Abraham: Father of Jews, Christians and Muslims...

Here is the document I told you about. It was provided to me by my efficient guide at the catechumenate : Sonia, with whom I had asked about the thing. So as you will learn (if you haven't already), the story is not lacking in humor! Abram had a wife: Sarai who was hopelessly barren, despite God's promise to Abram to be the father of many nations. Sarai therefore offers her servant Hagar as a concubine to her husband. Hagar gave Abram a child: Ishmael. Abram accepted theCovenant offered by God. Abram then becomes Abraham and Sarai becomes Sarah ("Princess" instead of "my princess"). Years later, Abraham saw three strangers pass by. He ran to them (Genesis, ch. 15 to 18) and he invited them to his tent, open to the four cardinal points (a sign of hospitality according to Rashi). Simultaneously God informed Abraham of the unborn child. Sarah, nonagenarian and who no longer shared the bed of her centenarian husband, laughed to hear such news... The Men got up from there and looked at Sodom, Abraham was walking with them to take his leave, and God the imminent destruction of Sodom et Gomorrah. The child will be born a year later and will therefore be called Isaac (“he/she laughed”)

As you will see with the illustration at the end of the article his two sons, Isaac et Ishmael, will respectively give substance to the Jewish and Christian religions as well as the Muslim ones. Abraham who rightly stood up from the start against the interests (that found in Islamic finance WITHOUT interests, and in the Christian and Jewish religion ). Moreover, seeing this filiation (and since the time they have been studying the texts), I was therefore surprised that the Israelis do not welcome the Palestiniens with open arms and beat them fruitlessly for 60 years... Wouldn't it be more 'constructive' to stop poisoning the whole world and to rebuild the kingdom of "Canaan" ? In any case, note the caustic "humor" of the Americans who pervert history and name their tanks: “M1A1 Abrams” , to bring the good word to the Muslims of Iraq and from Afghanistan…

Discover

“God comes to meet us”. The Christians, in asserting this, rely on the experience of the believers who preceded them.

Since the earliest times, the Bible has brought us into contact with those who bear witness to their encounter with God.

Beyond the barriers of cultural differences, the discovery of Christianity places us at the crossroads of the faith paths of witnesses of yesterday and today.

For all believers in the one God, one of the most founding experiences remains that of Abraham.

A - The beginning of a situated adventure. Who is Abraham?

He is the "elder" of the people of Israel, the patriarch.

Its history dates back to the eighteenth^e century BC. The stories concerning this people are first transmitted orally, then transcribed in the biblical book of Genesis, from chapter 12.

The attached map shows you the region of the Middle East where the story begins. The land of Canaan covers approximately Israel and present-day Palestine. Abraham was a nomad, a cattle herder.

The biblical stories allow us to perceive how God reveals himself; how the people of that time got to know a god "desirous" of the happiness of all men on earth and in all times.

The originality of Abraham's faith in God is that it is part of the experience of a man's life. It is a faith linked to Changes, to interior attitudes… But it is also confronted with failure, with disappointment.

B – A Call, a new beginning

The Bible tells us that Abraham “listened to God”. To those who listen, God makes it clear that everything is possible on condition that they do not remain fixed on their own ideas, habits, securities...

Already on the way (to Canaan) with his tribe, Abram experiences faith; its walk is oriented by a happy promise: a country, an offspring, the blessing of God through the Alliance.

C- In New Name, new mission

Abram responds to God's call but his path crosses doubts and illusions; his faith is tried. Abram moves from encampment to encampment. But God continues to speak to him.

Abram builds an altar for the lord, he keeps trust. God gives him a name Abram – Abraham, as well as his wife Sarai – Sarah; This change symbolically expresses that a mission has been entrusted to them: to be at the origin of a new people, the people of God.

D – God promises land, descendants

Precisely when everything seems hopeless, it is then that God's promise is more perceptible, Abraham, he will not see the promised land, but in the birth of his sons, the people to come are prefigured.

The promise of God is the promise of life.

For Christians, Abraham is the father of believers. Thus is fulfilled the promise of God: "In you shall all the nations of the earth be blessed"

The faith lived by the Hebrews is not a "ready-made road"; it differs from other beliefs centered on nature and the energies of the cosmos. The contemporaries of Abraham perpetuate the ancestral religious practices. So in the midst of them, how to live one's faith when one recognizes oneself as a people of God's promise? The scene of the sacrifice of the firstborn shows that the answer is not obvious. If necessary, Abraham is ready to offer his son Isaac. But God teaches him that he does not want the misfortune of those whom he calls.