As we have said, Abraham was born about two hundred and sixty years before the death of Rameses II, that is, within a period of time from the end of the reign of Tuthmosis II to the beginning of the reign of Tuthmosis III. In those times the Bedouins were numerous and often mentioned in Egyptian chronicles as "Sashu". They were by definition "the men who live on the sand". This appellative automatically excludes them from any relationship with Abraham, Isaac or Jacob, who lived constantly in Palestine in areas that were certainly not desert, i.e. towns or in the immediate vicinity. The Sashu were a marginal race profoundly despised by both the Egyptians and the standing populations; but there are no indications that Abraham was despised by anyone whosoever. On the contrary, he was, on every occasion, treated with great respect and deference. Abimelech, lord of Gerar, treated him as an equal. Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought out bread and wine and blessed him (Gen.14,18); the Amorites Mamr, Eshcol and Aner put themselves under his command when they hunted the Syrian marauders; the Hittites of Hebron told him, "Sir,(...) you are a mighty prince among us ..." (Gen. 26,6), and so on.
Another meaningful aspect concerns the strength of a Bedouin tribe; the desert environment compels them to be limited in number. On the contrary, Abraham was chief of a true population of thousands of people; when he pursued the four Syrian kings who had sacked Sodom and kidnapped Lot, he put three hundred and eighteen armed men of his household to the pursuit (Gen. 14,14), pushing even beyond Damascus. It is certain that these men were not by any means the total adult population at his disposal; it is simply unthinkable that he had stripped his flocks of shepherds and the encampments of all the men set to defend them, leaving them at the mercy of any marauder, who might come along. He must have had at least the same number again. Therefore, Abraham's tribe must have consisted of at least six hundred adult males, which means that with the women, children and elderly, the tribe must have totalled well over two thousand. This was, for those times, a true and proper nation whose chief possessed power and dignity on the level of a sovereign. It is quite unthinkable to consider him to be a humble Bedouin.
What, then, were his origins? Whose son was he? There are no explicit indications regarding his father's status; the name Abram (his original name) means "son of a great father" and that of his wife Sarah means "princess." When Abraham buys the family tomb at Machpelah (Gen. 23,6), the Hittites at Hebron call him "mighty prince".
There are other episodes and circumstances from which we can deduce, with a high degre of reliability , what type of education Abraham received, what activities he was versed in, and in which of those he was expert. For example, in Genesis 26,16, Abimelech tells the Patriarch: "Move away from us; you have become too powerful for us". If we consider that Abimelech was lord of Gerar, a very important province with a proper army, the episode indicates that the supposed nomadic shepherd was sufficiently strong and experienced to instil respect in the most important persons of that time.
This is also confirmed by the episode in which Abraham defeated four Syrian kings who joined forces and devastated the Jordan Valley. They were sufficiently powerful to challenge, with considerable success, the very Egyptian Empire--the 18th Dynasty at the height of its power, with a dominion stretching from Palestine and Syria as far as the Euphrates--destroying the allied armies of important cities such as the Pentapolis, and plundering them. In spite of all this, Abraham dashed off in pursuit of the four kings, at the head of a small force composed of his own men, and with apparent ease routed and defeated the enemy forces.
This leads us to a well-founded conclusion that Abraham had had previous war experience and was an expert in the military art. If one further considers that he efficiently controlled a large population and administered (apparently with remarkable success) a fortune which for those times was enormous, we must presume that he possessed a capability and knowledge that cannot be acquired overnight. Still less can it be imagined that these qualities could be acquired within a small nomadic Bedouin community.
To conclude, all the indications in Genesis point to a decisive rebuttal of the idea that Abraham could have been an insignificant Sashu, wandering in the midst of similarly miserable shepherds of those times. If it is necessary to judge what his origins could have been on the basis of the Genesis data alone, the only answer that comes to mind, is that he must have been the son of some prince of Urartu and was, therefore, educated as such.