Key Terms Ch. 2

Question 1

Genesis 12-25; a collection of stories focused on Abraham

Answer 1

Abraham cycle

Question 2

the first father (patriarch) of Israel; God made a covenant with him in which God promised to make him a great nation; Isaac was his son by Sarah, and Ishmael was his son by Hagar

Answer 2

Abram/Abraham

Question 3

the covenant that YHWH made with Abraham, sealed by circumcision

Answer 3

Abrahamic covenant

Question 4

refers to the forebears of the nation of Israel–the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Hebrews, usually Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel and Leah, and sometimes the twelve sons of Jacob

Answer 4

ancestors

Question 5

the accounts in Genesis 12-50 that pertain to the ancestors of the Israelites

Answer 5

Ancestral Story

Question 6

the territory north and east of Palestine where Abraham’s ancestors had settled and from where the wives of Isaac and Jacob came; roughly the region of modern northern Syria and northwestern Iraq

Answer 6

Aram

Question 7

the twelfth son of Jacob; the younger brother of Joseph; Rachel was his mother; he was the ancestor of the tribe of Benjamin

Answer 7

Benjamin

Question 8

the special inheritance rights of the first born son that gave him claim to the bulk of the ancestral property

Answer 8

birthright

Question 9

cutting off the loose fold of skin at the end of the penis; the ritual attached to the covenant God made with Abraham; in Judaism, it is ritually performed when a boy is eight days old in a ceremony called brit milah, which indicated that the ritual establishes a covenant b/t God and the individual; in Islam, it’s performed at the age of puberty

Answer 9

circumcision

Question 10

a pact or formal agreement between two parties in which there are mutual obligations and expectations

Answer 10

covenant

Question 11

refers to a collection of stories centered on or cycling around one person

Answer 11

cycle

Question 12

a territory south of Judah, the location of the Edomites, the descendants of Esau

Answer 12

Edom

Question 13

a supposed ancestor whose name is the same as or related to the name of a later group, tribe, or nation

Answer 13

eponym

Question 14

the first son of Isaac and Rebekah; the twin of Jacob; he was the ancestor of the Edomites

Answer 14

Esau

Question 15

the territory in the eastern Nile delta of Egypt where Joseph settled the family of Jacob

Answer 15

Goshen

Question 16

the servant of Sarah and one of Abraham’s wives; the mother of Ishmael, who was driven away from the family by Sarah

Answer 16

Hagar

Question 17

the son of Abraham and Sarah who inherited the ancestral promises; he married Rebekah and was the father of Esau and Jacob

Answer 17

Isaac

Question 18

the son of Abraham and Hagar; he was not the son of the promise; he and his mother were expelled by Sarah and Abraham

Answer 18

Ishmael

Question 19

the second son of Isaac and Rebekah; he was the twin brother of Esau; his name was changed to Israel after he wrestled with God at the Jabbok River; he became the recipient of the ancestral promises, and his twelve sons became the ancestors of the tribes of Israel

Answer 19

Jacob

Question 20

the narratives of Genesis 25:19-35:29 that revolve around the ancestor Jacob

Answer 20

Jacob cycle

Question 21

son of Jacob by Rachel; brother of Benjamin; he was sold into slavery by his brothers and became a high official within the Egyptian government; his sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, became tribes within Israel

Answer 21

Joseph

Question 22

the collection of stories centered on Joseph, son of Jacob, contained in Genesis 37-50

Answer 22

Joseph cycle

Question 23

Jacob’s fourth son, he was the ancestor of the tribe of Judah; became the name of the southern kingdom after the northern ten tribes separated from Judah and Benjamin

Answer 23

Judah

Question 24

Rebekah’s brother and Jacob’s uncle who lived in Aram; Jacob became wealthy there and married his daughters, Rachel and Leah

Answer 24

Laban

Question 25

daughter of Laban; the first wife of Jacob who had six sons and one daughter

Answer 25

Leah

Question 26

the nephew of Abraham who accompanied him to Canaan

Answer 26

Lot

Question 27

Latin for “first mother”; a term used to refer to female ancestors such as Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, and Leah

Answer 27

matriarchs

Question 28

Latin for “first father”; the father and ruler of a family; the head of a tribe

Answer 28

Patriarch/patriarchs

Question 29

Egyptian term for “great house” that became the title for a king of Egypt; it’s not a king’s name

Answer 29

Pharaoh

Question 30

the Egyptian administrator in Genesis who purchased Joseph to be his slave

Answer 30

Potiphar

Question 31

the daughter of Laban, most loved wife of Jacob, and mother of Joseph and Benjamin

Answer 31

Rachel

Question 32

the sister of Laban, Isaac’s wife, mother of Esau and Jacob

Answer 32

Rebekah

Question 33

a long prose narrative having an episodic structure developed around stereotyped themes or objects; sagas abound in the primeval and ancestral collections of Genesis

Answer 33

saga

Question 34

the wife of Abraham; first called Sarai before Genesis 17; she was barren until God enabled conception, and Isaac was born in her old age

Answer 34

Sarah

Question 35

Greek for “appearance of God”; a manifestation or appearance of the divine–for example, when God appears in a burning bush to Moses

Answer 35

theophany

Question 36

Hebrew for “generations”; the ten “generations” used in Genesis as a way of structuring the history told in the book

Answer 36

Toledot

Question 37

an ancient Sumerian and Babylonian city on the Euphrates River in southern Mesopotamia; the home of Abraham before he left for Canaan

Answer 37

Ur