The Patriarchs

Abraham, his son Isaac, and Isaac's son Jacob (also known as Israel) are the patriarchs (or forefathers) of the Jewish people. In Genesis 12, God makes a covenant with Abraham and promises him that he will be a great nation through whom the nations will be blessed and that his children will inherit the land of Canaan. Throughout the rabbinic tradition, the concept of the merit of the patriarchs, zekhut avot, is invoked, typically as an appeal to God's covenant with the forefathers for the forgiveness of their descendants, the Jewish people.