Abraham was ninety-nine years old when God renewed the covenant (Genesis 17:1). The sons of Korah composed a psalm about this moment — "Gird your sword upon your thigh, O mighty one, in your splendor and your majesty" (Psalm 45:3). The rabbis applied it to Abraham directly: more beautiful than Adam, more beautiful than Seth and Enosh, more beautiful than Noah's descendants who built Babel. This is a bold claim about the hierarchy of human achievement.
The covenant's terms were specific: circumcision for every male, a new name for Abram (now Abraham), and the promise that nations and kings would descend from him. God changed His own name in this transaction too — adding a letter to El Shaddai to make room for the new covenant relationship. The rabbis noted that the heh added to both names (Abram became Abraham, Sarai became Sarah) came from the divine name itself. Something of God was inscribed in their names permanently.
Grace was poured upon Abraham's lips, says the psalm — and the rabbis point to a specific moment as evidence. When the king of Sodom offered Abraham all the spoils of war after he rescued Lot, Abraham refused: "I have lifted my hand to the Lord God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth, that I will take nothing that is yours" (Genesis 14:22-23). He could have been rich. He stayed poor and kept his integrity. The rabbis called this the highest form of valor: not the ability to take, but the strength to decline.