Genesis 26:1-13 ▼

1 There was a famine in the land, besides the first famine that was in the days of Abraham. Isaac went to Abimelech king of the Philistines, to Gerar.

2 And God appeared to him, and said, |Do not go down into Egypt. Live in the land I will tell you about.

3 Sojourn in this land, and I will be with you, and will bless you. For to you, and to your descendants, I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath which I swore to Abraham your father.

4 I will multiply your descendants as the stars of the sky, and will give to your descendants all these lands, and by your descendants will all the nations of the earth be blessed,

5 because Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my requirements, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.|

6 So Isaac settled in Gerar.

7 The men of the place asked him about his wife. He said, |She is my sister,| for he was afraid to say, |My wife,| lest, he thought, |the men of the place might kill me for Rebekah, because she is very beautiful.|

8 It happened, when he had been there a long time, that Abimelech king of the Philistines looked out at a window, and saw, and look, Isaac was caressing Rebekah, his wife.

9 Abimelech called Isaac, and said, |Look, surely she is your wife. Why did you say, 'She is my sister?'| Isaac said to him, |Because I thought, 'Lest I die because of her.'|

10 Abimelech said, |What is this you have done to us? One of the people might easily have slept with your wife, and you would have brought guilt on us.|

11 Abimelech commanded all the people, saying, |He who touches this man or his wife will surely be put to death.|

12 Isaac sowed in that land, and reaped in the same year one hundred times what he planted. And God blessed him.

13 The man became wealthy, and prospered more and more until he became very wealthy.