Revenge of the Philistines

As I said before, people don’t like to be mistrusted. Not even people who should be mistrusted.

So here was Isaac, with a royal edict protecting him, and with obvious blessing from God, and he was in trouble.

The blessing was a bumper crop that he grew during a time of famine, the result of which was that he became very rich and powerful. So rich and powerful that those Philistines he had insulted by saying he thought them bad enough to kill him for his wife began to become more and more unhappy with their neighbor. And over and over again, Isaac began to find the wells his father had dug, the wells he counted on for his animals, his servants and his crops, filled with dirt. There weren’t any dust storms doing that, either, because nobody else’s wells were getting stopped up. It wasn’t long before the Philistines had gotten every well that Abraham had dug.
And then Abimelech got involved. He was a little more honest and straightforward with Isaac than his subjects were. He simply told Isaac that he was too powerful for them and to pack up and move away.

And Isaac did, without argument, but he didn’t go very far. He went to the Valley of Gerar (remember, he was already in Gerar). He reopened all Abraham’s wells, and his servants even opened a new well. Wells were so important to this culture that they even had names. Isaac called the wells by the same names his father had given them.

Isaac’s servants had done the work, and they were living on the property. Nevertheless, the other herdsmen in the area decided to claim the new well, which made for some quarrelling between them and Isaac’s servants. Isaac named the well “Esek,” which means quarrelling, or strife. I couldn’t help but notice the similarity between this name and Isaac’s name, which means laughter. Do strife and laughter ever sound similar? Something to think about.

But Isaac wasn’t doing any quarrelling. He simply moved on, and his servants dug a new well. The local herdsman looked at it and said, “Would you look at that! The wandering Semite has dug us another well!” Which of course Isaac’s servants disagreed with, because they hadn’t intended to dig it for them at all. Isaac named this well Sitnah. One of the commentators pointed out that this was from the same word that we get the name Satan. It means hatred.

Isaac just let the local herdsmen have it and dug again, finding a new well. And then the herdsman gave up. They weren’t going to get Isaac to fight. Nor were they going to take anything away from him by taking away his source of water, either, because God kept giving him a new source. Isaac named the new well Rehoboth, which means room, because, he said, God had made room for them.

After this, Isaac went home, back to where he had started from when the famine had started. That’s what one of the commentaries said. The Bible says he went to Beersheba. And then it goes on to tell how Beersheba got its name. It means “Well of the Oath,” or “Well of Seven.” In context, the first meaning makes more sense, as you’ll see.

Abimelech came to visit, with a whole entourage of Philistines. You’d think we’d have heard the last of him. Isaac thought the same, and asked Abimelech what he was doing there. After all, the last Isaac had seen of him, Abimelech was kicking him out of Gerar. Abimelech got straight to the point. He wanted a peace treaty with Isaac. He told Isaac that he should make a peace treaty with them because they had left him alone, hadn’t harmed him, and had “sent him away in peace.” I almost find that laughable. Abimelech: the world’s first recorded spin doctor.

But Isaac, though his name means laughter, didn’t laugh. He took Abimelech seriously and welcomed him with a feast. He agreed to the peace treaty. He had no sooner sent his guests away when his servants came to him and told him, “We’ve found water!” And Isaac called this new well Shibah, which means “Oath,” or “Seven.” And from that name Beersheba takes its name.

Here would be a good place to say, “And they all lived happily ever after.” However, that would not be true. That’s never true until we get to heaven, because trouble never ceases coming.
This time, the trouble came to his own house, to his own family. His son Esau married not one but two Hittite women. In Esau’s defense, it must be said that Esau was forty years old. Abraham had not allowed Isaac to marry one of the local women. They were idolaters, and therefore unsuitable, not only because it isn’t right for God’s people to marry idolaters, but because of the promises God had made concerning Who was to come of their descendants. But perhaps Isaac had been so busy making sure there was water that the Philistines didn’t take from him that he didn’t have a chance to do what Abraham had done and make sure his sons had proper wives. Even if that was the case, Esau showed by this action that he either did not care about or believe this promise—or both. Isaac and Rebekah’s two new daughters-in-law, Judith and Basemath, were absolutely not Isaac and Rebekah’s favorite people. The Bible says they were a “grief of mind” to them.

Usually when I read about Isaac and Rebekah’s first daughters-in-law I think of my godly parents-in-law and think that a grief of mind is something I do not want to be. I am typing this conclusion on my 24th wedding anniversary. My father-in-law is a pastor and my mother-in-law is a good friend whose company I very much enjoy. They raised a great son, and I not only love him, but his parents who raised him. I would never want to be a Hittite to them.