CHAPTER 26
1 Forsooth for hunger rose on the land, after that barrenness that befelled in the days of Abraham, Isaac went forth to Abimelech, king of Palestines, in Gerar.
2 And the Lord appeared to him, and said, Go not down into Egypt, but rest thou in the land which I shall say to thee,
3 and be thou a pilgrim therein; and I shall be with thee, and I shall bless thee; for I shall give all these countries to thee, and to thy seed, and I shall [ful] fill the oath which I promised to Abraham, thy father.
4 And I shall multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven, and I shall give all these countries to thine heirs, and all folks of the earth shall be blessed in thy seed,
5 for Abraham obeyed to my voice, and kept my behests, and my commandments, and my ceremonies, and my laws.
6 And so Isaac dwelled in Gerar.
7 And when he was asked of [the] men of that place of his wife, he answered, She is my sister; for he dreaded to acknowledge that she was fellowshipped to him in matrimony, and he guessed lest peradventure they would slay him for the fairness of her.
8 And when full many days were passed, and he dwelled there, Abimelech, king of Palestines, beheld by a window, and saw him playing with Rebecca, his wife.
9 And when Isaac was called, the king said, It is open, that she is thy wife; why saidest thou, that she was thy sister? Isaac answered, For I dreaded, lest I should die for her.
10 And Abimelech said, Why hast thou deceived us? Some man of the people might do lechery with thy wife, and thou haddest brought in grievous sin on us.
11 And the king commanded to all the people, and said, He that toucheth the wife of this man shall die by death.
12 Forsooth Isaac sowed in that land, and he found an hundredfold increase in that year; and the Lord blessed him.
13 And the man was made rich, and he went profiting and increasing, till he was made full great.
14 Also he had possessions of sheep and of great beasts, and full much of menials. For this thing Palestines had envy to him,
15 and they stopped in that time and filled with earth all the pits or wells which the servants of Abraham his father had digged,
16 in so much that Abimelech himself said to Isaac, Go thou away from us, for thou art made greatly mightier than we.
17 And he went away, that he should come to the strand of Gerar, and dwelled there.
18 And he digged again other wells, which the servants of Abraham his father had digged, and which the Philistines had stopped sometime, when Abraham was dead; and he called those pits by the same names, by which his father had called before.
19 They digged in the strand, and they found quick, or welling up, water.
20 But also strife of [the] shepherds of Gerar was there against the shep-herds of Isaac, and they said, The water is ours; wherefore of that strife that befelled, Isaac called the name of that well False Challenge, or Esek, or Quarrel.
21 And they digged another well, and they strived also for that, and Isaac called that well Enmities, or Sitnah, or Enmity.
22 And he went forth from thence, and digged another pit, for which they strived not, [and] therefore he called the name of that well Breadth, either Largeness; and said, Now God hath alarged us, and hath made us to increase on [the] earth.
23 Isaac forsooth went up from that place into Beersheba,
24 where the Lord appeared to him in that night; and said, I am [the] God of Abraham, thy father; do not thou dread, for I am with thee, and I shall bless thee, and I shall multiply thy seed for my servant Abraham.
25 And so Isaac builded there an altar to the Lord; and when the name of the Lord was inwardly called, he stretched forth a tabernacle; and he commanded his servants that they should dig pits.
26 And when Abimelech, and Ahuzzath, one of his friends, and Phicol, [the] duke of knights, had come from Gerar to that place,
27 Isaac spake to them, What came ye to me, a man whom ye have hated, and putted away from you?
28 Which answered, We saw that God is with thee, and therefore we said now, An oath be betwixt us, and make we a covenant of peace,
29 that thou do not any [thing of] evil to us, as we touched nothing of thine, neither did that that hurted thee, but with peace we let go thee increased by the blessings of the Lord.
30 Therefore Isaac made them a feast; and after meat and drink,
31 they rose early, and swore each to other; and Isaac let go them peaceably into their place.
32 Lo! forsooth in that day the servants of Isaac came, telling to him of the pit which they had digged, and said, We have found water.
33 Wherefore Isaac called that pit Abundance or Shebah; and the name of the city was set Beersheba till into this present day.
34 Esau forsooth forty years eld [or old] wedded two wives, Judith*, the daughter of Beeri Hittite, and Bashemath†, the daughter of Elon, of the same place;
35 which both offended the soul of Isaac and of Rebecca.
* CHAPTER 26:34 She is also known as Oholibamah or Aholibamah. † CHAPTER 26:34 She is also known as Adah.