Covenant Between the Parts

(7) Then He said to him, “I am the LORD who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans to assign this land to you as a possession.”

(8) And he said, “O Lord GOD, how shall I know that I am to possess it?”

(9) He answered, “Bring Me a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old she-goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young bird.” (10) He brought Him all these and cut them in two, placing each half opposite the other; but he did not cut up the bird. (11) Birds of prey came down upon the carcasses, and Avram drove them away. (12) As the sun was about to set, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and a great dark dread descended upon him.

(13) And He said to Avram, “Know well that your offspring shall be strangers in a land not theirs, and they shall be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years; (14) but I will execute judgment on the nation they shall serve, and in the end they shall go free with great wealth. (15) As for you, You shall go to your fathers in peace; You shall be buried at a ripe old age. (16) And they shall return here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.” (17) When the sun set and it was very dark, there appeared a smoking oven, and a flaming torch which passed between those pieces. (18) On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your offspring I assign this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates: (19) the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, (20) the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, (21) the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.”

And Shmuel said: Because he examined the characteristics of God, as it is stated: “Whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?” (Genesis 15:8).

And Rabbi Yoḥanan said: He was punished because he distanced people from entering under the wings of the Divine Presence, as it is stated that the king of Sodom said to him: “Give me the people and take the goods to yourself”

How shall I know: Our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, said (Nedarim 32a), "Because Avram said, 'How shall I know,' he was punished with, 'You shall surely know [that your offspring shall be strangers in a land not theirs, and they shall be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years]' (Genesis 15:13)." But the intellect demurs from accepting this drash (homiletical understanding): That his children should suffer such a great punishment because of the sign that Avram requested; and Avram himself did not receive any punishment, whereas his children's teeth were set on edge. Therefore my heart tells me and has concluded that the exile in Egypt had other causes. And our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, disagree about [the causes] – and you can find all of the opinions in [the commentary on the Torah] of our teacher, Rabbi Yitzchak Abarbanel, as he gathered them together. But (the reason for not quoting them here is that) the length of a page is too short to put all of those opinions upon it. Rather the writer of this drash was bothered by [the following question]: Whatever the reason for the exile may have been – why is it that the Holy One, blessed be He, should tell Avram this bad news, to distress him for nothing? It is about this that he said that [it was] for the sin of "How shall I know' – that he wanted to know something that was unnecessary to know, as why did he need to ask for a sign about the word of God? [Hence] he was punished with, 'You shall surely know,' such that the Holy One, blessed be He, informed him about something to distress him. And this is also poetic justice (middah keneged middah).

Rabbi Yoḥanan said in the name of Rabbi Shimon ben Yoḥai: From the day that the Holy One, Blessed be He, created the world there was no person who called him “Lord” until Avraham came and called him Lord. As it is stated: “And he said, ‘My Lord, God, by what shall I know that I will inherit it?’” (Genesis 15:8).