Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Genesis 17:1 - 17:1
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
The covenant had been made with Abram for at least fourteen years, and yet Abram remained without any visible sign of its accomplishment, and was merely pointed in faith to the inviolable character of the promise of God. Jehovah now appeared to Him again, when he was ninety-nine years old, twenty-four years after his migration, and thirteen after the birth of Ishmael, to give effect to the covenant and prepare for its execution. Having come down to Abram in a visible form (Gen 17:22), He said to him, “I am El Shaddai (almighty God): walk before Me and be blameless.” At the establishment of the covenant, God had manifested Himself to him as Jehovah (Gen 15:7); here Jehovah describes Himself as El Shaddai, God the Mighty One. שַׁדַּי: from שָׁדַד to be strong, with the substantive termination ai, like חַגַּי the festal, יְשִׁישַׁי the old man, סִינַי the thorn-grown, etc. This name is not to be regarded as identical with Elohim, that is to say, with God as Creator and Preserver of the world, although in simple narrative Elohim is used for El Shaddai, which is only employed in the more elevated and solemn style of writing. It belonged to the sphere of salvation, forming one element in the manifestation of Jehovah, and describing Jehovah, the covenant God, as possessing the power to realize His promises, even when the order of nature presented no prospect of their fulfilment, and the powers of nature were insufficient to secure it. The name which Jehovah thus gave to Himself was to be a pledge, that in spite of “his own body now dead,” and “the deadness of Sarah's womb” (Rom 4:19), God could and would give him the promised innumerable posterity. On the other hand, God required this of Abram, “Walk before Me (cf. Gen 5:22) and be blameless” (Gen 6:9). “Just as righteousness received in faith was necessary for the establishment of the covenant, so a blameless walk before God was required for the maintenance and confirmation of the covenant.” This introduction is followed by a more definite account of the new revelation; first of the promise involved in the new name of God (Gen 17:2-8), and then of the obligation imposed upon Abram (Gen 17:9-14). “I will give My covenant,” says the Almighty, “between Me and thee, and multiply thee exceedingly.” בְּרִית נָתַן signifies, not to make a covenant, but to give, to put, i.e., to realize, to set in operation the things promised in the covenant - equivalent to setting up the covenant (cf. Gen 17:7 and Gen 9:12 with Gen 9:9). This promise Abram appropriated to himself by falling upon his face in worship, upon which God still further expounded the nature of the covenant about to be executed.