What is the Abrahamic Covenant and its significance in history?

Question:

What is the Abrahamic Covenant and its significance in history?

Answer:

The Abrahamic Covenant is of utmost significance when it comes to our understanding of all human history and God’s plan of salvation. The unique mark of this covenant is found in the nature in which it was made and the resulting covenantal properties it held. A covenant is most often a bilateral agreement (between two parties) and can be formed in two principle constructs – conditional or unconditional. Another form (or subset) of an unconditional covenant is a unilateral covenant, which holds only one party obligated to fulfill its obligations in the agreement.

The term for covenant, berı̂yth [pronounced ber-eeth], originates from the Hebrew word bârâ’ [pronounced baw-raw’], which means “to cut”. The significance of this is found in the method in which covenants were oft entered into in the Jewish culture – by the cutting of an animal. To create a binding bilateral covenant, the two parties would bring the appropriate animals, cut them in half, and lay them on either side to create a pathway in the middle. Then both parties would walk through the newly created pathway, thus binding them to the agreement/covenant through the adherence of the terms therein.

With this foundation set, we can now look at Genesis 12:1-3 as the articulation of God’s covenant with Abraham and understand its nature as we look to the ceremony outlined in Genesis 15. In Genesis 12:1-3, we see the results of the covenant as a nation that is made and blessed with favour because it is used as the vehicle to bless God’s chosen. In Genesis 15, we observe the covenantal ceremony and realize that Abraham had fallen asleep (Genesis 15:12) and it was God manifested in the form of “a smoking firepot with a blazing torch” and only God that “passed between the pieces” (Genesis 15:17). From this we can clearly see that Abraham was not bound to adhere to terms of the covenant and that God had made a unilateral/unconditional covenant with Abraham (Genesis 15:18). Although Abraham is known as the father of faith, it is amazing to realize that God made this unbreakable covenant with Abraham as the fore bearer into humanity to begin His plan of salvation. It isn’t based on anything Abraham or his immediate descendants or we are able to do. God alone makes this unconditional blessed covenant.

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1. Jack says:

   February 9, 2012 at 5:31 pm

   Thanks for the article.

   It seems to me that a basic truth we learn from the Abrahamic Covenant is that salvation is by grace alone. Faith in the human heart seems to be a gift of God. Even then, the Spirit of God, indwelling the believer, battles against the remnants of unbelief.

   Abrahams’s failures of faith are numerous. God’s promised blessings on Abraham were certainly unmerited. It took a lifetime for his faith to become mature. At 99, he laughed at the promise of God. Although he battled with
   the corruptions of the natural man, his faith could not totally fail. Faith was
   Divinely planted in his heart, and guaranteed his continuance in obedience, even after stumbling in many ways.

   Anyway, thats how it looks to me, and I think it is the Biblical view. “the flesh profiteth nothing”.