ContradictionsReading order 418Bible context 3 min read
How old was Abraham when he left Haran?
A departure age of seventy five seems inconsistent with the family chronology if Abram was born when Terah was seventy, but that birth-age assumption is not explicit.
- Textual conflict
- Weak tension
- The alleged conflict needs substantial assumptions, such as treating an omission as a denial or figurative language as literal.
- Importance
- Minor
- A local detail in a story, chronology, or inventory.
The incompatible departure age depends on assuming Abram was born when Terah was seventy, which the collective birth notice does not establish.
An editorial assessment of the quoted passages. Importance describes the stakes; it does not increase certainty. Reading order weighs both.
Abram leaves Haran at seventy five
So Abram departed, as the Lord had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him: and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran.
Genesis 12:4
Translation / edition: King James Version (KJV)
Read the full chapter:Genesis 12
Acts places the departure after Terah's death at two hundred five
And Terah lived seventy years, and begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Now these are the generations of Terah: Terah begat Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran begat Lot. And Haran died before his father Terah in the land of his nativity, in Ur of the Chaldees. And Abram and Nahor took them wives: the name of Abram’s wife was Sarai; and the name of Nahor’s wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah, and the father of Iscah. But Sarai was barren; she had no child. And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran his son’s son, and Sarai his daughter in law, his son Abram’s wife; and they went forth with them from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan; and they came unto Haran, and dwelt there. And