BOCA RATON, Florida — Young Abraham differed from what we think. Everything written about Abraham as a young man is midrashic. They are imaginative events, not based on anything in the Torah. A close reading of the Torah reveals a totally different young Abraham than the fictional midrashic accounts.
took him, his wife, and the rest of his family, from their home in Ur of the Chaldees, without the Bible giving a reason for the trip, to Haran where the family settled, and Abram’s father
died there. Then, when Abram was seventy-five years old, God spoke to him, with no indication of any prior conversation or relationship. God told him to leave Haran. He obeyed and went to Canaan.
Midrashic stories about Abraham include the following:
*His father sold idols and Abraham as a child destroyed them, got into trouble with King Nimrod
opposite is true.
As stated earlier, the Torah states that before Abraham was age 75, his father took his family and
relationship between Abraham and his dad.
Noah lived 350 years after the flood. The Flood occurred 1656 years after Creation. Noah died in 2006 after the Creation. By the Hebrew calendar, Abraham was born in 1948 after the Creation and was 58 years old when Noah died.
Notes
(1) Other examples of passages to which Maimonides referred are when Joseph told his brothers in Genesis 45:7, “God sent me before you.” Or in Genesis 24:51 when Laban told Abraham’s servant regarding Rebecca, “Let her be a wife to the son of your master, as the Lord spoke.” Or in Jonah 2:11, “The Lord spoke to the fish and it vomited out Jonah.”