1 Jehovah said to Abram: »Leave your country, your people, and your father’s household, and go to the land I will show you.

2 »I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you. I will make your name great. You will be a blessing.

3 »I will bless those who bless you. I will curse whoever curses you. All the people on earth will be blessed through you.«

4 So Abram left, just as Jehovah told him. Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran.

5 He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran. They set out for the land of Canaan and soon arrived there.

6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great oak tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land.

7 Jehovah appeared to Abram and said: »I will give this land to your offspring seed.« He built an altar there to Jehovah, who had appeared to him.

8 From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent. Bethel was on the west and Ai on the east. He built an altar to Jehovah and called on the name of Jehovah.

9 Abram continued toward the Negev.

10 There was a famine in the land. Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while, because the famine was severe.

11 He was about to enter Egypt. He said to his wife Sarai: »I know what a beautiful woman you are.

12 »When the Egyptians see you, they will say: ‘This is his wife.’ Then they will kill me, but will let you live.

13 »Say you are my sister, so that I will be treated well for your sake, and my life will be spared because of you.«

14 When Abram came to Egypt, the Egyptians saw that she was a very beautiful woman.

15 Pharaoh’s officials saw her. They praised her to Pharaoh. She was taken into his palace.

16 He treated Abram well for her sake. Abram acquired sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, menservants and maidservants, and camels.

17 Jehovah inflicted serious diseases on Pharaoh and his household because of Abram’s wife Sarai.

18 So Pharaoh summoned Abram. »What have you done to me?« he asked. »Why did you not tell me she was your wife?

19 »Why did you say: ‘She is my sister,’ so that I took her to be my wife? Now then, here is your wife. Take her and go!«

20 Pharaoh gave orders about Abram to his men, and they sent him on his way, with his wife and everything he had.