Genesis 19–21

1The two angels came to Sodom at evening. Lot sat in the gate of Sodom. Lot saw them, and rose up to meet them. He bowed himself with his face to the earth,

2and he said, “See now, my lords, please come into your servant’s house, stay all night, wash your feet, and you can rise up early, and go on your way.” They said, “No, but we will stay in the street all night.”

3He urged them greatly, and they came in with him, and entered into his house. He made them a feast, and baked unleavened bread, and they ate.

4But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both young and old, all the people from every quarter.

5They called to Lot, and said to him, “Where are the men who came in to you this night? Bring them out to us, that we may have sex with them.”

6Lot went out to them through the door, and shut the door after himself.

7He said, “Please, my brothers, don’t act so wickedly.

8See now, I have two virgin daughters. Please let me bring them out to you, and you may do to them what seems good to you. Only don’t do anything to these men, because they have come under the shadow of my roof.”

9They said, “Stand back!” Then they said, “This one fellow came in to live as a foreigner, and he appoints himself a judge. Now we will deal worse with you than with them!” They pressed hard on the man Lot, and came near to break the door.

10But the men reached out their hand, and brought Lot into the house to them, and shut the door.

11They struck the men who were at the door of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they wearied themselves to find the door.

12The men said to Lot, “Do you have anybody else here? Sons-in-law, your sons, your daughters, and whomever you have in the city, bring them out of the place:

13for we will destroy this place, because the outcry against them has grown so great before Yahweh that Yahweh has sent us to destroy it.”

14Lot went out, and spoke to his sons-in-law, who were pledged to marry his daughters, and said, “Get up! Get out of this place, for Yahweh will destroy the city!” But he seemed to his sons-in-law to be joking.

15When the morning came, then the angels hurried Lot, saying, “Get up! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be consumed in the iniquity of the city.”

16But he lingered; and the men grabbed his hand, his wife’s hand, and his two daughters’ hands, Yahweh being merciful to him; and they took him out, and set him outside of the city.

17It came to pass, when they had taken them out, that he said, “Escape for your life! Don’t look behind you, and don’t stay anywhere in the plain. Escape to the mountains, lest you be consumed!”

18Lot said to them, “Oh, not so, my lord.

19See now, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have magnified your loving kindness, which you have shown to me in saving my life. I can’t escape to the mountain, lest evil overtake me, and I die.

20See now, this city is near to flee to, and it is a little one. Oh let me escape there (isn’t it a little one?), and my soul will live.”

21He said to him, “Behold, I have granted your request concerning this thing also, that I will not overthrow the city of which you have spoken.

22Hurry, escape there, for I can’t do anything until you get there.” Therefore the name of the city was called Zoar.

23The sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar.

24Then Yahweh rained on Sodom and on Gomorrah sulfur and fire from Yahweh out of the sky.

25He overthrew those cities, all the plain, all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew on the ground.

26But Lot’s wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.

27Abraham went up early in the morning to the place where he had stood before Yahweh.

28He looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain, and saw that the smoke of the land went up as the smoke of a furnace.

29When God destroyed the cities of the plain, God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the middle of the overthrow, when he overthrew the cities in which Lot lived.

30Lot went up out of Zoar, and lived in the mountain, and his two daughters with him; for he was afraid to live in Zoar. He lived in a cave with his two daughters.

31The firstborn said to the younger, “Our father is old, and there is not a man in the earth to come in to us in the way of all the earth.

32Come, let’s make our father drink wine, and we will lie with him, that we may preserve our father’s family line.”

33They made their father drink wine that night: and the firstborn went in, and lay with her father. He didn’t know when she lay down, nor when she arose.

34It came to pass on the next day, that the firstborn said to the younger, “Behold, I lay last night with my father. Let’s make him drink wine again tonight. You go in, and lie with him, that we may preserve our father’s family line.”

35They made their father drink wine that night also. The younger went and lay with him. He didn’t know when she lay down, nor when she got up.

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

37The firstborn bore a son, and named him Moab. He is the father of the Moabites to this day.

38The younger also bore a son, and called his name Ben Ammi. He is the father of the children of Ammon to this day.

1Abraham traveled from there toward the land of the South, and lived between Kadesh and Shur. He lived as a foreigner in Gerar.

2Abraham said about Sarah his wife, “She is my sister.” Abimelech king of Gerar sent, and took Sarah.

3But God came to Abimelech in a dream of the night, and said to him, “Behold, you are a dead man, because of the woman whom you have taken; for she is a man’s wife.”

4Now Abimelech had not come near her. He said, “Lord, will you kill even a righteous nation?

5Didn’t he tell me, ‘She is my sister’? She, even she herself, said, ‘He is my brother.’ I have done this in the integrity of my heart and the innocence of my hands.”

6God said to him in the dream, “Yes, I know that in the integrity of your heart you have done this, and I also withheld you from sinning against me. Therefore I didn’t allow you to touch her.

7Now 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.”

8Abimelech rose early in the morning, and called all his servants, and told all these things in their ear. The men were very scared.

9Then Abimelech called Abraham, and said to him, “What have you done to us? How have I sinned against you, that you have brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin? You have done deeds to me that ought not to be done!”

10Abimelech said to Abraham, “What did you see, that you have done this thing?”

11Abraham said, “Because I thought, ‘Surely the fear of God is not in this place. They will kill me for my wife’s sake.’

12Besides, she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife.

13When God caused me to wander from my father’s house, I said to her, ‘This is your kindness which you shall show to me. Everywhere that we go, say of me, “He is my brother.”’”

14Abimelech took sheep and cattle, male servants and female servants, and gave them to Abraham, and restored Sarah, his wife, to him.

15Abimelech said, “Behold, my land is before you. Dwell where it pleases you.”

16To Sarah he said, “Behold, I have given your brother a thousand pieces of silver. Behold, it is for you a covering of the eyes to all that are with you. In front of all you are vindicated.”

17Abraham prayed to God. So God healed Abimelech, his wife, and his female servants, and they bore children.

18For Yahweh had closed up tight all the wombs of the house of Abimelech, because of Sarah, Abraham’s wife.

1Yahweh visited Sarah as he had said, and Yahweh did to Sarah as he had spoken.

2Sarah conceived, and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time of which God had spoken to him.

3Abraham called his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore to him, Isaac.

4Abraham circumcised his son, Isaac, when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him.

5Abraham was one hundred years old when his son, Isaac, was born to him.

6Sarah said, “God has made me laugh. Everyone who hears will laugh with me.”

7She said, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? For I have borne him a son in his old age.”

8The child grew and was weaned. Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned.

9Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, mocking.

10Therefore she said to Abraham, “Cast out this servant and her son! For the son of this servant will not be heir with my son, Isaac.”

11The thing was very grievous in Abraham’s sight on account of his son.

12God said to Abraham, “Don’t let it be grievous in your sight because of the boy, and because of your servant. In all that Sarah says to you, listen to her voice. For your offspring will be named through Isaac.

13I will also make a nation of the son of the servant, because he is your child.”

14Abraham rose up early in the morning, and took bread and a container of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder; and gave her the child, and sent her away. She departed, and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba.

15The water in the container was spent, and she put the child under one of the shrubs.

16She went and sat down opposite him, a good way off, about a bow shot away. For she said, “Don’t let me see the death of the child.” She sat opposite him, and lifted up her voice, and wept.

17God heard the voice of the boy. The angel of God called to Hagar out of the sky, and said to her, “What troubles you, Hagar? Don’t be afraid. For God has heard the voice of the boy where he is.

18Get up, lift up the boy, and hold him with your hand. For I will make him a great nation.”

19God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. She went, filled the container with water, and gave the boy a drink.

20God was with the boy, and he grew. He lived in the wilderness, and as he grew up, he became an archer.

21He lived in the wilderness of Paran. His mother got a wife for him out of the land of Egypt.

22At that time, Abimelech and Phicol the captain of his army spoke to Abraham, saying, “God is with you in all that you do.

23Now, therefore, swear to me here by God that you will not deal falsely with me, nor with my son, nor with my son’s son. But according to the kindness that I have done to you, you shall do to me, and to the land in which you have lived as a foreigner.”

24Abraham said, “I will swear.”

25Abraham complained to Abimelech because of a water well, which Abimelech’s servants had violently taken away.

26Abimelech said, “I don’t know who has done this thing. You didn’t tell me, and I didn’t hear of it until today.”

27Abraham took sheep and cattle, and gave them to Abimelech. Those two made a covenant.

28Abraham set seven ewe lambs of the flock by themselves.

29Abimelech said to Abraham, “What do these seven ewe lambs, which you have set by themselves, mean?”

30He said, “You shall take these seven ewe lambs from my hand, that it may be a witness to me, that I have dug this well.”

31Therefore he called that place Beersheba, because they both swore an oath there.

32So they made a covenant at Beersheba. Abimelech rose up with Phicol, the captain of his army, and they returned into the land of the Philistines.

33Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and there he called on the name of Yahweh, the Everlasting God.

34Abraham lived as a foreigner in the land of the Philistines many days.