Then God said to Abram, “Know for certain that your seed will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years.
Now it happened that when Abram was ninety-nine years old, Yahweh appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am God Almighty; Walk before Me and be blameless,
indeed I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore; and your seed shall possess the gate of his enemies.
God also said to him, “I am God Almighty; Be fruitful and multiply; A nation and an assembly of nations shall come from you, And kings shall come forth from your loins.
The angel who has redeemed me from all evil, Bless these boys; And may my name live on in them, And the names of my fathers Abraham and Isaac; And may they grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth.”
But his father refused and said, “I know, my son, I know; he also will become a people, and he also will be great. However, his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his seed shall become the fullness of nations.”
But Moses said to the people, “Do not fear! Stand by and see the salvation of Yahweh which He will accomplish for you today; for the Egyptians whom you have seen today, you will never see them again forever.
‘Do not fear, for I am with you; Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God. I will make you mighty, surely I will help you; Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.’
Then Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, swore to them and to their men, saying, “Do not be afraid of serving the Chaldeans; stay in the land and serve the king of Babylon, that it may go well with you.
And you shall answer and say before Yahweh your God, ‘My father was a wandering Aramean, and he went down to Egypt and sojourned there, few in number; but there he became a great, mighty, and populous nation.