Lech Lecha - testing, testing, 1, 2, 3 ...

(3) With ten trials was Abraham, our father, tried, and he withstood them all; to make known how great was the love of Abraham, our father.

(1)Ten tests: One - Ur Kasdim, when Nimrod cast him into the fiery furnace; the second - "'Go out from your land'" (Genesis 12:1); the third - "and there was a famine" (Genesis 12:10); the fourth - "and the woman was taken to the house of Pharaoh" (Genesis 12:15); the fifth - the war of the kings; the sixth - the stand between the pieces, where he was shown the subjugation of [his descendants by] the nations; the seventh - the circumcision; the eighth - "and Avimelekh sent... and he took Sarah" (Genesis 20:2); the ninth - "'Expel this maidservant and her son'" (Genesis 21:10); the tenth - the binding [of Isaac].

(6) When the woman saw that the tree was good for eating and a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable as a source of wisdom, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave some to her husband, and he ate.(7) Then the eyes of both of them were opened and they perceived that they were naked; and they sewed together fig leaves and made themselves loincloths.(8) They heard the sound of God יהוה moving about in the garden at the breezy time of day; and the Human and his wife hid from God יהוה among the trees of the garden.(9) God יהוה called out to the Human and said to him, “Where are you?”(10) He replied, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.”(11) “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat of the tree from which I had forbidden you to eat?”(12) The Human said, “The woman You put at my side—she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”(13) And God יהוה said to the woman, “What is this you have done!” The woman replied, “The serpent duped me, and I ate.”

((8) Cain said to his brother Abel … and when they were in the field, Cain set upon his brother Abel and killed him.(9) יהוה said to Cain, “Where is your brother Abel?” And he said, “I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?”(10) “What have you done? Hark, your brother’s blood cries out to Me from the ground!(11) Therefore, you shall be more cursed than the ground, which opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.(12) If you till the soil, it shall no longer yield its strength to you. You shall become a ceaseless wanderer on earth.”

(5) יהוה saw how great was human wickedness on earth—how every plan devised by the human mind was nothing but evil all the time.(6) And יהוה regretted having made humankind on earth. With a sorrowful heart,(7) יהוה said, “I will blot out from the earth humankind whom I created—humans together with beasts, creeping things, and birds of the sky; for I regret that I made them.”

(17) The Flood continued forty days on the earth, ....(22) All in whose nostrils was the merest breath of life, all that was on dry land, died.(23) All existence on earth was blotted out—humans, cattle, creeping things, and birds of the sky; they were blotted out from the earth.

(1) Everyone on earth had the same language and the same words.(2) And as they migrated from the east, they came upon a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there....(4) And they said, “Come, let us build us a city, and a tower with its top in the sky, to make a name for ourselves; else we shall be scattered all over the world.”(5) יהוה came down to look at the city and tower that humanity had built,(6) and יהוה said, “If, as one people with one language for all, this is how they have begun to act, then nothing that they may propose to do will be out of their reach.(7) Let us, then, go down and confound their speech there, so that they shall not understand one another’s speech.”(8) Thus יהוה scattered them from there over the face of the whole earth; and they stopped building the city.

(26) When Terah had lived 70 years, he begot Abram, Nahor, and Haran.(27) Now this is the line of Terah: Terah begot Abram, Nahor, and Haran; and Haran begot Lot.(28) Haran died in the lifetime of his father Terah, in his native land, Ur of the Chaldeans.(29) Abram and Nahor took wives for themselves, the name of Abram’s wife being Sarai and that of Nahor’s wife Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah and Iscah.(30) Now Sarai was barren, she had no child.(31) Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot the son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and they set out together from Ur of the Chaldeans for the land of Canaan; but when they had come as far as Haran, they settled there.(32) The days of Terah came to 205 years; and Terah died in Haran.

(1) AND THERE WAS A FAMINE IN THE LAND. Know that Abraham our father unintentionally committed a great sin by bringing his righteous wife to a stumbling-block of sin on account of his fear for his life. He should have trusted that G-d would save him and his wife and all his belongings for G-d surely has the power to help and to save. His leaving the Land, concerning which he had been commanded from the beginning, on account of the famine, was also a sin he committed, for in famine G-d would redeem him from death. It was because of this deed that the exile in the land of Egypt at the hand of Pharaoh was decreed for his children. In the place of justice, there is wickedness and sin.

Nachmanides writes that Avraham sinned greatly when he moved to Egypt, seeing that he unintentionally subjected his wife to great danger. He should have had trust in G’d that He would save him from the famine. ...

[In my view], Avraham is not considered as having sinned when he described his wife as his sister; on the contrary, this was a meritorious act on his part, as it proves that he was loath to rely on miracles as long as he had not done what was humanly possible to save G’d from having to intervene by upsetting the laws of nature. The reputation of the Egyptians had been such that he had every reason to fear for his life if he had described Sarai as his wife.

(2) ולך לך, “and go for yourself, etc.” Avraham underwent ten trials of his faith. The first one commenced with the words לך לך, “go for yourself,” and the last one concluded with the introduction לך לך, “go for yourself.” Avraham scored perfect marks each time (Avot 5,3). The first trial was “leave your country;” the last one was the binding of Yitzchak.