Avimelech and Avraham

(22) At that time Abimelech and Phicol, chief of his troops, said to Abraham, “God is with you in everything that you do. (23) Therefore swear to me here by God that you will not deal falsely with me or with my kith and kin, but will deal with me and with the land in which you have sojourned as loyally as I have dealt with you.” (24) And Abraham said, “I swear it.” (25) Then Abraham reproached Abimelech for the well of water which the servants of Abimelech had seized. (26) But Abimelech said, “I do not know who did this; you did not tell me, nor have I heard of it until today.” (27) Abraham took sheep and oxen and gave them to Abimelech, and the two of them made a pact. (28) Abraham then set seven ewes of the flock by themselves, (29) and Abimelech said to Abraham, “What mean these seven ewes which you have set apart?” (30) He replied, “You are to accept these seven ewes from me as proof that I dug this well.” (31) Hence that place was called Beer-sheba, for there the two of them swore an oath. (32) When they had concluded the pact at Beer-sheba, Abimelech and Phicol, chief of his troops, departed and returned to the land of the Philistines. (33) [Abraham] planted a tamarisk at Beer-sheba, and invoked there the name of the LORD, the Everlasting God. (34) And Abraham resided in the land of the Philistines a long time.

אלוקים עמך, seeing that G’d clearly is on your side I am afraid of you. I am not afraid of your personal strength, but of that of your G’d. This is why I ask you to swear to me. [so that you cannot appeal to G’d’s assistance in any grievance you would have against me. Ed.]

אלוקים עמך, “G–d is on your side.” Originally, they had thought that if Avraham was such a righteous individual he would not have expelled his firstborn son. After observing Avraham’s lifestyle, his success, and good deeds, they had come to the conclusion that his G–d had approved all of what he had done.

Avimelech’s servants. His ministers and officials. Had taken by force. Avraham was concerned not about the injustice done to him but about the lack of fear of Heaven on the part of Avimelech’s men and presumably Avimelech himself. How could he propose swearing in Hashem’s Name if he had no fear of Him?

אשר גזלו עבדי אבימלך, he criticised him precisely in his position of king, seeing that robbery had been tolerated in his country and there was no one to protest this. He also criticised him for the evildoers in his own entourage. He did not act according to the norms of righteous people. Psalms 101,7 suggests that righteous people have no business dwelling in the proximity of people who practice deception.

וגם אתה לא הגדת לי וגם אנכי לא שמעתי, what you have accused me of, that while in my position as king I had condoned violence. A king does interfere such matters only if one of two conditions exist 1) If the party that has suffered robbery complains loudly; 2) if neutral people aware of the robbery raise their voices in protest. In the case of Avraham, neither of such conditions existed until now.

Apparently, Avimelech had been aware that someone had robbed Abraham of his wells but he did not know the identity of the robbers. Abraham therefore told Avimelech that he should have made it his business to find out who the culprits were. To this argument Avimelech replied that Abraham himself was also at fault because he had not informed him previously. He, Avimelech, had waited for Abraham's complaint; he would have taken action as soon as he would have received an official complaint from Abraham. Seeing Abraham had not informed him, he had remained unaware. This is the meaning of: "also I did not hear until this day." He meant that he made no effort to inform himself of the situation and was apprised of it only today when Abraham spoke up.

כי את שבע כבשות תקח מידי, ”for the seven sheep accept from me;” because Avraham made this gift to Avimelech, G-d said to him: “because you have given him seven sheep, I will let your descendants wait seven generations during which his descendants will ruin seven locations in which the Jewish people will have their abode. They are: the Tabernacle in Gilgal, Shiloh, Nov, Giveon, and two permanent Temples. Furthermore the Holy Ark was exiled in the territory of the Philistine for a period of seven months during the period beginning with the death of the High Priest Eli. (Samuel I 6,1.) All of this is referred to in the Book of Psalms 38,20: ואויבי חיים עצמו; David meant to say: the three generations that Avraham gave away to Avimelech had to be paid for by his descendants with seven generations. There were seven generations between Avraham and Moses, and Pharaoh, a descendant of Avimelech was still alive. [The seven generations comprise Avraham, Yitzchok, Yaakov, Levi, Kehat, Amram, Moses.]

ויקרא שם בשם ה' א-ל עולם, he used the occasion to proclaim the eternal nature of G’d, as opposed to any other deities, which, even if on occasion appearing to have demonstrated some power to protect those worshipping them, could at best enjoy a brief period of effectiveness.

ויטע אשל, he planted some saplings there to serve as proof that the well nearby was now his undisputed property. The word אשל describes certain plants (fruit-bearing) as In Samuel I 22,6 תחת האשל ברמה, “under the eshel in Ramah). According to our sages in Beytzah 27 the reference is to tall trees which are difficult to uproot. Our sages in Midrash Tehillim 106 understand the word אשל as an acronym for אכילה, שתיה, לינה, “eating, drinking, staying overnight.” In other words, Avraham established a hotel there to serve people passing that region. He taught the people around Beer Sheva to practice the art (virtue) of hosting strangers. In order to fulfill that virtue one must provide the three ingredients represented by the three letters in the word אשל.