26.1-35

Genesis

In response to another famine (Gen 12:10-20), Isaac returns to the city of Gerar, where Abraham had deceived Abimelech into thinking Sarah was his sister (Gen 20). Similarly, lacking the faith to know God would protect him, Isaac does the same thing - in the same place - to the same person and people. Isaac did not have the benefits of Christ's Words, but we can consider them as we read of Isaac's deception: "For nothing is hidden that will not become evident, nor anything secret that will not be known and come to light." (Lk 8:17, also Mark 4:22). What Isaac hid, became evident when King Abimelech observes him "caressing" his wife Rebekah. "Conjugal caresses" (צָחַק ṣeḥōq) ironically also means laughter and uses the same root as Isaac's name (יִצְחָק yiṣ·ḥāq - laughter). Abimelech's subsequent command to the Philistines (v11) corrected a lie that had been told for a long time (v8). It also effectively restored Isaac's conjugal right to his wife. Then something interesting happens in verse 12 - Isaac sowed and reaped one hundredfold. "Reap (מָצָא matzah - to attain, find)" is used with the idea of attaining to, arriving at, a resting place; of marriage; of finding a place for temple, and to find/gain/secure favor in the eyes of 1) men; 2) what is lost; 3) judgment; 4) knowledge of God; and 5) wisdom. The immediate circumstance preceding Isaac's blessing from Yahweh was the revelation of Isaac's lie about Rebekah. The change in Isaac's circumstance was that he was reconciled to a right (honest) relationship with his fellow man. He regained what was lost with his wife. The king's judgment freed him from the threat of violence. His faith in God was affirmed. And his knowledge of God increased, adding to his wisdom. Mark 4:20, Matthew 13:8,23, and Luke 8:8 each deliver the harvest results following Christ's Parable of the Sower. See how much more context we have for the hundredfold harvest in this parable, knowing the very first application of this principle in Scripture. The hundredfold harvest is a blessing that follows reconciliation to a right relationship with the truth, man, and God. Luke and Mark both continue the Parable of the Sower, tying the revelation of hidden/secret things (see above) to the mystery (Luke 8:10).

CHAPTER 26

Yahweh Establishes the Oath with Isaac

1 Now there was a famine in the land, besides the previous famine that had occurred in the days of Abraham. So Isaac went to Gerar, to Abimelech king of the Philistines.
2 And Yahweh appeared to him and said, “Do not go down to Egypt; dwell in the land of which I shall tell you.
3 “Sojourn in this land, and I will be with you and bless you, for to you and to your seed I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath which I swore to your father Abraham.
4 “And I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and I will give your seed all these lands; and by your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed;
5 because Abraham listened to My voice and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws.”

Isaac and Abimelech

6 So Isaac lived in Gerar.
7 Then the men of the place asked about his wife. And he said, “She is my sister,” for he was afraid to say, “my wife,” thinking, “lest the men of the place kill me on account of Rebekah, for she is beautiful in appearance.”
8 Now it happened, when he had been there a long time, that Abimelech king of the Philistines looked out through a window and saw, and behold, Isaac was caressing his wife Rebekah.
9 Then Abimelech called Isaac and said, “Behold, surely she is your wife! How then did you say, ‘She is my sister’?” And Isaac said to him, “Because I said, ‘Lest I die on account of her.’”
10 And Abimelech said, “What is this you have done to us? One of the people might easily have lain with your wife, and you would have brought guilt upon us.”
11 So Abimelech commanded all the people, saying, “He who touches this man or his wife shall surely be put to death.”
12 And Isaac sowed in that land and reaped in the same year one hundredfold. And Yahweh blessed him,
13 and the man became great and continued to grow greater until he became very great;
14 and he had possessions of flocks and possessions of herds and many servants, so that the Philistines were jealous of him.
15 Now all the wells which his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines stopped up by filling them with earth.
16 Then Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us, for you are too mighty for us.”
17 And Isaac departed from there and camped in the valley of Gerar and settled there.

The Quarrel over the Wells

18 Then Isaac dug again the wells of water which had been dug in the days of his father Abraham, but the Philistines had stopped them up after the death of Abraham; and he called them by the same names by which his father had called them.
19 Then Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found there a well of flowing water.
20 And the herdsmen of Gerar contended with the herdsmen of Isaac, saying, “The water is ours!” So he named the well Esek, because they quarreled with him.
21 Then they dug another well, and they contended over it also, so he called it Sitnah.
22 Then he moved away from there and dug another well, and they did not contend over it; so he named it Rehoboth, and he said, “At last Yahweh has made room for us, and we will be fruitful in the land.”
23 And he went up from there to Beersheba.
24 And Yahweh appeared to him that night and said,
“I am the God of your father Abraham;
Do not fear, for I am with you.
I will bless you and multiply your seed,
For the sake of My servant Abraham.”
25 So he built an altar there and called upon the name of Yahweh and pitched his tent there; and there Isaac’s servants dug out a well.

Isaac’s Oath with Abimelech

26 Now Abimelech came to him from Gerar with his adviser Ahuzzath and Phicol the commander of his army.
27 And Isaac said to them, “Why have you come to me, since you hate me and have sent me away from you?”
28 Then they said, “We see plainly that Yahweh has been with you; so we said, ‘Let there now be an oath between us—between you and us—and let us cut a covenant with you,
29 that you will do us no harm, just as we have not touched you and have done to you nothing but good and have sent you away in peace. You are now the blessed of Yahweh.’”
30 Then he made them a feast, and they ate and drank.
31 In the morning they arose early, and each swore to the other; then Isaac sent them away, and they departed from him in peace.
32 Now it happened on that day, that Isaac’s servants came in and told him about the well which they had dug and said to him, “We have found water.”
33 So he called it Shibah; therefore the name of the city is Beersheba to this day.
34 And Esau was forty years old, and he took as a wife Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and also Basemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite;
35 and they brought bitterness to Isaac and Rebekah.