#115 Dethroning Abraham: The Messy Story Behind the Father of Many Nations + Dr. Mallory Chappell

Humanizing Abraham Without Diminishing God's Holiness

How do you not lose the holiness when you are humanizing Abraham?

We lose so much in what we can learn and what we can understand, in understanding how God works. He was actually the complete opposite.

God's like, you, who doesn't know me, who's been doing the opposite of worshiping me. I'm gonna use you.

Yes. I'm seeing the extent of bad decisions that humans can make, and I'm seeing how God loves them and works through them.

What does he actually believe about God? What should we believe about him? Hello, hello. Welcome to Biblically Speaking. My name is Cassian Bellino, and I'm your host. In this podcast, we talk about the Bible in simple terms with experts, PhDs, and scholarly theologians to make understanding God easier.

These conversations have transformed my relationship with Christ and understanding of religion. Now, I'm sharing these recorded conversations with you. On this podcast, we talk about the facts, the history, and the translations to make the Bible make sense so we can get to know God, our creator, better.

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Reconsidering Abraham's Flaws and Faith

I'm your host, Cassian Bellino, and today we're gonna dethrone Abraham. I have Dr. Mallory Chappell here with me today. She is somebody that was on the show previously, and we talked about, it was basically an exposition on King David, and we talked about, you know, he's great, he's awesome.

Obviously the Bible loves him, we love him, but let's put kind of what he did in context, and if we're being realistic, some of it's not okay, and if you haven't heard that episode, Go Back, it's wonderful.

It really does a deep dive into the context of what it was like for Bathsheba and what it was like for a general and how the people around him maybe would have reacted in a strange way the same way we would have, but the Bible doesn't show that side, and I think it's great to humanize the people that God chooses because, you know, God can still choose us despite our flaws the same way he chooses and chose King David, and today we're doing the same thing with Abraham, and Abraham, father of many nations, Abraham, the guy who seems to have no flaws despite, you know, lying about his wife, and, you know, the guy who, you know, saved a lot, you know, despite, you know, almost sacrificing his only son, and, you know, despite many things like, you know, having a baby with Hagar.

So all of these things, what does he actually believe about God? What should we believe about him? Today I have the expert with me. If you don't know, Dr. Mallory Chappell, you should. She has a PhD in Bible exposition from Liberty University, a master of divinity with a focus on biblical languages.

Your research looks at the Septuagint, the Greek and the Old Testament, and how language and ancient culture affect the way we understand these texts. Literally my bread and butter for the show. I'm so glad that you're here.

You also teach Bible, ancient history, cultural geography. You serve as a discipleship pastor. Welcome to the show. I'm so glad you're back. Thank you. I am so happy to be here. Been looking forward to this.

Abraham's Background and Religious Worldview

So Abraham, how do we feel about him? Like knowing what you know before I know what you know.

As I was working through kind of prepping for today, the song that was in my brain, and I don't know if everybody else had this experience at church, but that Father Abraham song. Oh, I don't know that one.

Where it's like Father Abraham had many sons, and many sons had Father Abraham, and like it goes through. And I'm just thinking of how much we gloss over in like Sunday school and from the pulpit, and I get it, but we lose so much.

We lose so much in what we can learn and what we can understand and understanding how God works. And I think it's a huge disservice to just hit the high points of Abraham's story and not dig into the more complicated passages.

I agree with that.

And you as an expert, how do you not lose the holiness when you are humanizing Abraham? Like how do you exit this conversation or enter it, I guess, knowing what you know, and not be like, think less of God's decisions?

Like you're still like.

That's a good question. I think honestly what it does for me is it humbles me because it's really humbling to go, okay, I'm seeing like the extent of bad decisions that humans can make, and I'm seeing how God loves them and works through them.

And it honestly reflects back on me where I go, okay, so I'm a discipleship pastor. Oh my goodness, I make mistakes all the time. I have no right being in a position that I'm in. They didn't have a right being in the position that they were in, and that's the point.

That's the point of the gospel is that it's all about God. So I think it's super humbling, or it can be, it should be. I don't think everybody views it that way, but I think if we go to humble of none of us deserve to be at the table, and yet God extends that invitation to us anyway, and he loves us anyway and uses us anyway.

That's a really good point. And I think that, yeah, when we look at people like Abraham, people like Moses, like they're so imperfect, but when we gloss over the humanness, is the disservice that you're discussing kind of like we put him on a pedestal?

Yes, I think so.

And we can't learn from that. We can't learn. And we talk about it at church all the time. Well, you can't learn if you're not open. You can't grow if you're not open. Join this small group, be vulnerable, but then we go to the Bible and we don't want vulnerability, but that's what we need.

Well, we go to the Bible and we're like,.

Okay, so he's perfect. I'll never be used by God. Right. Because what he did, God was okay with, but when I do it, it's a problem. So I guess just excuse me from serving the nations or serving the kingdom, I guess.

Abram's Polytheistic Past and Call to Canaan

Okay, so we're gonna discuss Sarah. We're gonna discuss Lot, and we're gonna discuss Hagar. And before we get into it, my favorite thing to do is who is Abraham? Like what do we know about him as he enters into Genesis 11?

Like what age is he at? This is right after the Tower of Babel.

Could you just kind of set the scene? Yeah, so Abraham, we don't have a clear timeline. What we do have is we know that Abraham is about 75 years old when he leaves this place called Haran. Now, Haran is where he and his family settled.

So we don't really know exactly how long he'd been there. We don't have all those details, but he's 75 when he leaves there to head to the promised land or what will be the promised land, to Canaan. We know that his father from tradition, not scripture, but from tradition, he was actually an idol maker.

And when he was called out, it's like, okay, now Yahweh has entered the picture. So there's some of that going on. We know that he has sheep, he has cattle. So he is kind of like a shepherd. They're nomadic in their lifestyle.

So they don't stay settled in one area. So the idea of living in a city is not really something they would have done. Certainly they would have gone to the city, but they wouldn't have lived there. They would move with the seasons, with where their flocks could graze.

So he was very like movable, living in tents, pitch a tent in your backyard, like real tents, like nice ones.

So you mentioned, Yahweh's been introduced. What does that mean? Like, I guess I assume that before they were set apart, they were like all worshiping many gods.

Yeah, yeah. And I think it's, yes, definitely. There was, there's no reason to think that Abraham always worshiped Yahweh. And truthfully, there's no reason to think that he only worshiped Yahweh for a large part of his life.

One of the things that we take for granted as an audience with the whole Bible is we look back and we go, well, of course it's only God. But Abraham didn't know that. He didn't have that. And there's nothing in the text that suggests that Abraham was, you know, sitting there one day and God plopped down and said, let me tell you all of the things that eventually I'll reveal to the whole church so that you know what's going on and you know who I am.

That's not what happens. And that's not how God works. He tends to reveal himself slowly over time. So did God tell him, hey, I'm the only one? Or did God just say, hey, make a covenant with me. I'm going to be your God and you're going to be in a covenant.

Let's go. Which must've been crazy that you lived 75 years. I've lived 30 years and I'm like one God, like can't even fathom spending a year of my life worshiping another God. He spent 75 years, vast majority for most people, if not all, worshiping many gods.

One of the gods emerges and says, hey, you and I, we're going to make a pinky promise that it's just us and I'm going to put you on a job. And I'm going to say something impossible, like you're going to have a ton of kids.

And Abraham's just like, okay.

I like what you said there. You said one of the gods, because from his perspective, like we know looking back, false God, true God, like we know that. That was not part of their worldview. This was a, these gods are over this land, you worship them.

Okay, go over here, worship this God. So that really would have been, okay, a God appeared to me and said, leave your home, go to my land and worship me. And you go, okay.

He's like, I have kids, my sheep are good, I'm retired. I might as well. That, okay. So I think that's important to state that because A, it's not obvious, but B, he didn't earn that title of father of many nations.

By no means was he like diligent and do kind of like Daniel. Like Daniel did a great job his whole life. He deserves that kind of title. But Abraham was like an idolatrous. He was a, I don't wanna say polygamist, but polytheist, sorry.

And he was, well, at some point he is a polygamist. So he was that too. Yeah, we'll get there. You know, like he wasn't that perfect nun, that perfect priest that was like, you've earned this. He was actually the complete opposite.

God's like you, who doesn't know me, who has been doing the opposite of worship me. I'm gonna use you. Yes, yes. Okay, so that's good. That's very humanizing. That gives me hope, you're right. Like that humbles me, but it also gives me hope as somebody who has done many things wrong in my life.

But I wanna just start kind of humanizing Abraham in the style of let's look at the text. And then I'm just gonna say like, what am I missing here? Because you know, like going to church, you're right.

Like he seems like he's doing great. But let's start in Genesis 12, which is the chapter after he comes into the scene of the Bible. And this is during the famine. So Genesis 12, verses 10 and 13. Now there was a famine in the land and Abraham went down to Egypt to live there for a while because the famine was severe.

As he was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife, Sarah, you say Sarai.

I mean, up until a certain point, God does change their names, but in modern times, we all know who we're talking about. So if I'm being super technical about it, yeah, I'll say Sarai until they change it, but.

Okay. Yeah. We'll be technical.

Sarai. I know what a beautiful woman you are. And she's also 75, right? Or is she like 30?

She'd be closer in age. I mean, I don't know that there's anything that says she's that far away, like in age. Cause we know the whole time she's kind of old, the whole time, cause kind of the whole premise is she can't have kids.

Okay. Okay. So he looks at his wife. She's also in her seventies.

I know what a beautiful woman you are. When the Egyptians see you, they will say, this is his wife and then they will kill me, but let you live. Say you are my sister so that I will be treated well for your sake and my life will be spared because of you.

Honestly, that makes sense. That to me sounds like survival, but you have a quorum with it because he's lying. He's kind of lying. They're half siblings.

What? They're half, they're half siblings.

Was that just like at the like chapter 11 when he's like, and then. Yeah. It's like, it's like snuck in there. Yeah. It's like kind of snuck in there. Yeah. And his wife, his sister, same thing. Yeah.

Kind of. Yeah. They just sweep that in. Yeah. But again, he's protecting her.

Yes. So technically lying, kind of not lying because yes, that is his sister, but it's also his wife. But yes, you're right. There is a huge level of like realism here, I think. They're going to a new land, realistic.

He's just being logical and. Yeah. Realistic with their situation.

And it seems like the circumstances are kind of dire. Not only are they going into a new place, we're like, yeah, like we don't know the culture. They might kill this woman. They might kill me for my woman.

Yes. But also like there is no food. And so God, he basically experienced a God, made a covenant with a God. And then he's like, okay, well, things are kind of rough here, God. So I'm going to go into the nearby city.

Did God tell him to go to Egypt?

There's no indication that he did. And I would say that because it's absent and because later Abraham's offspring are told not to go there until they go there for a long time, I think we can say like, he wasn't really supposed to.

It's not like God prompted him to go. Okay. He just, it was a reasonable choice. I don't know if it's disobedient so much because I don't know that he's told him not to go either. There is this idea though, that since Abraham was brought to the land that God showed him, I think there was kind of this followed assumption of he should probably stay there.

But Egypt was a logical choice. They had food. They didn't have to worry so much about famines because of the Nile River. So they weren't hit as hard as everywhere else. So kind of a reasonable next step if you're not factoring in God, of course.

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So we continue in the verse, you know, verses 14 to 20. So then Abram comes to Egypt and the Egyptians saw that Sarai was very beautiful. And then when Pharaoh's officials saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh and she was taken into his palace, which is crazy that she walks in and then she's just yeeted into the palace just immediately like, she's pretty, I want her.

And then he treated Abram well for her sake and Abram acquired sheep and cattle and male and female donkeys and male and female servants and camels. But the Lord inflicted serious diseases on Pharaoh and his household because of Abram's wife, Sarai.

So Pharaoh summoned Abram, what have you done to me? And why didn't you tell me she was your wife? Why did you say she's my sister so that I took her to be my wife? Now then, here's your wife, take her and go.

And then Pharaoh gave orders about Abram to his men and they sent him on his way and his wife with everything he had. So again, this is like an English translation. It seems like a misunderstanding, a little bit of anger, a lot of reward, but not a lot of consequences.

Is there something about the original translation that we miss out on?

So with this, she was taken and it is the extent of what it sounds like. She was taken into the harem, she was. She was now a part of the Pharaoh's harem. Got it. Yeah, so and all that that entails. I think the piece that's missing is because we kind of jump from she's taken in and then all of a sudden they get sick and they immediately assume it was Abram.

And it's like, as the reader, we're like, well, how'd you know that? And a lot of it comes down to, the Egyptians did have magicians. They had people who were in the mystical arts. And if you study ancient Egyptian magic, they had spells and incantations and all of these things and they would have been watching the stars and all the events and all of that.

And so narrowing down that it was because of Abram is kind of reasonable with all of the things that they had at their disposal. And as far as the like, why Pharaoh's not, I mean, kind of mad, but like giving him stuff is it's like, this is somebody else's wife.

You've got your God, we've got our gods. Let's appease them and go away and stop punishing our household because they would have seen it as Yahweh punishing their household because they made a different God mad.

Oh, okay. Yeah. That. Yeah, so this is like a war of the gods almost, which we see again in Exodus, right? We see that again with the plagues where it's like Yahweh versus their gods. And so Pharaoh's like, no, no, no, no.

Let me make you happy. Let me give you all of these things because Pharaoh could have had Abram killed. Right. But he didn't because Abram's God is clearly powerful enough to strike his whole household.

So gives him stuff and sends him on his way.

There is so much that you just said. First of all, just like the fact that his wife, he's like, yeah, she's my sister, we good. And then he goes, thank you. She's going to become one of my concubines.

I will have sex with her. And so will many, well, I guess, would other people, like would she be going to be like prostituted out?

Probably not. Probably, especially because it was for Pharaoh. So that's like, they're like for Pharaoh.

Yeah. Okay. So probably not. That's horrible that his wife is taken into a harem. She's probably like, thanks husband. Right. Because like, what is she going to do? What is she going to do? But also do you think like, again, context, she's probably like, this is a best case scenario for me.

I mean, I think that's a reasonable possibility. Yeah. Because the other possibility is that her husband is killed and she's taken anyway. Like she doesn't have a whole lot of choice.

Okay. So that is horrible, but then he gets, but so his wife is just taken into a harem. He's not killed. And then he gets like a pirate ship's worth of like, it's just insane. The Bible's like, and a million sheep.

Yeah. And all of this stuff. Yes. Like where do they put it? You know, does he, is he given a farm with it?

No, it's probably, that's what I know. No, his, he's got male and female servants presumably to carry it and to guide it. He now, he goes from like coming into Egypt with whatever he had before to now leaving Egypt with all of this stuff that they now have to transport.

And it just seems like over the next couple of chapters, his wealth just increases like more and more.

I wonder like what he was doing, like how long this was happening before the plague struck the household, that was he like chilling for a couple months or was it like immediate that he's like, okay, you know, we were here for three days, basically in and out because the plague and the magicians kind of put it together.

So interestingly, it kind of depends on the plague. There's been some suggestion from different scholars that maybe this was like an infertility thing. Don't know obviously, we're trying to piece together what we don't know, right?

So it could be like this infertility, which would paint a longer picture, right? Cause it takes a while to find out that you can't have children back then. They don't, they can't, you know, they don't have like those sticks you can get at Walmart.

And so maybe it's that. So then we're talking a couple of months, but it's also been suggested that maybe it's like a STD type plague. Yeah, it says diseases. Right, it says diseases. And so that would, could have been, I wouldn't say would have, but could have been a quicker turnaround because that can happen much more quickly.

So the text really doesn't tell us and without anything else, we really don't know. It could have been a long time. It could have been quite short. Interesting, interesting.

Yeah, it is just, when you don't put it in context of like circumstantial and like the gods battling out, you kind of see Abraham benefiting from handing his wife over. And then God intervenes, you know, Abraham isn't knocking down the door to get his wife out of the harem.

He's kind of like, oh, I'm gonna stock up on food while my wife is locked away. Hopefully she gets out. You know, if not, I guess I'll leave. You know, it's God coming in and intervening to essentially make the Pharaoh let go.

Yeah, to solve this problem that Abraham really couldn't solve on his own. Because like you said, it's not like he's knocking on the door to get her back, but how could he? And so God really is coming in and solving the problem that Abraham created and solving it in a way that Abraham is not only blessed with stuff, but is also protected.

It paints a really loving picture of God.

Yeah, and almost like the Pharaoh, the paganistic God is doing something better than Abraham. I mean, he definitely has more power than Abraham, but he still is like the one that doesn't serve our God.

No, but he's definitely submitting to the power of Yahweh in this situation, for sure. Yeah.

Wow. Okay. That's like really hard, really hard to believe. But it's also circumstantial, you know, like as anybody would to look at our lives, like how, and again, you just think about like, where is Abraham's head in this moment?

Like, what do we do with him where he's like, well, I was serving other gods and like, this is crazy that like my God just beat that one. And, you know, Egypt is this powerhouse and yet here I am sitting on my hands and I'm like beating the Pharaoh, that is insane.

Like that must have been humiliating to the Pharaoh's house, but also God's battling was like commonplace in that time.

Yes, and then think of the, like as we're going through this and every time God shows up and fixes something or provide something or whatever it is, it's building this view that Abram has of God. I mean, we all have in our head what God is like and it's generally based on our experiences.

We'd like to say it's because we read the Bible and we know exactly what it says and there's some of that, but it really is experiences. How do we experience God? How do we come to him? How does he show up for us?

How do we understand who he is? And so as we're seeing Abram interact with Yahweh, it's piecing together this image of who God is and who Abraham is in relation to who his God is. And so as we go, it's like adding more pieces to that puzzle.

Wow, yeah, because for him, this is a brand new God that he's experiencing. It's not like he's walking into towns and he's like, well, this is what God's doing for me. What is God doing for you? Like no one technically has heard about Yahweh.

Not in, I mean, I wouldn't say that like God wasn't doing anything anywhere. Cause like with Job, Job was happening, Job is set around the same time as Abraham. So like that kind of suggests that maybe God was doing other stuff, but in general, no.

In general, it's not like we can leave, I can leave where I live and like come visit you. And there's five churches I can choose from. It's not like that. It would have been, if at all, very few and far between.

And then what in the world would they even know about Yahweh? Would they know his name?

Like, yeah. Which must have been weird for Pharaoh. He's like, what is this brand new God on the scene who's more powerful than like the Egyptian gods that have taken over so many people? Like that must have been a little like, something's happening and we don't know what.

I think it explains why he jumped so quickly to. What have you done to me? Take your wife, take your new stuff and leave. It's like, I want no part in that. I don't want that here. Don't mess up my status quo.

Go away. Yeah. Not even like, let's not, let's see who wins. It's like, let's just not do any of that. We're not going there. Yeah. But that's interesting because it happens many times that he walks into towns and Sarah is taken.

And then this kind of copy and paste happens.

Yeah, it happens twice. And then it happens once with his son after, same kind of deal.

So, and these are all different Pharaohs.

So the first one is in Egypt here, it's Pharaoh. The second one, I think it's the Amalekites. And then with his son, it's, well, it says the same group, whether it's the exact same, I don't know. So this is the only time in Egypt that we get this.

Interestingly though, and I know I'm kind of getting way ahead of myself, but when Abraham's descendants, when the Israelites leave Egypt in Exodus, they're given stuff too. They're given tons of stuff to take with them when they leave Egypt to go to the promised land.

I didn't know that. I thought they were like running for their lives.

No, it's like, well, I mean, they were after, but when Pharaoh finally says, yes, you can leave, they're given all this stuff and then they leave, then they're running for their lives with all their stuff.

That's, you know, after. Because Pharaoh wants to be honorable to their God?

I think there, it's definitely fear. It's like, you just did all of these things. You just killed all these people. Take this stuff and go. And this is weird. Or is it? Oh, I think it's like a bribe, kind of like a bribe.

Well, it makes me think of like the Odyssey, like how much of that culture was like to appease the gods were going to be very generous. And it's like, that's a secular book, but it's like, that was the time.

Like that was the belief is like, I don't know if you saw the movie, but it's like Zeus's law is this big. Yeah, like Zeus's law is like a concept that we don't really adhere to, but to them. Right, we don't.

Very big, very, very central. This idea of, I'm glad you said that, because this idea of like how the gods interact in their lives truthfully is so much more central to how God interacts in the lives of most people.

You know, when something happens is our first thought, okay, what is God doing? Or is our first thought, what am I going to do? Like if something bad happens or something good happens, you know, is our first thought, okay, how is God directing this?

How am I supposed to respond to God? Or is it, oh no, I have to fix this problem. I know I have to address this situation. I mean, we just don't have the same, it's very different. Even in the secular or the pagan world back then, they had that same mindset, very attuned to the supernatural in a way that we just aren't.

Yes, totally.

Yeah, all of like Greek mythology, like all of Homer's works, it's like, and based off this, we heard like the thunder and like clearly this is what the gods were doing. It was never like Odysseus didn't know what to do.

He just like thought to himself. It was like, he was very much so like, this is what I think is happening in the unseen realm. And you're totally right. You know, whether we like it or not, we've become individualistic in the way we approach problems by excluding God's role in what he's doing.

Yes. Whoa, okay. Great sidebar. So we're just gonna go forward. I'm just gonna keep going. Keep going, the clock is ticking. So we just left Genesis chapter 12, but we're going to zoom forward. A bunch happens, kind of like what we just said with all the different leaders and Sarah getting taken again and again, but you know, God prevailing.

Lot's Separation and God's Promise of Land

We get to chapter 20, or no, sorry. We get to chapter 13, the next one. And this is again, like Abraham has cousins. He's got family nearby. And so chapter 13 goes, so Abram went up from Egypt to Negev with his wife and everything he had, which must be tons, and Lot went with him.

So his cousin, his nephew. Nephew. His nephew shows up, is with him. Abram had become very wealthy in livestock and silver and gold. So he's kind of like, I'm resourceful. You might as well, like family sticks together.

So from the Negev, he went from the place to place until he came to Bethel to the place between Bethel and how do you pronounce that, Ai? Yeah, Ai. Okay, Ai, where his tent had been earlier and where he had first built an altar where Abram called on the name of the Lord.

So he's back where he started. Now Lot, who was moving about with Abram also had flocks and herds and tents, but the Lord could not support them while they stayed together for their possessions were so great that they were not able to stay together.

And quarreling arose between Abram's herders and Lot's and the Canaanites and Perizzites were also living in the land at that time. So just too many cooks in the kitchen. Yes. At that point, it's not like who's gonna be the leader.

It's just one of those things like, I have a lot, you have a lot, it's just not working. Yep, that's all it is. Okay, so Abram said to Lot, let's not have any quarreling between you and me or between your herders and mine for we're close relatives is not the whole land before you, let's part company.

If you go to the left and I'll go to the right, if you go to the right, I'll go to the left. So now Abram and Lot have so much stuff that they literally can't live together. What does that actually like realistically?