How to read this page

An Intertextuality Pair — one connection between two passages, shown as linked verse cards: the Later text and the Earlier text it quotes, alludes to or echoes. The Significance essay explains why the link matters and where it points in Christ.

Reference Type— how explicit the link is: Quotation, Allusion, or Echo
Connection Method(s)— how it carries meaning: e.g. Typology, Promise-Fulfillment, Analogy, Longitudinal Theme
Found via— where the connection was identified, e.g. the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge or an Anchor-Text Network

Graph View — tap the constellation icon in the top bar to see this page's connections as a web of light: gold points are passages, and the coloured threads are the connection types. Click any type in the graph's own legend to filter it in or out, and use the expand control for the full-screen night sky.

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Intertextuality Pair

Romans 4:17 → Genesis 17:5

Quotation

Later text

Romans 4:17BSB

As it is written: “I have made you a father of many nations.” He is our father in the presence of God, in whom he believed, the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being what does not yet exist.

Earlier text

Genesis 17:5BSB

No longer will you be called Abram, but your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations.

Walk the Square · a single-voice walk of this pair around the Clowney square9:12

Significance

Paul quotes the divine promise to Abraham at the covenant of circumcision — "I have made you a father of many nations" — to demonstrate that Abraham's fatherhood extends beyond ethnic Israel to all who share his faith. The promise was given before circumcision (the point of Romans 4), showing that Abraham is father of believing Gentiles as well as Jews. Paul sees the promise fulfilled in the multinational church composed of both Jewish and Gentile believers.

Found via: Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type: Direct Quotation
Connection Method(s): Promise-Fulfillment

Linked Mentions 2

Trajectory Tables 2