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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Genesis 26:26 - 26:26
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Abimelech's Treaty with Isaac. - The conclusion of this alliance was substantially only a repetition of renewal of the alliance entered into with Abraham; but the renewal itself arose so completely out of the circumstances, that there is no ground whatever for denying that it occurred, or for the hypothesis that our account is merely another form of the earlier alliance; to say nothing of the fact, that besides the agreement in the leading event itself, the attendant circumstances are altogether peculiar, and correspond to the events which preceded. Abimelech not only brought his chief captain Phicol (supposed to be the same as in Gen 21:22, if Phicol is not also an official name), but his מֵרֵעַ “friend,” i.e., his privy councillor, Ahuzzath. Isaac referred to the hostility they had shown; to which Abimelech replied, that they (he and his people) did not smite him (נָגַע), i.e., drive him away by force, but let him depart in peace, and expressed a wish that there might be an oath between them. אָלָה the oath, as an act of self-imprecation, was to form the basis of the covenant to be made. From this אָלָה came also to be used for a covenant sanctioned by an oath (Deu 29:11, Deu 29:13). תַּעֲשֶׂה אִם “that thou do not:” אִם a particle of negation used in an oath (Gen 14:23, etc.). (On the verb with zere, see Ges. §75, Anm. 17; Ewald, §224.) - The same day Isaac's servants informed him of the well which they had dug; and Isaac gave it the name Shebah (שִׁבְעָה, oath), in commemoration of the treaty made on oath. “Therefore the city was called Beersheba.” This derivation of the name does not shut the other (Gen 21:31) out, but seems to confirm it. As the treaty made on oath between Abimelech and Isaac was only a renewal of his covenant concluded before with Abraham, so the name Beersheba was also renewed by the well Shebah. The reality of the occurrence is supported by the fact that the two wells are in existence still (vid., Gen 21:31).