Genesis Vol 3.pdf - College Press

20 : 1-2 1 : 34 GENESIS ’
ff.), the creation of the port of Ezion-geber by Solomon,
and later when these mines became too silted, the creation
of a new port at Elath by Uzziah (1 Ki. 9:26, 22:48; 2
Ki. 14:22). The persistent animosity of the Edomites was
motivated by the struggles to control this trade (cf. Ezek.
25 : 12, and the book of Obadiah). The “way of Shur”
crossed this area from the central highlands (really moun-
tains) of Sinai northeastward to Judea (Gen. 16:7, 20:1,
25:18; Exo. 15:22; Num. 33:8), the way followed by the
Patriarchs (Gen. 24:62, 26:22), by Hadad the Edomite
(1 Ki. 11:14, 17, 21, 22), and probably by Jeremiah in
escaping to Egypt (43:6-12), and later by Joseph and
Mary (Matt. 2:13-15). The route was dictated by the
zone of settled land in which the presence of well water
was so important; hence the frequent references to its
wells (Gen. 26:18-25; Josh. 15:18-19; Judg. 1:13-15).
See NBD, s.v.) This region, the Negeb, covers approxi-
mately one-half of the area of the state of modern Israel.
(2) Abraham’s Journey. Following the destruction
of the Cities of the Plain, Abraham pulled his stakes, so to
speak, and journeyed “toward the land of the South.”
Various reasons have been suggested as to the motive for
this journey, e.g., in consequence of the hostility of his
neighbors (Calvin); desire to escape from the scene of
such a terrible catastrophe which he had just witnessed
(Calvin, Murphy) ; impulsion by God, to remind him
that Canaan “was not intended for a permanent habita-
tion, but a constant pilgrimage” (Kalisch) ; but most
likely, it would seem, in search of pasture, as on a previous
occasion (Keil); cf. Gen. 12:9-10, 13:l. Arriving in the
land of the South, it seems that he ranged his herds from
Kadesh on the north (also Kadesh-barnea), some seventy
miles south of Hebron, to Shur, a wilderness lying at the
northwest tip of the Sinai peninsula (beside one of its
springs the Angel of Jehovah, it will be remembered, found
Hagar: cf. Gen. 16:7-14). (A wilderness in the Palestin-
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