Unto the place of the altar, which he had made there at the
first
When he first came to that place, and before he went down to Egypt: it is not said he came to the altar, but "to the place", where it had stood, for it seems now to have been demolished, either having fallen of itself, being made of earth, or had been destroyed by the Canaanites, since Abram left it; or perhaps it might be pulled down by Abram himself before he went from thence, that it might not be used and polluted by the idolatrous Canaanites. And there Abram called on the name of the Lord;
prayed unto him, and gave him thanks for the preservation of him and his wife in Egypt; for the support of himself and his family there during the famine in Canaan; for the increase of his worldly substance, and for the protection of him, and all that belonged to him, in his journey from Egypt thither; and for all the instances of his grace, and the rich experiences of his goodness he had favoured him with; (See Gill on Genesis 12:8) where the same form of expression is used.