Genesis 26:22 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Genesis 26:22
And he removed from thence, and digged another well; and for that they strove not: and he called the name of it Rehoboth; and he said, For now the LORD hath made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.
to remove (intransitive or transitive) figuratively · conjunction + verb, hiphil sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
digged
וַיַּחְפֹּר֙vai.yach.Por
H2658
properly · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
another
אַחֶ֔רֶת'a.Che.ret
H312
properly · adjective, feminine singular absolute
well
בְּאֵ֣רbe.'Er
H875
a pit · noun, common feminine singular absolute
strove
רָב֖וּra.Vu
H7378
properly · verb, qal perfect, 3rd person common plural
called
וַיִּקְרָ֤אvai.yik.Ra'
H7121
to call out to (i.e. properly · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
it
שְׁמָהּ֙she.Mah
H8034
an appellation · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person feminine singular
Rehoboth
רְחֹב֔וֹתre.cho.Vot
H7344
Rechoboth · proper noun, a place name
said
וַיֹּ֗אמֶרvai.Yo.mer
H559
to say (used with great latitude) · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
now
עַתָּ֞ה'a.Tah
H6258
at this time · adverb
LORD
יְהוָ֛הYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
room
הִרְחִ֧יבhir.Chiv
H7337
to broaden (intransitive or transitive · verb, hiphil perfect, 3rd person masculine singular
fruitful
וּפָרִ֥ינוּu.fa.Ri.nu
H6509
to bear fruit (literally or figuratively) · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 1st person common plural
land
בָאָֽרֶץva.'A.retz
H776
the earth (at large · preposition with the article + noun, common feminine singular absolute
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
Genesis 17:6 And I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee.
Exodus 1:7 And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with…
Psalms 118:5 I called upon the LORD in distress: the LORD answered me, and set me in a large place.
Genesis 28:3 And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people;
Genesis 41:52 And the name of the second called he Ephraim: For God hath caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction.
Psalms 4:1 Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness: thou hast enlarged me when I was in distress; have mercy upon me, and hear my prayer.
Psalms 18:19 He brought me forth also into a large place; he delivered me, because he delighted in me.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Genesis 26:12-25
Here we have,
I. The tokens of God's good-will to Isaac. He blessed him, and prospered him, and made all that he had to thrive under his hands. 1. His corn multiplied strangely, Gen 26:12. 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, Psa 3…
Isaac digged again the wells of water--The naming of wells by Abraham, and the hereditary right of his family to the property, the change of the names by the Philistines to obliterate the traces of their origin, the restoration of the names by Isaac, and the contests between the respective shepherds to the exclusive possession of the water, are circumstances that occur among the natives in those regions as frequently in the present day as in the time of Isaac.
Adam Clarke on Genesis 26:21
They dug another well - Never did any man more implicitly follow the Divine command, Resist not evil, than Isaac; whenever he found that his work was likely to be a subject of strife and contention, he gave place, and rather chose to suffer wrong than to have his own peace of mind disturbed. Thus he overcame evil with good.
John Gill on Genesis 26:22
And he removed from thence,.... A little further from their border, to cut off all pretence, and put a stop to all dispute and controversy for the future:
and digged another well; in the place he removed to:
and for that they strove not; it being at such a distance from their border, they could not have the face to claim any right to it:
and he called the name of it Rehoboth; which signifies broad and spacious, places, enlargements:
for now hath the Lord made room for us; for himself, his family, his herds, and flocks, and freed them, from those difficulties under which they laboured, and the straits into which they were brought through the contention of the herdsmen of Gerar:
and we sh…
The Church Fathers
(Verse 22.) And they dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it: so he called its name Broad Places; or, in Hebrew, Rehoboth, to prove what we have said above, that he himself built the city of Nineveh and its broad places (Genesis 10).
Now Isaac reopened many wells that his father had dug, but strangers had filled them after the death of his father Abraham. Beyond the others he dug the following wells: one in the valley of Gerar, and he found there a well of living water; and the shepherds of Gerar disputed with Isaac's shepherds, because they claimed the water of this well as their own, and he called its name "Injustice." And he dug another well over which a quarrel arose, and he called it "Enmity." And he dug a third well, over which no dispute began among the shepherds, and he called it "Room Enough." He also dug a well and did not find water in it and called that well "Well of the Oath." Would anyone reading of these things consider that those works were earthly rather than spiritual?
If, therefore, you too, hearing these things today, receive the hearing faithfully, Isaac works also in you, he cleanses your hearts from earthly senses, and, seeing that such great mysteries as these lie hidden in the divine scriptures, you advance in understanding, you advance in spiritual senses. You will begin even yourselves to be teachers, and "rivers of living water" will proceed from you. For the Word of God is present, and this now is his operation, that he may remove the earth from the soul of each one of you and open your fountain. For he is within you and does not come from without, just as "the kingdom of God also is within you." And that woman who had lost the drachma did not find it outside, but in her own house, after she "lit a lamp and cleansed the house" of the filth and uncleannesses which the sloth and dullness of long time had heaped up, and there she found the drachma. And you too, then, if you light a lamp, if you apply to yourself the illumination of the Holy Spirit and "in his light see light," you will find the drachma within you. For within you is placed the image of the heavenly King. For when God made man in the beginning, "he made him to his own image and likeness"; and this image he placed not without, but within him. This could not be seen in you while your house was sordid, filled with uncleannesses and rubble. That fountain of knowledge was situated within you, but it could not flow, because the Philistines had filled it with earth and had made in you "the image of the earthly." But you indeed then bore "the image of the earthly"; now, however, having heard these things, cleansed by the Word of God from all that earthly mass and oppression, make "the image of the heavenly" shine forth in you. This, then, is the image of which the Father said to the Son: "Let us make men to our image and likeness." The Son of God is the painter of this image. And because the painter is such and so great, his image can be obscured through neglect, but it cannot be destroyed through malice. For the image of God abides forever, even though you draw over yourself "the image of the earthly." This picture you paint upon yourself. For when lust has darkened you, you have laid on one earthly color; but if you also burn with avarice, you have mixed in another. And also when anger makes you bloody, you add nonetheless a third color. To pride too…
Dictionary and topics
Abimelech — My father a king, or father of a king, a common name of the Philistine kings, as “Pharaoh” was of the Egyptian kings. (1.) The Philistine king of Gerar in the time of Abraham (Gen. 20:1-18). By an…
Judah — Praise, the fourth son of Jacob by Leah. The name originated in Leah’s words of praise to the Lord on account of his birth: “Now will I praise [Heb. odeh] Jehovah, and she called his name Yehudah”…
Rehoboth — Broad places. (1.) A well in Gerar dug by Isaac (Gen. 26:22), supposed to be in Wady er-Ruheibeh, about 20 miles south of Beersheba. (2.) An ancient city on the Euphrates (Gen. 36:37; 1 Chr. 1:48),…
Tent — (1.) Heb. ‘ohel (Gen. 9:21, 27). This word is used also of a dwelling or habitation (1 Kings 8:66; Isa. 16:5; Jer. 4:20), and of the temple (Ezek. 41:1). When used of the tabernacle, as in 1 Kings…
And Isaac digged again the wells of water. First, we see that the holy man was so hated by his neighbors, as to be under the necessity of seeking a retreat for himself which was destitute of water; and no habitation is so troublesome and inconvenient for the ordinary purposes of life as that which suffers from scarcity of water. Besides, the abundance of his cattle and the multitude of his servants -- who were like a little army -- rendered a supply of water very necessary; whence we learn that he was brought into severe straits. But that this last necessity did not instigate him to seek revenge, is a proof of singular forbearance; for we know that lighter injuries will often rack the patien…
Reopening and Discovery of Wells. - In this valley Isaac dug open the old wells which had existed from Abraham's time, and gave them the old names. His people also dug three new wells. But Abimelech's people raised a contest about two of these; and for this reason Isaac called them Esek and Sitnah, strife and opposition. The third there was no dispute about; and it received in consequence the name Rehoboth, "breadths," for Isaac said, "Yea now (כּי־עתּה, as in Gen 29:32, etc.) Jehovah has provided for us a broad space, that we may be fruitful (multiply) in the land." This well was probably not in the land of Gerar, as Isaac had removed thence, but in the Wady Ruhaibeh, the name of which is s…
Isaac moved . . . to the Gerar Valley (away from the city of Gerar itself, 26:6, but probably still within ten miles) and reopened his father’s wells. Isaac was also opposed there, but chose not to fight back; he relinquished one well after another until God’s blessing outdid the opposition. Whenever Isaac reopened a well, and regardless of how often enemies caused them to cave in, he found water. God was blessing Isaac and that blessing could not be hindered. Finally, the Philistines left Isaac alone.
Rashi on Genesis 26:10
והבאת עלינו אשם AND YOU WOULD HAVE BROUGHT GUILT UPON US — If he had lain with her already, YOU WOULD HAVE BROUGHT GUILT UPON US.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Wells
· .Between
— .Between
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).