I. Name

The ‘original’ name of the patriarch ʾabrām belongs to the common stock of West Semitic names known since the beginning of the second millennium bce. It is a contracted form of ʾăbîrām (HALAT 9; de Vaux 1968:11; 1 Kgs. 16.32; Num. 16.1; Num. 26.9; Ps. 106.17), written abrm in Ugarit (KTU 4.352:2, 4 = ^I A-bi-ra-mu/i; PRU 3, 20; 5, 85:10; 107:8, cf. also Mari, H. B. Huffmon, Amorite Personal Names in the Mari Texts [Baltimore 1965] 5), ʾbrm in Elephantine (E. Sachau, Aramäische Papyrus und Ostraka aus ei…