← Back
←Previous: jubilee 23
Chapter 24
Next: jubilee 25→

Verse 1

After Abraham’s death, the Lord blessed his son Isaac. He set out from Hebron and went during the first year of the third week of this jubilee [2073] and lived at the well of the vision for seven years.

Verse 2

During the first year of the fourth week [2080] a famine — different than the first famine which had occurred in Abraham’s lifetime — began in the land.

Verse 3

When Jacob was cooking lentil porridge, Esau came hungry from the field. He said to his brother Jacob: ‘Give me some of this wheat porridge’. But Jacob said to him: ‘Hand over to me your birthright which belongs to the first-born, and then I will give you food and some of this porridge as well’.

Verse 4

Esau said to himself: ‘I will die. What good will this right of the first-born do’? So he said to Jacob: ‘I (hereby) give (it) to you’.

Verse 5

Jacob said to him: ‘Swear to me today’. So he swore to him.

Verse 6

Then Jacob gave the food and porridge to his brother Esau, and he ate until he was full. Esau repudiated the right of the first-born. This is why he was named Esau and Edom: because of the wheat porridge which Jacob gave him in exchange for his right of the first-born.

Verse 7

So Jacob became the older one, but Esau was lowered from his prominent position.

Verse 8

As there was a famine over the land, Isaac set out to go down to Egypt during the second year of this week [2081]. He went to Gerar to the Philistine king Abimelech.

Verse 9

The Lord appeared to him and told him: ‘Do not go down to Egypt. Stay in the land that I will tell you. Live as a foreigner in that land. I will be with you and bless you,

Verse 10

because I will give this entire land to you and your descendants. I will carry out the terms of my oath which I swore to your father Abraham. I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars of the sky. I will give this entire land to your descendants.

Verse 11

All the peoples of the earth will be blessed through your descendants because of the fact that your father obeyed me and kept my obligations, commands, laws, statutes, and covenant. Now obey me and live in this land’.

Verse 12

So he lived in Gerar for three weeks of years.

Verse 13

Abimelech gave orders as follows regarding him and everything that belonged to him: ‘Any man who touches him or anything that belongs to him is to die’.

Verse 14

Isaac prospered among the Philistines and possessed much property: cattle, sheep, camels, donkeys, and much property.

Verse 15

They planted seeds in the land of the Philistines, and he harvested a hundred ears. When Isaac had become very great, the Philistines grew jealous of him.

Verse 16

(As for) all the wells that Abraham’s servants had dug during Abraham’s lifetime — the Philistines covered them up after Abraham’s death and filled them with dirt.

Verse 17

Then Abimelech told Isaac: ‘Leave us because you have become much too great for us’. So Isaac left that place during the first year of the seventh week [2101]. He lived as a foreigner in the valleys of Gerar.

Verse 18

They again dug the water wells which the servants of his father Abraham had dug and the Philistines had covered up after his father Abraham’s death. He called them by the names that his father Abraham had given them.

Verse 19

Isaac’s servants dug wells in the wadi and found flowing water. Then the shepherds of Gerar quarreled with Isaac’s shepherds and said: ‘This water is ours’. So Isaac named that well Difficult ‘because they have been difficult for us’.

Verse 20

They dug a second well, and they fought about it too. He named it Narrow. When he had set out, they dug another well but did not quarrel about it. He named it Wide. Isaac said: ‘Now the Lord has enlarged (a place) for us, and we have increased in numbers on the land’.

Verse 21

He went up from there to the well of the oath during the first year of the first week in the forty-fourth jubilee [2108].

Verse 22

The Lord appeared to him that night — on the first of the first month — and said to him: ‘I am the God of your father Abraham. Do not be afraid because I am with you and will bless you. I will certainly make your descendants as numerous as the sand of the earth for the sake of my servant Abraham’.

Verse 23

There he built the altar which his father Abraham had first built. He called on the Lord’s name and offered a sacrifice to the God of his father Abraham.

Verse 24

They dug a well and found flowing water.

Verse 25

But when Isaac’s servants dug another well, they did not find water. They went and told Isaac that they had not found water. Isaac said: ‘On this very day I have sworn an oath to the Philistines; now this has happened to us’.

Verse 26

He named that place the well of the oath because there he had sworn an oath to Abimelech, his companion Ahuzzath, and his guard Phicol.

Verse 27

On that day Isaac realized that he had sworn an oath to them under pressure to make peace with them.

Verse 28

On that day Isaac cursed the Philistines and said: ‘May the Philistines be cursed from among all peoples at the day of anger and wrath. May the Lord make them into (an object of) derision and a curse, into (an object of) anger and wrath in the hands of the sinful nations and in the hands of the Kittim.

Verse 29

Whoever escapes from the enemy’s sword and from the Kittim may the just nation in judgment eradicate from beneath the sky, for they will become enemies and opponents to my sons during their times on the earth.

Verse 30

They will have no one left or anyone who is rescued on the day of judgmental anger, for all the descendants of the Philistines (are meant) for destruction, eradication, and removal from the earth. All of Caphtor will no longer have either name or descendants left upon the earth.

Verse 31

For even if he should go up to the sky,from there he would come down;even if he should become powerful on the earth,from there he will be torn out.Even if he should hide himself among the nations,from there he will be uprooted;even if he should go down to Sheol,there his punishment will increase.There he will have no peace.

Verse 32

Even if he should go into captivity through the power of those who seek his life,they will kill him along the way.There will remain for him neither name nor descendants on the entire earth,because he is going to an eternal curse’.

Verse 33

This is the way it has been written and inscribed regarding him on the heavenly tablets — to do (this) to him on the day of judgment so that he may be eradicated from the earth.

←Previous: jubilee 23
Chapter 24
Next: jubilee 25→