Forbidden Bible Verses — Genesis 26:12-22

The three-year Lectionary that many Catholics and Protestants hear in public worship gives us a great variety of Holy Scripture.

Yet, it doesn’t tell the whole story.

My series Forbidden Bible Verses — ones the Lectionary editors and their clergy omit — examines the passages we do not hear in church. These missing verses are also Essential Bible Verses, ones we should study with care and attention. Often, we find that they carry difficult messages and warnings.

Today’s reading is from the English Standard Version Anglicised (ESVUK) with commentary by Matthew Henry.

Genesis 26:12-22

¹² Isaac planted crops in that land and the same year reaped a hundredfold, because the Lord blessed him. ¹³ The man became rich, and his wealth continued to grow until he became very wealthy. ¹⁴ He had so many flocks and herds and servants that the Philistines envied him. ¹⁵ So all the wells that his father’s servants had dug in the time of his father Abraham, the Philistines stopped up, filling them with earth.

¹⁶ Then Abimelek said to Isaac, ‘Move away from us; you have become too powerful for us.’

¹⁷ So Isaac moved away from there and camped in the Valley of Gerar, where he settled. ¹⁸ Isaac reopened the wells that had been dug in the time of his father Abraham, which the Philistines had stopped up after Abraham died, and he gave them the same names his father had given them.

¹⁹ Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and discovered a well of fresh water there. ²⁰ But the herdsmen of Gerar quarrelled with those of Isaac and said, ‘The water is ours!’ So he named the well Esek,^[a] because they disputed with him. ²¹ Then they dug another well, but they quarrelled over that one also; so he named it Sitnah.^{[b] 22} He moved on from there and dug another well, and no one quarrelled over it. He named it Rehoboth,^[c] saying, ‘Now the Lord has given us room and we will flourish in the land.’

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Last week’s post discussed Isaac’s lie to Abimelek (the title of the Philistines’ ruler, not an actual name) about his wife Rebekah and Abimelek’s decree which protected the couple. Anyone who harmed either of them would be put to death.

That post also pointed out that Abram had committed the same sin of lying about Sarai when they were in exile in Egypt during a famine. When Pharoah found out, he expelled both of them from Egypt.

The events of Genesis 26 took place during another famine.

Isaac and Rebekah were still taking refuge in the land of the Philistines.

Isaac planted crops in that land and in the same year reaped a hundredfold, because the Lord had blessed him (verse 12).

Isaac became rich and his wealth grew until he became very wealthy indeed (verse 13).

In fact, he had so many flocks and herds that the Philistines envied him (verse 14).

Matthew Henry’s commentary says this about God’s blessing on Abraham’s son with Sarah (emphases mine):

He blessed him, and prospered him, and made all that he had to thrive under his hands. 1. His corn multiplied strangely, v. 12. He had no land of his own, but took land of the Philistines, and sowed it; and (be it observed for the encouragement of poor tenants, that occupy other people’s lands, and are honest and industrious) God blessed him with a great increase. He reaped a hundred fold; and there seems to be an emphasis laid upon the time: it was that same year when there was a famine in the land; while others scarcely reaped at all, he reaped thus plentifully. See Isa 65 13, My servants shall eat, but you shall be hungry, Ps 37 19, In the days of famine they shall be satisfied. 2. His cattle also increased, v. 14. And then, 3. He had great store of servants, whom he employed and maintained. Note, As goods are increased those are increased that eat them, Eccl 5 11.

Henry briefly discusses the all-consuming sin of envy:

It is an instance, 1. Of the vanity of the world that the more men have of it the more they are envied, and exposed to censure and injury. Who can stand before envy? Prov 27 4. See Eccl 4 4. 2. Of the corruption of nature; for that is a bad principle indeed which makes men grieve at the good of others, as if it must needs be ill with me because it is well with my neighbor.

The Philistines had blocked up all the wells that Abraham had his servants dig years earlier (verse 15).

Henry says:

This was spitefully done. Because they had not flocks of their own to water at these wells, they would not leave them for the use of others; so absurd a thing is malice. And it was perfidiously done, contrary to the covenant of friendship they had made with Abraham, ch. 21 31, 32. No bonds will hold ill-nature.

Abimilek eventually had had enough.

He told Isaac, ‘Move away from us; you have become too powerful for us‘ (verse 16).

So, Isaac moved away to camp in the Valley of Gerar, where he settled (verse 17).

Henry points out that Isaac did the right thing in avoiding conflict:

The king of Gerar began to look upon him with a jealous eye. Isaac’s house was like a court, and his riches and retinue eclipsed Abimelech’s; and therefore he must go further off. They were weary of his neighbourhood, because they saw that the Lord blessed him; whereas, for that reason, they should the rather have courted his stay, that they also might be blessed for his sake. Isaac does not insist upon the bargain he had made with them for the lands he held, nor upon his occupying and improving them, nor does he offer to contest with them by force, though he had become very great, but very peaceably departs thence further from the royal city, and perhaps to a part of the country less fruitful. Note, We should deny ourselves both in our rights and in our conveniences, rather than quarrel: a wise and a good man will rather retire into obscurity, like Isaac here into a valley, than sit high to be the butt of envy and ill-will.

Isaac’s servants reopened Abraham’s wells; Isaac gave the wells the same names that his father had give his (verse 18).

Henry says that wealth must not stop the wealthy from continuing to be industrious:

Though he had grown very rich, yet he was as solicitous as ever about the state of his flocks, and still looked well to his herds; when men grow great, they must take heed of thinking themselves too big and too high for their business. Though he was driven from the conveniences he had had, and could not follow his husbandry with the same ease and advantage as before, yet he set himself to make the best of the country he had come into, which it is every man’s prudence to do.

It is also important to remember our forefathers’ wisdom:

Note, In our searches after truth, that fountain of living water, it is good to make use of the discoveries of former ages, which have been clouded by the corruptions of later times. Enquire for the old way, the wells which our fathers digged, which the adversaries of truth have stopped up: Ask thy elders, and they shall teach thee.

Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and discovered a well of fresh water there (verse 19).

Henry advises us to be thankful for the blessing of clean and plentiful water:

What a mercy it is to have plenty of water, to have it without striving for it. The more common this mercy is the more reason we have to be thankful for it.

The herdsmen of Gerar took issue with this and quarrelled with Isaac’s herdsmen, claiming that the water was theirs; therefore, Isaac named the well Esek, which means ‘dispute’ (verse 20).

Then Isaac’s men dug another well, which the herdsmen of Gerar also opposed; Isaac named that one Sitnah, which means ‘opposition’ (verse 21).

Henry’s translations say that the names of the wells mean ‘contention’ and ‘hatred’, respectively:

Those that open the fountains of truth must expect contradiction. The first two wells which they dug were called Esek and Sitnah, contention and hatred. See here, [1.] What is the nature of worldly things; they are make-bates and occasions of strife. [2.] What is often the lot even of the most quiet and peaceable men in this world; those that avoid striving yet cannot avoid being striven with, Ps 120 7. In this sense, Jeremiah was a man of contention (Jer 15 10), and Christ himself, though he is the prince of peace.

A similar thing happened to Abram when he went to the Negev with Lot, his nephew. Lot’s father — Abram’s brother — had died, which put Lot at equal status with Abram.

Their herdsmen began quarrelling with each other, saying that there was not enough room for both men’s herds and possessions, so they had to split up, Lot taking the better land but among a highly sinful people (Genesis 13:1-13):

13 So Abram went up from Egypt to the Negev, with his wife and everything he had, and Lot went with him. ² Abram had become very wealthy in livestock and in silver and gold.

³ From the Negev he went from place to place until he came to Bethel, to the place between Bethel and Ai where his tent had been earlier ⁴ and where he had first built an altar. There Abram called on the name of the Lord.

⁵ Now Lot, who was moving about with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents. ⁶ But the land could not support them while they stayed together, for their possessions were so great that they were not able to stay together. ⁷ And quarrelling arose between Abram’s herdsmen and Lot’s. The Canaanites and Perizzites were also living in the land at that time.

⁸ So Abram said to Lot, ‘Let’s not have any quarrelling between you and me, or between your herdsmen and mine, for we are close relatives. ⁹ Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I’ll go to the right; if you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.’

¹⁰ Lot looked around and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan towards Zoar was well watered, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt. (This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.) ¹¹ So Lot chose for himself the whole plain of the Jordan and set out towards the east. The two men parted company: ¹² Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tents near Sodom. ¹³ Now the people of Sodom were wicked and were sinning greatly against the Lord.

Returning to Isaac, he moved away from where his men had dug the wells Esek and Sitnah; they dug a third well over which no one quarrelled and named it Rehoboth, meaning ‘room enough’. Isaac said, ‘Now the Lord has given us room and we will flourish in the land‘ (verse 22).

Henry does not mention Abram in his commentary at this point, preferring to contrast Isaac’s conduct with that of Ishmael, Abram’s older son by his female slave Hagar:

Note, Those that follow peace, sooner or later, shall find peace; those that study to be quiet seldom fail of being so. How unlike was Isaac to his brother Ishmael, who, right or wrong, would hold what he had, against all the world! ch. 16 12. And which of these would we be found the followers of? This well they called Rehoboth, enlargements, room enough: in the two former wells we may see what the earth is, straitness and strife; men cannot thrive, for the throng of their neighbours. This well shows us what heaven is; it is enlargement and peace, room enough there, for there are many mansions.

One wonders whether that is what the founders of Rehoboth Beach had in mind when they founded that summer resort centuries ago in Delaware:

Rehoboth (Hebrew: רְחוֹבוֹת) means “broad spaces.” It appears three times in the Old Testament as a place name: a well dug by Isaac (at modern Wadi er-Ruheibeh) (Genesis 26:22), a city on the Euphrates River (Genesis 36:37; I Chronicles 1:48), and one of the cities of Asshur (Genesis 10:11) in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq). Hence the name may have had a special appeal for the religious founders of the city, although the adjacent bay had already borne the name Rehoboth for at least a century before the town was founded.^[11]

I was there with friends for a weekend in the early 1980s.

It was originally used as a church camp (bold in the original):

By the mid-19th century, the descendants of these landholders were farmers attempting to make a living off the relatively poor sandy infertile land.^[12] The town was founded in 1873 as the Rehoboth Beach Camp Meeting Association by the Rev. Robert W. Todd, of St. Paul’s Methodist Episcopal Church of Wilmington, Delaware, as a site for Methodist Episcopal Church camp meetings in the spirit of similar resorts further north on the New Jersey shore, such as Ocean Grove. The Camp Meeting Association disbanded in 1881, and in 1891, the location was incorporated by the General Assembly of Delaware (state legislature) as “Cape Henlopen City”. In 1893, it was renamed to Rehoboth Beach.^[13]

I also visited the former church camp beach towns on the southern New Jersey coastline later that decade. In Ocean Grove, we stayed in the original and rather grand hotel for participants. Current members of the original Methodist group still meet there today, although, for most of the year, the hotel operates as a secular establishment. It has a large room with a grand piano so that those attending camp could — and can — gather round to sing after dinner. I would not call it a ballroom, as dancing was — and is — no doubt prohibited.

I digress, but there is more to come on Ocean Grove, New Jersey, next week, as we follow Isaac onwards and upwards in divine blessing.

Next time — Genesis 26:26-35