Genesis

¹ So Abram and his wife and all his possessions left Egypt and went to the Negreb and Lot went with him.

² Abram was now very rich in cattle, in silver, and in gold.

³ He journeyed on from the Negreb in stages towards Bethel, to the place where he had earlier pitched his tent between Bethel and Ai

⁴ and had set up the alter to worship the Lord .

⁵ Lot, who went with Abram, also had so many flocks and herds and tents

⁶ that the land was not fertile enough to support them both. They had too many animals to live in the same place.

⁷ At that time, the Canaanites and Perizzites were living in the land. So when there was a quarrel between Lot’s herdsmen and Abram’s herdsmen,

⁸ Abram said to Lot, “There should be no quarrels between me and you, or between my herdsmen and yours, because we are relatives.

⁹ Is not the whole land before you? Let’s separate. If you go to the left, then I will go to the right; or if you go to the right, then I will go to the left.”

¹⁰ Then Lot looked about and saw that all the plain of the Jordan, as far as Zoar, was well watered everywhere, like a garden of the Lord . (This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.)

¹¹ So Lot chose for himself all the valley of the Jordan and went on to the east; and they separated from one another.

¹² Abram lived in the land of Canaan and Lot lived in the cities of the plain and moved his tent as far as Sodom.

¹³ (But the men of Sodom were very wicked and sinned against the Lord .)

¹⁴ The Lord said to Abram, after Lot had gone away from him, “Lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are northward, southward, eastward and westward,

¹⁵ for all the land that you see I will give to you and to your descendants forever.

¹⁶ I will make your descendants as many as the dust of the earth, so that if someone could count the dust of the earth, then your descendants could also be counted.

¹⁷ Rise, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I will give it to you.”

¹⁸ Then Abram moved his tent and lived in the oak grove of Mamre, which is in Hebron, and built there an altar to the Lord .