As I travelled through the wilderness a strange thing began to happen. I felt myself dwindling, the world growing vaster around me. I knew that I walked on ground but it seemed to me, more and more as if I did not walk on Earth. A strange feeling for a man alone, or perhaps not so strange. Are we not held to this world by our relations? Are we not connected to Ur, when we are from there, by those parts of Ur that have special meaning to us through those we know there—our own cities are as foreign as a strangers when in strange parts.

I felt the sky watching me again. This time, I listened.

Some ancient instinct which I had always trusted, lately more, made me leave my donkey with my friend Eshcol, an Amorite who lived near the lush oaks of Mamre. I continued on foot, the sun hot on my back. I continued the way I was going, waiting for the message I knew I was about to receive.

At last I came to a small road, carved into the trackless soil by the passage of men, beginning where the plains of Ai rose into the mountains of central Canaan. There I saw an old man leaning on a staff. He smiled at me, and asked if I was headed for Salem. I told him I was, and he asked whether I desired any company on the voyage. I looked into his eyes and saw within them a deep well of light, like the stars in the sky. I said I did, a shiver shooting down my spine. He smiled again.

Without another word we continued on together, only it did not seem to me as if his feet touched the ground.