“Then, in the presence of Adonai your God, you are to say, ‘My ancestor was a nomad from Aram. He went down into Egypt few in number and stayed. There he became a great, strong, populous nation.”-Deuteronomy 26:5
We are in the midst of talking about the First Fruits ceremony.
After the priest concludes the first part of the First Fruits ceremony which involves the action of taking the basket and setting it before the Altar, the Israelite farmer is to stand up before the Lord and utter an important proclamation.
What’s fascinating about this proclamation is that it basically summarizes the whole history of Israel.
Let’s take a look at the first statement which declares “my father was a nomad from Aram“.
Although there has been some debate as to the precise meaning of this, essentially this statement is all about the fact that the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob all identified more with the homeland of their ancestor TERACH (Abraham’s father) than they did with the land of Canaan they wandered into before they eventually moved on to Egypt.
In case you’re wondering about the name “Aram”, one of the names for the area where Abraham hailed from is “Aram alongside the River”.
So it is perfectly accurate and not incorrect to identify the Patriarchs as Aram-eans.
What’s interesting is that some Bible versions will say “my father was a fugitive from Syria”.
The reason is because Syria eventually absorbed a large population of Arameans.
But this didn’t happen until long after the time of the Patriarchs.
The important thing to keep in mind here is that each Israelite through this prayer declares their association to the Patriarchs all who originally descended from Aram.
By making this declaration, Israel is humbly admitting they began as nothing special and that any power or glory that has been accorded to them comes from HASHEM alone.
It’s worth noting that Aramaic was the language of the Arameans who are said to be descended from Noah’s son Aram.