Genesis 26:17

17 And he went away, that he should come to the strand of Gerar, and dwelled there. (And so he went away from that place, and came to the Gerar Valley, and lived there.)

Genesis 26:17 Meaning and Commentary

Genesis 26:17

And Isaac departed thence
At once, peaceably and quietly, though to his loss and disadvantage, without taking himself either to argument or arms, in favour of himself; he departed immediately, as soon as he perceived his abode was disagreeable to the king and his people; which gives us a very agree, able idea of the calm and peaceable disposition of Isaac: and pitched his tent in the valley of Gerar, and dwelt there;
at some distance from the city of Gerar, as Jarchi observes. Josephus ^F7 says it was not far from it; but how far is not certain; very probably it was not out of the country, though on the borders of it. Some render it, "the brook of Gerar" ^F8, and interpret it, that he pitched his tent, and dwelt by it; and the word used does signify a brook as well as a valley; and there was a brook of Gerar, which Sozomen ^F9 makes mention of.

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FOOTNOTES:

F7 Antiqu. l. 1. c. 18. sect. 2.
F8 (rrg lxnb) "ad torrentem Gerarae", V. L.
F9 Eccl. Hist. l. 6. c. 32.

Genesis 26:17 In-Context

15 and they stopped in that time and filled with earth all the wells which the servants of Abraham his father had digged, (and so they stopped up, and filled with earth, all the wells which the servants of his father Abraham had dug,)

16 in so much that Abimelech himself said to Isaac (and finally Abimelech himself said to Isaac), Go thou away from us, for thou art made greatly mightier than we (be).

17 And he went away, that he should come to the strand of Gerar, and dwelled there. (And so he went away from that place, and came to the Gerar Valley, and lived 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 which the Philistines had stopped up after Abraham died); and he called those wells by the same names, by which his father had called (them) before.

19 They digged in the strand (And they dug in the valley), and they found quick, or welling up, water.