Problem: The writer of Hebrews informs us here that Abraham “went out, not knowing where he was going.” Yet Genesis 12:5 asserts that Abraham “departed to go to the land of Canaan.”
Solution: Abraham did not know at the time he was called by God where he would eventually go. He was simply told by God to go to “a land that I will show you” (Gen. 12:1). Or, as Hebrews renders it, “to the place which he would afterward receive as an inheritance” (Heb. 11:8). The statement (in Gen. 12:5) that he “departed to go to the land of Canaan” is a comment by the author looking back, not the condition of Abraham’s mind at the time.
“And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son, and all their substance that they had gathered, and the souls that they had gotten in Haran; and they went forth to go into the land of Canaan; and into the land of Canaan they came. (Gen 12:5)
By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. (Heb 11:8)”
