to add or augment (often adverbial · conjunction + verb, hiphil sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
Abraham
אַבְרָהָ֛ם'av.ra.Ham
H85
Abraham · proper noun, a man's name
took
וַיִּקַּ֥חvai.yi.Kach
H3947
to take (in the widest variety of applications) · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
wife
אִשָּׁ֖ה'i.Shah
H802
a woman · noun, common feminine singular absolute
name
וּשְׁמָ֥הּu.she.Mah
H8034
an appellation · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person feminine singular
Keturah
קְטוּרָֽהke.tu.Rah
H6989
Keturah · proper noun, a woman's name
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
1 Chronicles 1:32-33 Now the sons of Keturah, Abraham’s concubine: she bare Zimran, and Jokshan, and Medan, and Midian, and Ishbak, and Shuah. And the sons of Jo…
Genesis 23:1-2 And Sarah was an hundred and seven and twenty years old: these were the years of the life of Sarah.
Genesis 28:1 And Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said unto him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Genesis 25:1-10
Abraham lived, after the marriage of Isaac, thirty-five years, and all that is recorded concerning him during the time lies here in a very few verses. We hear no more of God's extraordinary appearances to him or trials of him; for all the days, even of the best and greatest saints, are not eminent days, some slide on silently, and neither come nor go with observation; such were these last days of Abraham. We have here,
I. An account of his children by Keturah, another wife whom he married after the death of Sarah. He had buried Sarah and married Isaac, the two dear companions of his life, and was now solitary. He wanted a nurse, his family wanted a governess, and it was not good for him to b…
Then again Abraham took a wife - When Abraham took Keturah we are not informed; it might have been in the lifetime of Sarah; and the original ויסף vaiyoseph, and he added, etc., seems to give some countenance to this opinion. Indeed it is not very likely that he had the children mentioned here after the death of Sarah; and from the circumstances of his age, feebleness, etc., at the birth of Isaac, it is still more improbable. Even at that age, forty years before the marriage of Isaac, the birth of his son is considered as not less miraculous on his part than on the part of Sarah; for the apostle expressly says, Rom 4:19, that Abraham considered not his own body Now Dead, when he was about a…
Then again Abraham took a wife,.... Three years after the death of Sarah, and when his son Isaac was married, and he alone, and now one hundred and forty years of age:
and her name was Keturah; who she was, or of what family, is not said. An Arabic writer (z) says she was a daughter of the king of the Turks; another (a) of them calls her the daughter of King Rama; and another (b) the daughter of Pactor, king of Rabbah; but there were then no such people in being. Very probably she was one of Abraham's handmaids born in his house, or bought with his money, perhaps the chief and principal of them. The Targums of Jonathan and Jerusalem say she is the same with Hagar, and so, Jarchi; but this i…
The Church Fathers
As for those who prefer to read no symbolic meanings into such facts, they still have no ground of complaint against Abraham. For, in the literal sense, there may be meant to be here an argument against those heretics who are opposed to second marriages, since the example of the very father of many nations proves that there is no sin in a second marriage that is made after one's wife is dead.
Because no law concerning virginity or chastity had been set down, lest desire ever make a stain in the mind of that just man.… Abraham took for himself a concubine after the death of Sarah, so that through the uprightness of his many sons who were to be scattered throughout the entire earth, knowledge and worship of the one God would be spread. Abraham then had sons from Keturah, and he sent them eastward with gifts. Abraham died 175 years old and was buried next to Sarah, his wife.
[One] who wishes to show himself to be a child of Abraham by doing the works of Abraham in accordance with the Savior's explanation need not literally have sexual intercourse with a handmaid or take another wife in old age after the death of his wife. We also learn from this quite clearly that we must interpret the whole story of Abraham allegorically and make each thing he did spiritual, beginning with the command, "Go forth from your land, your kindred, and your father's house, into the land that I will show you." This statement is made not only to Abraham but also to everyone who will be his child.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Genealogy — In Hebrew the term for genealogy or pedigree is “the book of the generations;” and because the oldest histories were usually drawn up on a genealogical basis, the expression often extended to the…
Keturah — Incense, the wife of Abraham, whom he married probably after Sarah’s death (Gen. 25:1-6), by whom he had six sons, whom he sent away into the east country. Her nationality is unknown. She is styled…
Marriage — Was instituted in Paradise when man was in innocence (Gen. 2:18-24). Here we have its original charter, which was confirmed by our Lord, as the basis on which all regulations are to be framed (Matt.…
Genealogy · Of Abraham, by his wife Keturah — Of Abraham, by his wife Keturah
Keturah · Wife (concubine) of Abraham — Wife (concubine) of Abraham
Midianites · Descended form Midian, son of Abraham by Keturah — Descended form Midian, son of Abraham by Keturah
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Then again Abraham took a wife [15] It seems very absurd that Abraham, who is said to have been dead in his own body thirty-eight years before the decease of Sarah, should, after her death, marry another wife. such an act was, certainly, unworthy of his gravity. Besides, when Paul commends his faith, (Romans 4:19,) he not only asserts that the womb of Sarah was dead, when Isaac was about to be born, but also that the body of the father himself was dead. Therefore Abraham acted most foolishly, if, after the loss of his wife, he, in the decrepitude of old age, contracted another marriage. Further, it is at variance with the language of Paul, that he, who in his hundredth year was cold and impo…
Though Abraham had sons by another wife, he safeguarded Isaac’s inheritance and blessing.
25:1 Exactly when Abraham married . . . Keturah is unknown. It was probably, but not necessarily, after Sarah’s death.
Rashi on Genesis 25:1
קטורה KETURAH — This is Hagar. She was named Keturah because her deeds were as beautiful (sweet) as incense (Ketoreth) (Genesis Rabbah 61). And since she closed her 'opening,' as she did not mate with anyone from the time she separated from Avraham (Genesis Rabbah 61:4).
