NOTES for Gen 17:1-27
Today's passage contains the story of another meeting with God, a very important one for Abraham. Here God for the first time reveals to Abraham the name by which He will be called for several centuries, right up to the time of the Exodus. This name is El Shaddai, "God of power" (v. 1). The translation "God Almighty" may be considered formally correct, but it does not reflect the full depth of the meaning of the name revealed to Abraham. For here the point is not only that Abraham's God can do everything. The point is power, a power known to all in ancient times, a supernatural power that lies at the foundation of the universe, hidden behind nature and manifested in many different natural phenomena, from a lightning strike to a spring bursting forth in the dry steppe. The ancients believed that gods, spirits, and even some people - chiefs, priests, sorcerers, magicians - possessed this power, but no one ever claimed to be its only source and bearer. Meanwhile God, addressing Abraham, speaks of Himself precisely as the "God of power," the God who is its only source and ruler. Such a God, of course, cannot but be the Creator of the world and its only Lord. But there was something else in this meeting too, no less important. It is no accident that precisely now Abram becomes Abraham, and Sarai becomes Sarah; their former names were different (vv. 5, 15). And a change of name has always meant, among all peoples, a serious inner change. It meant that the former person who bore the old name no longer existed; in his place another, new person had appeared, and this new person bore a new name. Obviously, together with the name of his God, Abraham learns something else, perhaps something more important. But this "something" apparently belongs to the number of inner changes that cannot be expressed in words, and the sacred author only hints at the change that happened to Abraham by mentioning his new name. Only now does God fulfill His promise about an heir (vv. 6-8, 16-21). It could not have been otherwise: Abraham's heir had to be not merely the leader of his tribe, but also the leader of the people of God, and among nomadic peoples in those days the leader usually also performed the role of high priest; responsibility for relations with the higher powers rested on him. Abraham's heir, like Abraham himself, had to become a man of God, a leader not only military and political, but spiritual as well. For this, both Abraham and Sarah had to experience a meeting with God and spiritual renewal, becoming different people. One cannot enter into a covenant with God and remain the same; He will surely transform and renew spiritually those whom He has called after Himself in order to make them worthy of the covenant He has made.