God’s Covenant with Abram

15 After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.”^{(A) 2} But Abram said, “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?”^{[a](B) 3} And Abram said, “You have given me no offspring, so a slave born in my house is to be my heir.”^{(C) 4} But the word of the Lord came to him, “This man shall not be your heir; no one but your very own issue shall be your heir.”^{(D) 5} He brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your descendants be.”^{(E) 6} And he believed the Lord, and the Lord^[b] reckoned it to him as righteousness.

⁷ Then he said to him, “I am the Lord who brought you from Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to possess.”^{(F) 8} But he said, “O Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it?”^{(G) 9} He said to him, “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.” ¹⁰ He brought him all these and cut them in two, laying each half over against the other, but he did not cut the birds in two.^{(H) 11} And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

¹² As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and a deep and terrifying darkness descended upon him.^(I)

¹⁷ When the sun had gone down and it was dark, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces.^{(A) 18} On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the River Euphrates,^(B)