7 Now therefore, restore the man's wife. For he is a prophet, and he will pray for you, and you will live. If you don't restore her, know for sure that you will die, you, and all who are yours."
and the earth opened its mouth, and swallowed them up, and their households, and all the men who appertained to Korah, and all their goods. So they, and all that appertained to them, went down alive into Sheol: and the earth closed on them, and they perished from among the assembly.
The covenant which he made with Abraham, His oath to Isaac, And confirmed the same to Jacob for a statute; To Israel for an everlasting covenant, Saying, "To you I will give the land of Canaan, The lot of your inheritance;" When they were but a few men in number, Yes, very few, and foreigners in it. They went about from nation to nation, From one kingdom to another people. He allowed no one to do them wrong. Yes, he reproved kings for their sakes, "Don't touch my anointed ones! Do my prophets no harm!"
Again, when I say to the wicked, You shall surely die; if he turn from his sin, and do that which is lawful and right; if the wicked restore the pledge, give again that which he had taken by robbery, walk in the statutes of life, committing no iniquity; he shall surely live, he shall not die. None of his sins that he has committed shall be remembered against him: he has done that which is lawful and right; he shall surely live.
Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the assembly, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord, and the prayer of faith will heal him who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. If he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Confess your offenses to one another, and pray one for another, that you may be healed. The effective, earnest prayer of a righteous man is powerfully effective.
If anyone desires to harm them, fire proceeds out of their mouth and devours their enemies. If anyone desires to harm them, he must be killed in this way. These have the power to shut up the sky, that it may not rain during the days of their prophecy. They have power over the waters, to turn them into blood, and to strike the earth with every plague, as often as they desire.
Yahweh spoke to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying, "This month shall be to you the beginning of months. It shall be the first month of the year to you. Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying, 'On the tenth day of this month, they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to their fathers' houses, a lamb for a household;
It happened after many days, that the word of Yahweh came to Elijah, in the third year, saying, Go, show yourself to Ahab; and I will send rain on the earth. Elijah went to show himself to Ahab. The famine was sore in Samaria. Ahab called Obadiah, who was over the household. (Now Obadiah feared Yahweh greatly: for it was so, when Jezebel cut off the prophets of Yahweh, that Obadiah took one hundred prophets, and hid them by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water.) Ahab said to Obadiah, Go through the land, to all the springs of water, and to all the brooks: peradventure we may find grass and save the horses and mules alive, that we not lose all the animals. So they divided the land between them to pass throughout it: Ahab went one way by himself, and Obadiah went another way by himself. As Obadiah was in the way, behold, Elijah met him: and he knew him, and fell on his face, and said, Is it you, my lord Elijah? He answered him, It is I: go, tell your lord, Behold, Elijah [is here]. He said, Wherein have I sinned, that you would deliver your servant into the hand of Ahab, to kill me? As Yahweh your God lives, there is no nation or kingdom, where my lord has not sent to seek you: and when they said, He is not here, he took an oath of the kingdom and nation, that they didn't find you. Now you say, Go, tell your lord, Behold, Elijah [is here]. It will happen, as soon as I am gone from you, that the Spirit of Yahweh will carry you I don't know where; and so when I come and tell Ahab, and he can't find you, he will kill me: but I your servant fear Yahweh from my youth. Wasn't it told my lord what I did when Jezebel killed the prophets of Yahweh, how I hid one hundred men of Yahweh's prophets by fifty in a cave, and fed them with bread and water? Now you say, Go, tell your lord, Behold, Elijah [is here]; and he will kill me. Elijah said, As Yahweh of Hosts lives, before whom I stand, I will surely show myself to him today. So Obadiah went to meet Ahab, and told him; and Ahab went to meet Elijah. It happened, when Ahab saw Elijah, that Ahab said to him, Is it you, you troubler of Israel? He answered, I have not troubled Israel; but you, and your father's house, in that you have forsaken the commandments of Yahweh, and you have followed the Baals. Now therefore send, and gather to me all Israel to Mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four hundred fifty, and the prophets of the Asherah four hundred, who eat at Jezebel's table. So Ahab sent to all the children of Israel, and gathered the prophets together to Mount Carmel. Elijah came near to all the people, and said, "How long will you waver between the two sides? If Yahweh is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him." The people answered him not a word. Then Elijah said to the people, "I, even I only, am left a prophet of Yahweh; but Baal's prophets are four hundred fifty men. Let them therefore give us two bulls; and let them choose one bull for themselves, and cut it in pieces, and lay it on the wood, and put no fire under; and I will dress the other bull, and lay it on the wood, and put no fire under. You call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of Yahweh; and the God who answers by fire, let him be God." All the people answered, "It is well said." Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, "Choose one bull for yourselves, and dress it first; for you are many; and call on the name of your god, but put no fire under it." They took the bull which was given them, and they dressed it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even until noon, saying, Baal, hear us. But there was no voice, nor any who answered. They leaped about the altar which was made. It happened at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, Cry aloud; for he is a god: either he is musing, or he is gone aside, or he is on a journey, or peradventure he sleeps and must be awakened. They cried aloud, and cut themselves after their manner with knives and lances, until the blood gushed out on them. It was so, when midday was past, that they prophesied until the time of the offering of the [evening] offering; but there was neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any who regarded. Elijah said to all the people, Come near to me; and all the people came near to him. He repaired the altar of Yahweh that was thrown down. Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the word of Yahweh came, saying, Israel shall be your name. With the stones he built an altar in the name of Yahweh; and he made a trench about the altar, as great as would contain two measures of seed. He put the wood in order, and cut the bull in pieces, and laid it on the wood. He said, Fill four jars with water, and pour it on the burnt offering, and on the wood. He said, Do it the second time; and they did it the second time. He said, Do it the third time; and they did it the third time. The water ran round about the altar; and he filled the trench also with water. It happened at the time of the offering of the [evening] offering, that Elijah the prophet came near, and said, Yahweh, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word. Hear me, Yahweh, hear me, that this people may know that you, Yahweh, are God, and [that] you have turned their heart back again. Then the fire of Yahweh fell, and consumed the burnt offering, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. When all the people saw it, they fell on their faces: and they said, Yahweh, he is God; Yahweh, he is God. and Elijah said to them, Take the prophets of Baal; don't let one of them escape. They took them; and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and killed them there. Elijah said to Ahab, Get you up, eat and drink; for there is the sound of abundance of rain. So Ahab went up to eat and to drink. Elijah went up to the top of Carmel; and he bowed himself down on the earth, and put his face between his knees. He said to his servant, Go up now, look toward the sea. He went up, and looked, and said, There is nothing. He said, Go again seven times. It happened at the seventh time, that he said, "Behold, a small cloud, like a man's hand, is rising out of the sea." He said, Go up, tell Ahab, Make ready [your chariot], and get you down, that the rain not stop you. It happened in a little while, that the sky grew black with clouds and wind, and there was a great rain. Ahab rode, and went to Jezreel: and the hand of Yahweh was on Elijah; and he girded up his loins, and ran before Ahab to the entrance of Jezreel.
He sent Eliakim, who was over the household, and Shebna the scribe, and the elders of the priests, covered with sackcloth, to Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz. They said to him, Thus says Hezekiah, This day is a day of trouble, and of rebuke, and of rejection; for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth. It may be Yahweh your God will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master has sent to defy the living God, and will rebuke the words which Yahweh your God has heard. Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Genesis 20
Commentary on Genesis 20 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 20
Ge 20:1-18. Abraham's Denial of His Wife.
1. Abraham journeyed from thence … and dwelled between Kadesh and Shur—Leaving the encampment, he migrated to the southern border of Canaan. In the neighborhood of Gerar was a very rich and well-watered pasture land.
2. Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister—Fear of the people among whom he was, tempted him to equivocate. His conduct was highly culpable. It was deceit, deliberate and premeditated—there was no sudden pressure upon him—it was the second offense of the kind [see on Ge 12:13]—it was a distrust of God every way surprising, and it was calculated to produce injurious effects on the heathen around. Its mischievous tendency was not long in being developed.
Abimelech (father-king) … sent and took Sarah—to be one of his wives, in the exercise of a privilege claimed by Eastern sovereigns, already explained (see on Ge 12:15).
3. But God came to Abimelech in a dream—In early times a dream was often made the medium of communicating important truths; and this method was adopted for the preservation of Sarah.
9. Then Abimelech called Abraham, and said … What hast thou done?—In what a humiliating plight does the patriarch now appear—he, a servant of the true God, rebuked by a heathen prince. Who would not rather be in the place of Abimelech than of the honored but sadly offending patriarch! What a dignified attitude is that of the king—calmly and justly reproving the sin of the patriarch, but respecting his person and heaping coals of fire on his head by the liberal presents made to him.
11. And Abraham said … I thought, Surely the fear of God is not in this place—From the horrible vices of Sodom he seems to have taken up the impression that all other cities of Canaan were equally corrupt. There might have been few or none who feared God, but what a sad thing when men of the world show a higher sense of honor and a greater abhorrence of crimes than a true worshipper!
12. yet indeed she is my sister—(See on Ge 11:31). What a poor defense Abraham made. The statement absolved him from the charge of direct and absolute falsehood, but he had told a moral untruth because there was an intention to deceive (compare Ge 12:11-13). "Honesty is always the best policy." Abraham's life would have been as well protected without the fraud as with it: and what shame to himself, what distrust to God, what dishonor to religion might have been prevented! "Let us speak truth every man to his neighbor" [Zec 8:16; Eph 4:25].