And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of
the
Egyptians
Which must be understood consistent with the omnipresence of God,
who is everywhere, and strictly speaking cannot be said to remove
from place to place, or to descend; but such a way of speaking is
used, when he gives some eminent display of his power or
goodness, as here in a wonderful manner he appeared in a burning
bush, and manifested himself in a way of grace and kindness to
his people, signifying that he would shortly save them: so Christ
in our nature came down from heaven to earth, to save his
spiritual Israel out of the hands of all their enemies: and
to bring them out of that land;
the land of Egypt, where they were in bondage, and greatly
oppressed: unto a good land, and a large;
the land of Canaan, which was not only a good land, but a large
one in comparison of Goshen, where the Israelites were pent up
and straitened for room through their great increase; and though
it was but a small country in itself, and when compared with some
others, being but one hundred and sixty miles from Dan to
Beersheba, and but forty six from Joppa to Bethlehem, and but
sixty from Joppa to Jordan, yet, for so small a country, it had a
great deal of good land in it; for Hecataeus F20 an
Heathen writer, says it had in it three hundred myriads of acres
of the best and most fruitful land: unto a land flowing
with milk and honey;
which is not to be restrained merely to the abundance of cattle
fed here, and the plenty of milk they produced, or the number of
bees that swarmed here, and the quantity of honey they made; for
the land abounded with other good things, and excellent fruits,
as corn, and wine, and oil, and with figs, pomegranates, palm
trees but this is a proverbial and hyperbolical expression,
setting forth the great affluence of all sorts of good things in
it, for the necessity and delight of human life: unto the
place of the Canaanites;
who are mentioned first, as being the general name for the
inhabitants of the land, as Aben Ezra suggests, though they are
often spoken of as a distinct nation or tribe from the rest, and
a principal one, denominated from Canaan the son of Ham:
and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and
the
Hivites, and the Jebusites:
the Hittites and Amorites had their names from Heth and Emor,
sons of Canaan; the Perizzites, Aben Ezra says, are the same with
Sidon, who was the firstborn of Canaan: and the Hivites and
Jebusites were the descendants also of sons of Canaan, ( Genesis
15:19-21 ) , the Girgashites are not here mentioned, either
because they were a lesser people than the rest, as Aben Ezra
thinks; or their land was not a land flowing with milk and honey,
as Abendana observes; or they were gone out of the land before
Israel went into it, according to other Jewish writers, or
immediately yielded to Joshua, without fighting against him.