We find that Abraham was a descendant of Shem, who was the son of Noah. I think all of us understand that. If we look down in verse 15 we find in a couple of generations after Shem that Salah begot Eber. We find therefore that Abraham’s genealogy is in the line of Noah through Shem through Eber. So this was the line through which God was preserving His truth, and indeed I think we can say that they, this line of men, represented His government on earth since the time of the Flood. We also find then that Jesus Christ, if we want to go to Luke the 3rd chapter, you will see all of these men’s names there, and you will see that Jesus came from the same line—Noah, Shem, Eber, Abraham, Judah, David, and on to Jesus Christ.
Genesis 11 is laying the foundation for Genesis 12. There are three important topics that are covered in Genesis 11. Beginning in verse 1 through verse 9, is the building of the Tower of Babel and the confusing of tongues, resulting in the spread of mankind over the whole earth. Then beginning in verse 10, we have the generations of Shem, which shows the line which God chose to preserve His truth. Then beginning in verse 26 or 27, somewhere right around there, the call of Abraham, which laid the foundation for the continuing preservation of God’s truth and established the line through which the Savior would come.
Now the word Chaldean is a Greek word. The Hebrew word is Chasidim which indicates people of Chasidim.
This Arphaxad, the best way that I can describe it, is an English corruption of Urfa-Chesed in Hebrew, or Urfa-Chaldean. So Ur is merely a shortened form of Urfa. Urfa then is the father of the Chaldeans and Abraham is descended from Arphaxad, through Eber, Urfa’s grandson. So we have a genealogy that went somewhat like this (I am going to leave some of the people out): Noah, Shem, Arphaxad, Eber, Peleg, Terah, Abraham. There were many others, but it gives us enough to understand the line.
I hope that I have established to you that Abraham was from northern Mesopotamia, the northern Ur of the Chaldeans. He is a direct descendant from Noah through Arphaxad to Eber to Terah down to him.
