12 Then Yahweh said to Abram, “You must leave your land and your relatives and your father’s house and go to the land that I’ll show you.[ref] 2 I’ll bless you and make you into a great nation. I’ll make you famous and you’ll be a blessing to others. 3 I’ll bless everyone who blesses you, but I’ll curse anyone who curses you. All the families on the earth will be blessed because of you.[ref]

4 So Abram left there just as Yahweh had told him, and Lot also went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left the city of Haran. 5 He took his wife Sarai and his nephew Lot and all their possessions that they had accumulated and the people who they had acquired in Haran, and they set out to go to the land of Canaan.

When they arrived in the Canaan region, 6 they continued travelling as far as the city of Shekem, to Moreh’s oak tree. (The Canaanites were still living in that region at that time.) 7 Then Yahweh came to Abram and told him, “I’ll give this land to your descendants.” So Abram built an altar there and made a burnt offering to Yahweh, who had appeared to him.[ref] 8 Then from there he went on to the hills to the east of Beyt-el (Bethel) and pitched his tents, with Beyt-el on the west and Ai on the east. He built an altar to Yahweh there, and sacrificed and prayed to Yahweh 9 before continuing south down toward the Negev desert.