Mamre

Biblical References

The name Mamre appears only in Genesis.

• Genesis 13:18: After parting from Lot, Abram moves his tent and settles by the oaks of Mamre (KJV: "the plain of Mamre"), "which is in Hebron," where he builds an altar.
• Genesis 14:13, 24: Mamre also appears as a personal name. Mamre the Amorite, brother of Eshcol and Aner, was an ally of Abram.
• Genesis 18:1–15: The LORD appears to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre (KJV: "in the plains of Mamre"). Sitting at the door of his tent, Abraham welcomes and entertains three men and hears the promise that Sarah will bear a son. In 18:16–33 he then intercedes for Sodom.
• Genesis 23:17–19; 25:9; 49:29–31; 50:13: These passages state that the cave of Machpelah, where Sarah, Abraham, and later Jacob were buried, lay "before Mamre." Genesis 23:19 adds, "Mamre: the same is Hebron."
• Genesis 35:27: Jacob comes to his father Isaac "unto Mamre, unto the city of Arbah."

Background

The text presents Mamre either as identical with Hebron or as a place immediately beside it. It does not say whether the place name derives from the man Mamre, and the original meaning of the name is uncertain. The Hebrew word that the New Korean Revised Version renders as "oak" is translated in other versions as "oak" or "terebinth," and some translations, such as the King James Version, render it "plain." Abraham had also stayed by the oak of Moreh at Shechem (Genesis 12:6), so the narrative records more than once that he dwelt beside great trees.

The site has traditionally been identified with the ruins of Ramat el-Khalil, a few kilometers north of Hebron. Remains of a Herodian-era enclosure wall survive there, and according to tradition a church was built at the site in the fourth century under Emperor Constantine. Scholars, however, differ on the location.

Significance in Scripture

Mamre was the center of Abraham's life as a sojourner dwelling in tents in Canaan. Hebrews 11:8–12 says that Abraham dwelt in tents with Isaac and Jacob while awaiting the promise. The words spoken at Mamre when Sarah laughed, "Is any thing too hard for the LORD?" (Genesis 18:14), are often read together with the account of Abraham's faith in Romans 4:18–21. The reference in Hebrews 13:2 to those who "have entertained angels unawares" is commonly understood to allude to this event at Mamre.

Interpretation and Debate

Genesis 18 states that the LORD appeared (18:1) and then speaks of "three men" (18:2); in 19:1 two angels arrive at Sodom. Interpretations of the three visitors differ:

• The LORD accompanied by two angels.
• One of the three as the preincarnate Christ. Some evangelical and Reformed commentators read the passage this way.
• A foreshadowing of the Trinity. Some Church Fathers read it this way, and in the Eastern Orthodox Church this reading is widely known through Andrei Rublev's fifteenth-century icon The Trinity.
• Jewish tradition generally understands the visitors as three angels.

The text does not state clearly whether Abraham recognized the visitors' identity from the outset. The claim that the tree known today in Hebron as "Abraham's Oak" is the very tree of the narrative rests not on the biblical text but on later tradition.

In the Korean Church

The Mamre scene of Genesis 18 is frequently used in Korean churches as a text for sermons on hospitality and intercessory prayer.