Acts 7:4

4 So Abraham left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. After Abraham's father died, God had him resettle in this land where you now live.

Acts 7:4 Meaning and Commentary

Acts 7:4

Then came he out of the land of the Chaldeans
The same with Mesopotamia; so Pliny says F2, that

``because of Babylon the head of the Chaldean nation---the other part of Mesopotamia and Assyria is called Babylonia.''

And he places Babylon in Mesopotamia; it was out of Ur, in the land of the Chaldeans particularly, that Abraham came, upon his first call:

and dwelt in Charan:
according to the Jewish writers F3, he dwelt here five years:

and from thence, when his father was dead;
who died in Haran, as is said in ( Genesis 11:32 ) and that it was after the death of Terah his father, that Abraham went from thence, is manifest from ( Genesis 11:31 Genesis 11:32 ) ( Genesis 12:4 Genesis 12:5 ) and yet a Jew F4 has the impudence to charge Stephen with a mistake, and to affirm, that Abraham went from Haran, whilst his father was yet living; proceeding upon a false hypothesis, that Terah begat Abraham when he was seventy years of age: but Philo the Jew is expressly with Stephen in this circumstance; he says F5,

``I think no man versed in the laws can be ignorant, that Abraham, when he first went out of the land of Chaldea, dwelt in Charan; (teleuthsantov te autw tou patrov ekenyi) "but his father dying there", he removed from thence:''

and so says Stephen:

he removed him into this land, wherein ye now dwell;
the land of Canaan; see ( Genesis 12:5 ) or "he removed himself", as the Ethiopic version renders it; or rather "God removed him", as the Syriac version reads, and so one copy in the Bodleian library; for it was by the order and assistance, and under the direction and protection of God, that he came into that land: after the words

wherein ye now dwell,
Beza's ancient copy adds, "and our fathers that were before us".


FOOTNOTES:

F2 De Urbibus, l. 6. c. 26.
F3 Seder Olam Rabba, c. 1. p. 2. Ganz Tzemach David, par. 1. fol. 5. 2.
F4 R. Isaac Chizzuk Emuna, par. 2. c. 61. p. 448.
F5 De Migratione Abrahami, p. 415.

Acts 7:4 In-Context

2 Stephen responded, “Brothers and fathers, listen to me. Our glorious God appeared to our ancestor Abraham while he was still in Mesopotamia, before he settled in Haran.
3 God told him, ‘Leave your homeland and kin, and go to the land that I will show you.'
4 So Abraham left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. After Abraham's father died, God had him resettle in this land where you now live.
5 God didn't give him an inheritance here, not even a square foot of land. However, God did promise to give the land as his possession to him and to his descendants, even though Abraham had no child.
6 God put it this way: His descendants will be strangers in a land that belongs to others, who will enslave them and abuse them for four hundred years.
Copyright © 2011 Common English Bible