes on Sarah, and he thought in his heart, “This Abraham is full of fire and zeal, like a sportsman; that I know well. He will rush into battle to deliver his kinsman Lot, and will perish; and then Sarah, his beautiful wife, will be mine.”
But, according to another version, it was the angel Michael who brought the news to Abraham; and to another, it was Oni, one of the slaves Nimrod had given him, and who had been sent to observe the progress of the war.
No sooner had Abraham heard the tidings than, filled with anxiety on Lot’s behalf, and with sympathy for the Sodomites, his neighbors, he called all his neighbors together, and all those who had followed him, and in earnest words exhorted them to prepare to fight and rescue Lot. But they, knowing the disparity of numbers, would make no promise; then he threatened them, but could not persuade them to join in what they regarded as an infatuated course certain to lead to destruction. Consequently Abraham was obliged to go against the enemy with only his own servants. But as they neared the plain, and saw the devastations wrought by the host of Chedorlaomer, they also slipped away in the night, and Abraham was left alone with Eliezer, his trusty slave, and his three friends Aner, Eshcol, Mamre. And he followed after the foe, as they retired with their spoil, till he reached one of the fountains of Jordan, which is named Paneas, or Dan.
Here his three friends forsook him, along with their wives, who had accompanied them thus far.
It was the night of the 15th Nisan, the self-same night in which in after-years the first-born of Egypt would be slain; and Abraham’s heart fainted as he overtook the mighty host, and saw that they were countless as the sands of the sea-shore, and as grasshoppers for number.
But lo! God fought for Abraham. The grass-blades changed into swords, and the stubble into spears, and battled all that night; and in the morning, when he looked upon the host, they were all dead corpses. Thus he delivered Lot and all the captives, men, women, and children, and the spoil that had been carried away; and none stayed them, for all their foes lay dead upon the ground.
The King of Sodom came forth to meet Abraham, full of pride of heart because he had been miraculously delivered, and attributing all the glory of the victory to Divine interposition on his own behalf. But all the people knew that Abraham was the favored of God, and their deliverer, and they built a throne of the trees that covered the plain, and which had been burnt in the war, and set Abraham as their prince and king thereon; therefore is that place called to this day, “The king’s dale.”307
But Abraham was little pleased with this exhibition of honor, and he thought upon what he had learnt of old from that aged man, Shem, consecrated by God to be His priest, when he fled to him in his cave from the tyranny of Nimrod.
Shem reigned now in the city of Salem, which was in later years called Jerusalem, and from his righteous government he was named Melchizedek (king of righteousness). And Abraham thought, “Will Shem ever forgive me for having drawn the sword against his grandsons, the sons of Elam?”
But Shem was of no less noble and considerate temper than Abraham; and he mused within himself, and said, “What sort of opinion can Abraham have formed of me, that such godless and violent hosts should have sprung from my loins, and have devastated the fair plain of Jordan, and carried away captive even his near kinsman!”
Then Shem full of noble resolution to reconcile himself with Abraham, rose up and went forth, bearing bread and wine as tokens of friendship.
The words of God flowed from his mouth; he instructed Abraham in all that appertained to the high priest’s office, which was in future times to belong to his family; and before he left, he blessed Abraham with these words, “Blessed be Abraham of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth; and blessed be the most high God, which hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand.”308
But in so saying, Melchizedek erred grievously, for he blessed Abraham before he blessed God, and the Creator should be blessed first, and the creature blessed afterwards; therefore the high priesthood was taken from him, and given to Aaron in after-times.
Of all the spoil which Abraham had taken, he separated a tenth part, and he gave it to Melchizedek, as the offering due to the priest, and this was the first tithe paid in the history of the world. All the booty of Sodom Abraham returned to the king thereof, and he took an oath, “I will not take from a thread even to a shoe-latchet, and I will not take any thing that is thine, lest thou should say, I have made Abraham rich, save only that which the young men have eaten, and the portion of the men which went with me, Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their portion.”309
On account of this unselfishness, the remembrance of which was to be continued through all generations, God gave the descendants of Abraham maxims to be written on their phylacteries and shoe-latchets; and the promise was made, “Over Edom will I cast out my shoe;”310 that is, Edom, the most cruel oppressor of the chosen people, should fall under the condemnation of the Most High.
The end of Nimrod and his confederate kings is related with greater fulness by the Mussulman historians.
According to Tabari, God sent an army of flies against the host of Chedorlaomer and Nimrod, and these flies attacked the soldiers in their faces; and the flies were so numerous that the soldiers could not see one another; and the horses stung by them went mad, and leaped, and fell; so that, what with the horses and the flies, the army was entirely dispersed. Nimrod escaped to Babylon, but he was pursued by the meanest of the gnats of that host; it was blind of one eye and lame of one leg. When Nimrod sat down on his throne, the gnat settled upon his knee. Then the tyrant smote at it; and it rose, flew up one of his nostrils and entered his brain, which it began to devour.
Nimrod beat his face and his head, and when he did so the fly ceased gnawing at his brain, but he had no repose from his agonies save when struck upon the head. Consequently there was, after that, always some one stationed by him to strike his head. The king had a large blacksmith’s hammer brought into his throne-room, and with that his princes and nobles smote him on the head; and the more violent the blow, the greater was the relief afforded. Nimrod reigned a thousand years before he felt the torment of the gnat; up to that moment he had suffered no pains. He lived for five hundred years with the fly eating at his brain; and all that while, night and day, there were relays of men to strike his head with the hammer.311
Precisely the same story is told by the Jewish Rabbis of Titus.312
There is, however, another version of the tradition; which is, that the gnat fattening on the brain grew in size till it swelled to the dimensions of a pigeon, and then the skull of Nimrod burst, and the gnat flew away; and this was fifteen days after it had entered by his nose.313
More shall be told of Melchizedek in a separate article.
4. THE BIRTH OF ISHMAEL
Ten years passed, and yet Sarah was barren. Abraham, in sore distress, prayed to God, and reminded Him of His promises. Sarah then said to Abraham, “God has refused me children, therefore take Hagar to wife, the daughter of Pharaoh, who was given to be my servant; I give her thee in all good-will, that my reproach may be taken away, and to her I give her freedom.”
Abraham consented; but Hagar, who had been virtuously brought up by Sarah, objected modestly, till Sarah pointed out to her how great an honor it would be to be the concubine of such a holy man.
But no sooner was Hagar installed as second wife, and felt in herself that she was about to become a mother, than her character changed; she assumed the pre-eminence, and cast bitter words in the teeth of her mistress. “What,” said she, “can Sarah be so holy and beloved of God, and He has never given her her heart’s desire?”
Sarah was stung to the quick by these words of her former slave. She turned to her husband and said, “I demand of thee my rights. For thee I forsook my father’s house, and followed thee into a strange land; for thee I passed myself off in Egypt as thy sister. And now what hast thou done? Thou hast suffered my slave to assume the chief place in the house, and to take upon herself airs, and thou holdest thy peace. Depend upon it, if she bear thee a son there will be no peace in the house, for she is a daughter of Pharaoh, who is of the race of Nimrod, who cast thee into the furnace of fire.”
“Hagar is in thy power,” answered Abraham; “but do her no harm. After thou gavest her her freedom, she may not again be brought into bondage.”
But Sarah paid no attention to these words of gentleness, and treated Hagar with such cruelty, beat her, and cast an evil eye on her, so that she was delivered before her time of a dead child, and she fled for her life from the house.
The All-Righteous, for this offence, shortened Sarah’s life, and made her die thirty-eight years before her husband.
Angels appeared to Hagar in the desert by the well of water whither she had fled, and bade her return to Abraham. So she went back, and was again pregnant, and bore a son, and called his name Ishmael.
5. THE DESTRUCTION OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH
At noon on the 15th Nisan, the third day after the circumcision of Abraham, as recorded in the Book of Genesis, the heat of the sun was so great that Gehinom (Hell) was penetrated by it. And Abraham had not recovered the administration of the rite, which had been performed by the hands of Shem, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God.
Abraham was wont every day to go forth and invite any travellers he might see to feast with him. But this day, owing to the heat and to his being in pain, he sent Eliezer, his servant, forth, who looked and returned and said that there was no one to be seen.
But Abraham thought, “Can I trust the words of this slave, and neglect for one day the performance of my accustomed hospitality?”
Then, notwithstanding the heat and his suffering, he went and sat in the shade of the door, and he beheld in the plain of Mamre the glory of the Lord that appeared. Abraham would have risen, but the voice of God called to him, saying, “Remain where thou art, and let thy pious, sitting posture teach future generations in their prayer and instruction to be seated; and let judges, in delivering judgment, occupy the same position.”
