great before the face of the LORD; and the LORD hath sent us to destroy it.

14 And Lot went out, and spake unto his sons in law, which married his daughters, and said, Up, get you out of this place; for the LORD will destroy this city. But he seemed as one that mocked unto his sons in law.

15 ¶ And when the morning arose, then the angels hastened Lot, saying, Arise, take thy wife, and thy two daughters, which are here; lest thou are found. be consumed in the 'iniquity of the city.

↑ Heb.

I Or,

punish

ment.

d Wisd. 10.

6.

16 And while he lingered, the men laid hold upon his hand, and upon the hand of his wife, and upon the hand of his two daughters; the LORD being merciful unto him: and they brought him forth, and set him without the city.

17 ¶ And it came to pass, when

13. the LORD hath sent us to destroy it] The angels speak here as messengers of judgment, not as He, who conversed with Abraham, ch. xviii. 17—33.

14. which married his daughters] Lit. "the takers of his daughters." LXX. "who had taken his daughters." Vulg. "who were about to marry his daughters." Some, Knobel, Delitzsch, &c., have held that besides those mentioned, vv. 8, 30, Lot had other daughters, who had married men of the city, and who perished in the conflagration with their husbands. It is more commonly thought that he had only two daughters, who were betrothed, but not yet married; betrothal being sufficient to give the title "son in law" or "bridegroom" to their affianced husbands.

15. which are here] Lit. "which are found." This seems to Knobel and others to indicate that there were other daughters, but that these two only were at home, the others being with their husbands in the city (see on V. 14); but it very probably points only to the fact, that Lot's wife and daughters were at home and ready to accompany him, whilst his sons in law scoffed and refused to go.

16. the LORD being merciful unto him] Lit. "in the mercy" (the sparing pity) "of the LORD to him."

17. that he said] i.e. one of the angels. the plain] The kikkar, the circuit of the Jordan. Lot was to escape from the whole

they had brought them forth abroad, that he said, Escape for thy life; look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed.

18 And Lot said unto them, Oh, not so, my Lord:

19 Behold now, thy servant hath found grace in thy sight, and thou hast magnified thy mercy, which thou hast shewed unto me in saving my life; and I cannot escape to the mountain, lest some evil take me, and I die:

20 Behold now, this city is near to flee unto, and it is a little one: Oh, let me escape thither, (is it not a little one?) and my soul shall live.

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18. my Lord] The Masorites have the note kadesh, i.e. holy," but it is probably no more than the salutation of reverence, see v. 2. For, though Lot had now found out the dignity of his guests, there is no evidence that he thought either of them to be the Most High. Indeed the word might be rendered in the plural "my lords," as the Syr. and Saad.

19. I cannot escape to the mountain] Lot and his family were, no doubt, exhausted by fear and anxiety, and he felt that, if he had to go to the mountains of Moab, he would be exposed to many dangers, which might prove his destruction; another instance of defective courage and faith, which yet is pardoned by a merciful God.

some evil] The evil, i.e. the destruction about to fall on Sodom; all Lot's conduct

here denotes excessive weakness.

20. is it not a little one?] Though Zoar may have been involved in the guilt of the other cities of the plain, Lot pleads that it has but few inhabitants, and that the sins of such a small city can be but comparatively small. So Rashi.

21. I have accepted thee] Lit. "I have lifted up thy face." It was the custom in the

East to make supplication with the face to the ground; when the prayer was granted, the face was said to be raised.

22. Zoar] i.e. "little." It appears by several ancient testimonies to have been believed that Zoar or Bela, though spared from the first destruction of the cities of the plain, was afterwards swallowed up by an earthquake, probably when Lot had left it, v. 30. (See Jerom. ad Jos.' xv. and 'Qu. in Gen.' c. XIV.; Theodoret 'in Gen.' XIX.). This tradition may account for the statement in Wisdom x. 6, that five cities were destroyed, and of Josephus (B. J.' IV. 8. 4), that the "shadowy forms of five cities" could be seen; whereas Deut. xxix. 23 only mentions four, viz. Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboim: yet, on the other hand, Eusebius (v. Bada) witnesses that Bela, or Zoar, was inhabited in his day, and garrisoned by Roman soldiers.

24. the LORD rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the LORD out of heaven] The LORD is said to have rained from the LORD, an expression much noted by commentators, Jewish and Christian. Several of the Rabbins, Manasseh Ben Israel, R. Simeon, and others, by the first JEHOVAH understand the angel Gabriel, the angel of the LORD: but there is certainly no other passage in Scripture, where this most sacred name is given to a created angel. Many of the fathers, Ignatius, Justin M., Tertullian, Cyprian, Athanasius, Hilary, The Council of Sirmium, &c. see in these words the mystery of the Holy Trinity, as though it were said, "GOD the Word rained down fire from GOD the Father;" an interpretation which may seem to be supported by the Jerusalem Targum, where the Word of the LORD" is said to have "rained down fire and bitumen from the presence of the LORD." Other patristic commentators of the highest authority (as Chrysostom, Jerome and Augustine) do not press this argument. Aben Ezra, whom perhaps a majority of Christian commentators have followed in this, sees in these words a peculiar "elegance or grace of language;" "The LORD rained...from the LORD" being a grander and more impressive mode of saying, VOL. I.

and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.

26 ¶ But his wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.

27 ¶ And Abraham gat up early in the morning to the place where he stood before the LORD:

28 And he looked toward Sodom

"The LORD rained from Himself." It is a common idiom in Hebrew to repeat the noun instead of using a pronoun.

brimstone and fire...out of heaven] Many explanations have been offered of this. Whether the fire from heaven was lightning, which kindled the bitumen and set the whole country in a blaze, whether it was a great volcanic eruption overwhelming all the cities of the plain, or whether there was simply a miraculous raining down of ignited sulphur, has been variously disputed and discussed. From comparing these words with Deut. xxix. 23, where it is said, "The whole land thereof is brimstone and salt and burning," it may be reasonably questioned, whether the "brimstone" in both passages may not mean bitumen, with which unquestionably, both before (see ch. xiv. 10), and after the overthrow, the whole country abounded (see also Jerusalem Targum quoted in the last note). The Almighty, in His most signal judgments and even in His most miraculous interventions, has been pleased often to use natural agencies; Egypt with an East wind and drove them as, for instance, He brought the locusts on back with a West wind (Ex. x. 13, 19). Possibly therefore the bitumen, which was the otherwise, was made the instrument by which natural produce of the country, volcanic or the offending cities were destroyed. The revelation to Abraham, the visit of the angels, the deliverance of Lot, mark the whole as miraculous and the result of direct intervention from above, whatever may have been the instrument which the Most High made use of to work His pleasure.

26. a pillar of salt] All testimony speaks of the exceeding saltness of the Dead Sea, and the great abundance of salt in its neighbourhood (e.g. Galen. De Simp. Medic. Facult.' IV. 19). In what manner Lot's wife actually perished has been questioned. AbenEzra supposed that she was first killed by the brimstone and fire and then incrusted over with salt, so as to become a statue or pillar of salt. There was a pillar of salt near the Dead Sea, which later tradition identified with Lot's wife (Joseph. Ant.' I. 11; Iren. IV. 51; Tertullian, Carmen de Sodoma;' Benjamin of

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and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain, and beheld, and, lo, the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furnace.

29 ¶ And it came to pass, when God destroyed the cities of the plain, that God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when he overthrew the cities in the which Lot dwelt.

30 And Lot went up out of Zoar, and dwelt in the mountain, and his two daughters with him; for he feared to dwell in Zoar: and he dwelt in a cave, he and his two daughters.

31 And the firstborn said unto the younger, Our father is old, and there is not a man in the earth to come in unto us after the manner of all the earth:

32 Come, let us make our father drink wine, and we will lie with him,

Tudela, 'Itin.' p.44. See Heidegger, II. p. 269). The American expedition, under Lynch, found to the East of Usdum a pillar of salt about forty feet high, which was perhaps that referred to by Josephus, &c.

29. God remembered Abraham] He remembered Abraham's intercession recorded in ch. xviii. and also the covenant which He had made with Abraham, and which was graciously extended so as to benefit his kinsman Lot.

30. he feared to dwell in Zoar] Jerome ('Qu.' ad h.l.) supposes that Lot had seen Zoar so often affected by earthquakes that he durst no longer abide there, see on v. 22. Rashi thought that the proximity to Sodom was the reason for his fear. The weakness of Lot's character is seen here again, in his not trusting God's promises.

dwelt in a cave] These mountainous regions abound in caves, and the early inhabitants formed them into dwellingplaces; see on ch. xiv. 6.

31. there is not a man in the earth] Iren. (IV. 51;) Chrysostom ('Hom. 34 in Genes.'), Ambros. (‘De Abrahamo,' 1. 6), Theodoret, ('Qu. in. Gen.' 69), excuse this incestuous conduct of the daughters of Lot on the ground, that they supposed the whole human race to have been destroyed, excepting their father and themselves. Even if it were so, the words of St Augustine would be true, that "they should have preferred to be childless rather than to treat their father so." (Potius

that we may preserve seed of our father.

33 And they made their father drink wine that night: and the firstborn went in, and lay with her father; and he perceived not when she lay down, nor when she arose.

34 And it came to pass on the morrow, that the firstborn said unto the younger, Behold, I lay yesternight with my father: let us make him drink wine this night also; and go thou in, and lie with him, that we may preserve seed of our father.

35 And they made their father drink wine that night also: and the younger arose, and lay with him; and he perceived not when she lay down, nor when she arose.

36 Thus were both the daughters of Lot with child by their father.

37 And the firstborn bare a son,

nunquam esse matres quam sic uti patre debuerunt, 'C. Faustum,' XXII. 43.) It is too apparent that the licentiousness of Sodom had had a degrading influence upon their hearts and lives.

In

32. let us make our father drink wine] It has been suggested in excuse for Lot, that his daughters drugged the wine. Of this, however, there is no intimation in the text. But the whole history is of the simplest character. It tells plainly all the faults, not of Lot only, but of Abraham and Sarah also. Still though it simply relates and neither praises nor blames, yet in Lot's history we may trace the judgment as well as the mercy of God. His selfish choice of the plain of Jordan led him perhaps to present wealth and prosperity, but withal to temptation and danger. the midst of the abandoned profligacy of Sodom he indeed was preserved in comparative purity, and so, when God overthrew the cities of the plain, he yet saved Lot from destruction. Still Lot's feebleness of faith first caused him to linger, v. 16, then to fear escape to the mountains, v. 19, and lastly to doubt the safety of the place which God had spared for him, v. 30. Now again he is led by his children into intoxication, which betrays him, unconsciously, into far more dreadful wickedness. And then we hear of him no more. He is left by the sacred narrative, saved indeed from the conflagration of Sodom, but an outcast, widowed, homeless, hopeless, without children or grandchildren, save the authors and the heirs of his shame.

and called his name Moab: the same is the father of the Moabites unto this day.

a son, and called his name Benammi: the same is the father of the children of Ammon unto this

37. Moab] According to the LXX.=meab, i.e. "from the father." So also the Targ. of Pseudo-Jonathan, Augustine, Jerome, &c. alluding to the incestuous origin of Moab. The Moabites dwelt originally to the East of the Dead Sea, from whence they expelled the Emims (Deut. ii. 11). Afterwards they were driven by the Amorites to the South of the river Arnon, which formed their Northern boundary.

38. Ben-ammi] i. e. "son of my people," in allusion to his being of unmixed race. The Ammonites are said to have destroyed the Zam-zummim, a tribe of the Rephaim, and to have succeeded them and dwelt in their stead. (Deut. ii. 22.) They appear for the most part to have been an unsettled marauding violent

race, of Bedouin habits, worshippers of Molech, "the abomination of the Ammonites." 1 K. xi. 7.

De Wette and his followers, Rosenmüller, Tuch, Knobel, &c. speak of this narrative, as if it had arisen from the national hatred of the Israelites to the Moabites and Ammonites, but the Pentateuch by no means shews such national hatred (see Deut. ii. 9, 19): and the book of Ruth gives the history of a Moabitess who was ancestress of David himself. It was not till the Moabites had seduced the Israelites to idolatry and impurity, Num. xxv. 1, and had acted in an unfriendly manner towards them, hiring Balaam to curse them, that they were excluded from the congregation of the Lord for ever. Deut. xxiii. 3, 4.

THE Dead Sea, if no historical importance attached to it, would still be the most remarkable body of water in the known world. Many fabulous characteristics were assigned to it by ancient writers, as that birds could not fly over it, that oxen and camels floated in it, nothing being heavy enough to sink (Tacit. Hist. v. 6; Plin. 'H. N. v. 16; Seneca, " Qu. Nat.' lib. II.). It has been conjectured by Reland, with some probability, that legends belonging to the lake of Asphalt said to have existed near Babylon (see on ch. xi. 3) were mixed up with the accounts of the Dead Sea, and both exaggerated (Reland, 'Palest.' II. pp. 244 seq.).

The Dead Sea called in Scripture the Salt Sea (Gen. xiv. 3; Numb. xxxiv. 3, 12), the Sea of the Plain (Deut. iii. 17, iv. 49; Josh. iii, 16), and in the later books, "the East Sea" (Ezek. xlvii. 18; Joel ii. 20; in Zech. xiv. 8, "the former sea" should be rendered "the East Sea"), is according to Lynch 40 geographical miles long by 9 to 93 broad. Its depression is 1316 feet below the level of the Mediterranean. Its depth in the northern portion is 1308 feet. Its extreme saltness was known to the ancients. Galen. ('De Simplic. Medicam. Facultat.' c. 19) says that "its taste was not only salt but bitter." Modern travellers describe the taste as most intensely and intolerably salt, its specific gravity and its buoyancy being consequently so great that people can swim or float in it, who could not swim in any other water. This excessive saltness is probably caused by the immense

masses of fossil salt which lie in a mountain at its South-west border, and by the rapid evaporation of the fresh water, which flows into it

Even

(Stanley, 'S. and P. p. 292; Robinson's 'Phys. Geog.' p. 195). Both ancient and modern writers assert that nothing animal or vegetable lives in this sea (Tacit. 'Hist.' v. 6; Galen. De Simpl. Med.' Iv. 19; Hieron. ad Ezech. XLVII. 18; Robinson, 'Bib. Res.' 11. P. 226). The few living creatures which the Jordan washes down into it are destroyed (Stanley, 'S. and P.' p. 293). No wonder, then, that the Salt Sea should have been called the Dead Sea, a name unknown to the sacred writers, but common in after times. its shores, incrusted with salt, present the appearance of utter desolation. The ancients speak much of the masses of asphalt, or bitumen, which the lake threw up. Diodorus Sic. affirms that the masses of bitumen were like islands, covering two or three plethra (Diod. Sic. II. 48); and Josephus says that they were of the form and magnitude of oxen (B. J.' Iv. 8. 4). Modern travellers testify to the existence of bitumen still on the shores and waters of the Dead Sea, but it is supposed by the Arabs, that it is only thrown up by earthquakes. Especially after the earthquakes of 1834 and 1837, large quantities are said to have been cast upon the Southern shore, probably detached by shocks from the bottom of the Southern bay (Robinson, B.R.' II. p. 229; Physical Geog.' p. 201. See also Thomson, 'Land and Book,' p. 223).

There is great difference between the North

ern and Southern portions of the sea. The great depth of the Northern division does not extend to the South. The Southern bay is shallow, its shores low and marshy, almost like a quicksand, (Stanley, 'S. and P.'p. 293). It has been very generally supposed from Gen. xiv. 3, that the Dead Sea now occupies the site of what was originally the Plain of Jordan, the vale of Siddim, and to this has been added the belief that the cities of Sodom, Gomorrah, &c. were situated in the vale of Siddim, and that they too were covered by the Dead Sea. Recent observations have led many to believe that probably a lake must have existed here before historic times. Yet it is quite conceivable that the terrible catastrophe recorded in Genesis, traces of which are visible throughout the whole region, may have produced even the deep depression of the bed of the Dead Sea, and so have arrested the streams of the Jordan, which may before that time have flowed onwards through the Arabah, and emptied itself into the Gulph of Akabah. At all events, it is very probable that the Southern division of the lake may have been formed at a comparatively recent date. The character of this Southern part, abounding with salt, frequently throwing up bitumen, its shores producing sulphur and nitre (Robinson, 'Phys. Geog.' p. 204), corresponds accurately with all that is told us of the valley of Siddim, which was "full of slime pits" (Gen. xiv. 10), and with the history of the destruction of the cities by fire and brimstone and the turning of Lot's wife into a pillar of salt. Very probably therefore the vale of Siddim may correspond with what is now the Southern Bay of the Dead Sea. There is, however, no Scriptural authority for saying that Sodom and the other guilty cities were immersed in the sea. They are always spoken of as overthrown by fire from heaven (cf. Deut. xxix. 23; Jer. xlix. 18, 1. 40; Zeph. ii. 9; 2 Pet. ii. 6). And Josephus (B. J. Iv. 8. 4) speaks of "Sodomitis, once a prosperous country from its fertility and abundance of cities, but now entirely burnt up," as adjoining the lake Asphaltites. This was observed long ago by Reland (II. p. 256), and is now generally admitted by travellers and commentators. All ancient testimony is in favour of considering the cities of

CHAPTER XX.

1 Abraham sojourneth at Gerar, 2 denieth his wife, and loseth her. 3 Abimelech is reproved for her in a dream. 9 He rebuketh Abraham, 14 restoreth Sarah, 16 and reproveth her. 17 He is healed by Abraham's prayer.

CHAP. XX. 1. From thence] i. e. from Mamre, where he had received the heavenly

the plain as having lain at this Southern extremity of the sea. The general belief at present that that portion only of the sea can have been of recent formation, and hence that that only can have occupied the site of the vale of Siddim, the belief that Sodom was near the vale of Siddim, the bituminous, saline, volcanic aspect of the Southern coast, the traditional names of Usdum, &c., the traditional site of Zoar, called by Josephus (as above) Zoar of Arabia, the hill of salt, said to have been Lot's wife, and every other supposed vestige of the destroyed cities being to the South, all tend to the general conviction that the cities of the plain (of the Kikkar) lay either within or around the present South bay of the Dead Sea. On the other hand, Mr Grove (in Smith's 'Dict. of the Bible') has argued with great ability in favour of a Northern site for these cities, and he is supported by Tristram (‘Land of Israel,' pp. 360-363). The chief grounds for his argument are 1st, that Abraham and Lot, at or near Bethel, could have seen the plain of Jordan to the North of the Dead Sea, but could not have seen the Southern valleys (see Gen. xiii. 10): 2ndly, that what they saw was "the Kikkar of the Jordan," whereas the Jordan flowed into the Dead Sea at its Northern extremity, but probably never flowed to the South of that sea: 3rdly, that later writers have been misled by apparent similarity of names, by the general belief that the sea had overflowed the sites of the cities and by uncertain traditions. It is, however, to be observed, that Mr Grove's arguments rest on two somewhat uncertain positions: first, that, in Gen. xiii. 10-13, Lot must have been able to see, from between Bethel and Ai, the cities of the plain; whereas it is possible that the language is not to be pressed too strictly, Lot seeing at the time the river Jordan North of the present Dead Sea, and knowing that the whole valley both North and South was fertile and well watered; secondly, that no part of the Dead Sea can be of recent formation, notwithstanding the terrible catastrophes all around it, to which not only Scripture but tradition and the present appearance of the whole country bear testimony. On the other hand, both tradition, local names and local evidences are strongly in favour of the Southern site of the cities destroyed.