Matriarch in distress (again)

Genesis 26. In which Isaac is the one to go to the land of King Abimelech in a time of famine, and pretend that Rebekah is his sister. This J source story mirrors the one from the E source found in Genesis 20.

In previous chapters (12 and 20) one twice finds Abraham moving to a foreign land in a time of famine, with his wife Sarah pretending to be his sister, and with her eventually taken as consort by the pharaoh or king, causing God to punish the royal household. In this chapter, famine drives Isaac and Rebekah into Gerar, the land of the Philistines, led by King Abimelech (the same one who tangled with Abraham and Sarah before). Once again a patriarch pretends that his wife is his sister, since he fears being killed by the King.

There are some differences: God specifically tells Isaac not to go to Egypt but to go to Gerar, the land he will give to Isaac’s descendants to fulfil the promise to Abraham. And this time the game is up when the king spots Isaac fondling his “sister” and realises that she must be his wife. (In Genesis 20 God warned Abimelech in a dream.) The King is not punished in this version of the story, since neither he nor anyone else took Rebekah as wife. Whereas previously the King bestowed great wealth on the man who deceived him, Isaac prospers as a farmer.

Isaac’s great wealth leads the king to tell Isaac to go away: “you have become too powerful for us”. In the beginning of the chapter it is said that Isaac settled in Gerar. In response to the King’s request that he leave, Isaac is said to depart from where he was and settle in “the valley of Gerar”. I am not sure how that constitutes “departing”. Here he opens all the wells his father had dug and the Philistines had filled in, and they again become a source of contention – this time between the herders of Gerar and Isaac.

At Beer-sheba, where God reassures Isaac that he will “make [his] offspring numerous for [God's] servant Abraham’s sake”, Isaac digs a well and build an altar. (Beer-sheba must have been fairly riddled with wells and altars at this point.)

As in chapter 20 the King meets with the patriarch: since he has seen that God is with Isaac he proposes that they swear a covenant to do each other no harm. Afterwards he takes his leave of Isaac.

The chapter ends with the 40-year old Esau taking two Hittite wives who make life bitter for Isaac and Rebekah. This is because Esau transgresses the rule that the family of Abraham may only marry within their own lineage. Somehow or other, like Cain, Ham and Lot, Esau seems destined to be the black sheep of the family.

Notes

• This story repeats that of chapter 20 for the most part, but some of what happened in that chapter is remembered by the characters in this one (such as the wells Abraham dug, and the famine of his time). There is no reference to the unlikely similarity of the stories though. It’s hard to think of a reason for this story to be repeated in this manner.

~ by tamfuwing on June 30, 2008.