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The Pulpit Commentary
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 19:33
And they made their father drink wine that night—which was sinful both in them and him (vide Isaiah 5:11; Proverbs 20:1; Habakkuk 2:15)—and the firstborn went in, and lay with her father; and he perceived not when she l…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 19:34
And it came to pass on the morrow, that the firstborn said unto the younger, Behold, I lay yester night with my father: let us make him drink wine this night also; and go thou in, and lie with him, that we may preserve…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 19:35
And they made their father drink wine that night also. The facility with which Lot allowed himself to be inebriated by his daughters Clericus regards as a sign that before this the old man had been accustomed to over-in…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 19:37
And the firstborn bare a son, and called his name Moab—Meab, from the father, alluding to his incestuous origin; though Mo (water, an Arabic euphemism for the semen virile) and ab has been advanced as a more correct der…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 19:38
And the younger, she also bare a son, and called his name Ben-ammi. I.e. son of my people, meaning that her child was the offspring of her own kind and blood (Rosenmüller), or the son of her relative (Kalisch), or of an…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:1-18
EXPOSITION
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:1
And Abraham journeyed (vide Genesis 12:9) from thence. Mamre (Genesis 18:1). In search of pasture, as on a previous occasion (Keil); or in consequence of the hostility of his neighbors (Calvin); or because he longed to…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:1-18
Abraham in Gerar, or two royal sinners. I. THE SIN OF THE HEBREW PATRIARCH 1. An old sin repeated. "Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister." Twenty years before the same miserable equivocation had been circula…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:2
Falsehood the fruit of unbelief. "Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister." Notice how imperfectly the obligation of truth recognized in Old Testament times. Not only among heathen, or those who knew little of…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:2
And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister. As formerly he had done on descending into Egypt (Genesis 12:13). That Abraham should a second time have resorted to this ignoble expedient after the hazardous exper…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:3
But God—Elohim; whence the present chapter, with the exception of Genesis 20:18, is assigned to the Elohist (Tuch, De Wette, Bleek, Davidson), and the incident at Gerar explained as the original legend, of which the sto…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:4
But Abimelech had not come near her. Apparently withheld by the peculiar disease which had overtaken him. The statement of the present verse (a similar one to which is not made with reference to Pharaoh) was clearly ren…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:5
Said he not unto me, She is my sister? and she, even she herself said, He is my brother. From which it is clear that the Philistine monarch, equally with the Egyptian Pharaoh, shrank from the sin of adultery. In the int…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:6
And God said unto him in a dream,—"It is in full agreement with the nature of dreams that the communication should be made in several, and not in one single act; cf. Genesis 37:1-36, and Genesis 41:1-57.; Matthew 2:1-23…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:7
Now therefore restore the man his wife. Literally, the wife of the man, God now speaking of Abraham non tanquam de homine quolibet, sod peculiariter sibi charum (Calvin). For he is a prophet Nabi, from naba, to cause to…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:8
Therefore Abimelech rose early in the morning,—an evidence of the terror into which' he had been cast by the Divine communication, and of his earnest desire to carry out the Divine instructions—and called all his servan…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:9
Then Abimelech called Abraham, and said unto him (in the presence of his people), What hast thou done unto us?—identifying himself once more with his people, as he had already done in responding to God (Genesis 20:4)—an…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:10
And Abimelech said unto Abraham, What sawest thou,—either, What hadst thou in view? (Knobel, Delitzsch, Keil, Murphy, et alii), or, What didst thou see? Didst thou see any of my people taking the wives of strangers and…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:11
And Abraham said (offering as his first apology for his sinful behavior the fear which he entertained of the depravity of the people), Because I thought,—literally, said (sc. in my heart)—Surely the fear of God is not i…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:12
And yet indeed she is my sister. This was the second of the patriarch's extenuating pleas, that he had not exactly lied, having uttered at least a half truth. She is the daughter of my father (Terah), But not the daught…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:13
And it came to pass, when God caused me to wander (or to go on pilgrimages) from my father's house,—Elohim, usually construed with a singular verb, is here joined with a verb in the plural, as an accommodation to the po…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:14
And Abimelech—as Pharaoh did (Genesis 12:18), but with a different motive—took sheep, and oxen, and men-servants, and women-servants. The LXX. and Samaritan insert "a thousand didrachmas" after "took," in order to inclu…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:15
And Abimelech said, Behold, my land is before thee: dwell where it pleaseth thee. Literally, in the good in thine eyes; the generous Philistine offering him a settlement within his borders, whereas the Egyptian monarch…
The Pulpit Commentary on Genesis 20:16
And unto Sarah he said, Behold, I have given thy Brother a thousand pieces of silver. Literally, a thousand of silver, the exact weight of each piece being uncertain. If sacred shekels (Gesenius, Keil, Kalisch) their va…