6.1.2 Gen. 12:10-20: Abraham and Sarah in Egypt

This seemingly strange incident describes the type of stories of the  “endangerment of the ancestress”, which we will later encounter again in  a similar way in Gen. 20:1ff and in Isaac and Rebekah Gen. 26:7-11. An  obstacle for an unbiased interpretation is the moral indignation that  immediately arises in us with the question: did Abraham not also  become guilty? 

Why of all things does this rather offensive story form the beginning of  the Abraham stories? Probably because with this situation the whole  promise of 12, 1 – 3 would have become invalid. At the same time, it  should make clear right at the beginning that in reality Yahweh directs  history and not man.