Editing Abraham (section)

===Palestinian origin hypothesis===
The earliest possible reference to Abraham may be the name of a town in the [[Negev]] listed in the [[Bubastite Portal]] inscription of Pharaoh [[Sheshonq I]] (biblical [[Shishak]]), which is referred as "the Fortress of Abraham", suggesting the possible existence of an Abraham tradition in the 10th century BCE.{{sfn|McCarter|2000|p=9}}{{sfn|Hendel|2005|pp=48–49}} The orientalist [[Mario Liverani]] has proposed to see in the name Abraham the eponymous ancestor of a 13th-century BCE [[Palestine (region)|Palestinian]] [[tribe]], the Raham, mentioned in a stele of [[Seti I]] found at [[Beth-Shean]] and dating back to around 1289 BCE. The tribe probably lived in the area surrounding or close to Beth-Shean, in [[Galilee]] (the stele in fact refers to battles that took place in the area). Liverani hypothesized that the members of the tribe of Raham called themselves "sons of Raham" (''*Banu-Raham''), so that the name of their eponymous ancestor would have been "father of Raham" (''*Abu-Raham''), that being the name of the patriarch Abraham.<ref>{{cite book |title=Israel's History and the History of Israel |last=Liverani |first=Mario |publisher=Routledge |year=2014 |isbn=978-1-317-48893-4 |page=25 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_1zfBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA25}}</ref> [[Israel Finkelstein]] and [[Thomas Römer]] suggested that the oldest Abraham traditions originated in the Iron Age (monarchic period) and that they contained an [[wikt:autochthonous|autochthonous]] hero story, as the oldest biblical references to Abraham outside the book of Genesis ({{Bibleverse|Ezekiel|33|KJV}} and {{Bibleverse|Isaiah|51|KJV}}) do not have an indication of a Mesopotamian origin of Abraham and present only two main themes of the Abraham narrative in Genesis—land and offspring.<ref name=":82">{{cite journal |title=Comments on the Historical Background of the Abraham Narrative: Between "Realia" and "Exegetica" |journal=Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel |url=https://www.academia.edu/29972948 |last1=Finkelstein |first1=Israel |issue=1 |volume=3 |pages=3–23 |last2=Römer |first2=Thomas |year=2014 |doi=10.1628/219222714x13994465496820 |archive-date=29 February 2024 |access-date=23 November 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240229190528/https://www.academia.edu/29972948 |url-status=live }}</ref> Finkelstein and Römer considered Abraham as ancestor who was worshiped in Hebron, with the oldest tradition of him possibly being about the altar he built in Hebron.<ref name=":82" />