Abraham builds his first altar at Shechem, at the oak of Moreh. ‘Shechem’ means ‘shoulder’. Now in the New Testament, we read that the Good Shepherd places the lost sheep on his shoulders [cf. Lk. 15: 5]. So, too, in Abraham, the race of Adam is gathered up to begin the process of returning home. ‘Moreh’, a word related to torah, means ‘teaching’. We see in this the necessity of ongoing learning in the ways of God, taught by the Good Shepherd Who speaks through the shepherds of the Church.