מלבד הרעב הראשון אשר היה בימי אברהם, as we read in Genesis 12,10. There was no need for this phrase except to inform us that just as his father Avraham had traveled to Egypt on account of a famine, so now his son was about to emulate his father and to travel to Egypt by way of the land of the Philistines. This was the shortest route to Egypt, as we know from Exodus 13,17. G’d told him not to go to Egypt as he knew what his plans were.

'כי לך ולזרעך וגו, because I have given him and his descendants this land, I have now commanded you not to leave this land which I described as the land I will show you, etc.” in Genesis 12,1.

בקולי , a reference to the binding of Yitzchok where the Torah had used the expression (22,18) עקב אשר שמעת בקולי, “as a consequence of your heeding My instructions.

וישמור משמרתי, a reference to the circumcision, where G’d had used this expression (את בריתי תשמור) describing the command in 17,9 to circumcise himself.

מצותי, the command to perform circumcision when the baby is eight days old; as in 21,4.

חוקותי ותורותי, basically these include all the laws known to mankind prior to the giving of the Torah, such as not murdering, not stealing, etc. They include virtues such as extending hospitality. At the time the Torah was revealed, these were renewed and elaborated on. At that time the covenant to keep these laws forever was concluded with the Jewish people.

ויהי כי ארכו לו שם, after a while Yitzchok was no longer careful to conduct himself in a manner that the suspicion that Rivkah was his wife could not be aroused. The reason was that he did not think that she would be abducted.

מצחק, engaging in marital intimacy. The same word was used for intimacy by the wife of Potiphar in Genesis 39,17 when she accused Joseph of trying to rape her. [the author brings this example as in Genesis 21,9 this word could not have had the same meaning. Ed.] Potiphar’s wife elsewhere used to word לשכב עמי, “to sleep with me,” to describe Joseph’s supposed conduct (39,14).

בארץ ההיא, even though the soil of this land is exceptionally hard;

בשנה ההיא, a year of general drought and even famine.

מאה שערים, a field which if one plants one measure of seed it produces 100 measures of grain as a harvest.

ועבודה רבה, work in the field and vineyards. The expression עבודה, unless defined differently, additionally, always refers to labour in the field.

סתמום פלשתים, the Philistines had stopped up these wells to ensure that Avraham’s descendants would not be able to use them and to claim the land around them. as their grazing land. The Torah had to record this for us since Avraham’s shepherds had in the meantime pitched their tents a distance from there. We have a parallel to this when the Torah writes in 9,18 חם אבי כנען, Cham, the son of Canaan, although at the time, Canaan had not been born yet. Here too, the verse serves as background to the facts in verse 18, explaining that the servants of Yitzchok were not annexing land for their use which had not already belonged to Avraham with the full consent of Avimelech the king at time.

אשר קרא להן אביו, in order to prevent anyone in the future to challenge the ownership of the wells.

ולא רבו עליה, seeing this well was quite a distance from the region where they grazed their livestock, as we know from ויעתק משם, he moved away from there.

ויעל משם באר שבע, because he was physically afraid of them. We have proof for this, seeing that G’d told him not to be afraid (verse 24)

ויכרו שם עבדי יצחק באר, Yitzchok did not name this well until his servants had completed it and until after Avimelech had come to him from Gerar suing for peace, and the confirmed their agreement by swearing an oath to each other. At that point his servants came and told him that they had located a new source of water and he called it שבעה as a reminder of the oath that had been sworn on that occasion by both Yitzchok and Avimelech.

מרעהו ואחזת, with an entourage of his friends, as per Onkelos. The expression מרעהו occurs in this sense in Judges 15,6. The prefix מ in the word מרעהו is similar to the same prefix in the מריע ותוקע (Rosh Hashanah 33) [an unusual shift from the simple active mode kal, to the causative mode hiphil for basically the same activity, namely blowing the shofar. Ed.] as well as the מ in Jeremiah 21,4 אנכי מסב את כלי המלחמה, “The author quotes several more examples, as for instance, Proverbs 12,26 יתר מרעהו צדיק, ודרך רשעים תתעם, “the righteous enjoys advantages over his fellow man; the way of the wicked leads him astray.” [If I understand correctly, the letter מ is used transitively, although in this instance in the construction of a noun. Avimelech’s entourage רעהו was meant to give moral support to Avimelech in this ordinarily humiliating undertaking for him. Rash’bam goes as far as understanding the word ויתורו in Numbers 13,2 not as commonly understood as a verbal form of תור, “to tour, to traverse,” but as related to the word יתר from יתרון quoted in his citation from Proverbs 12,26. As to the fact that, if so, he word in Numbers should have been ויתירו instead of ויתורו, he quotes the interchangeable usage or ישוב and ישיב as well as יקום and יקים as examples where the hiphil is also used with the letter ו instead of the letter י for the middle root letter, עיו הפועל. Ed.]

תהי נא אלה, which is בינותינו, between your father and me should remain in force also between בינינו, ובינך, between you and me. This had been part of the condition of that pact that neither Avraham’s children nor grandchildren were allowed to renege on a promise he had made on their behalf. (21,23)

אתה עתה, therefore conclude a pact with us and let us go home, just as we have allowed you to leave our country unmolested.

אתה, you are blessed by the Lord. (verse 31)

(3) BLESSED OF ADONAI. Similar to "Come, blessed of Adonai," written about Lavan. And that is what Yitzhak did (v. 31), "they departed from him in peace."

על כן שם העיר באר שבע this was not the same Beer Sheva we read about in connection with Avraham. There were two towns called Beer Sheva, as we know from Kings I 19,3 ויבא באר שבע אשר ליהודה, “he came to Beer Sheva in Yehudah.” [If there had not been another Beer Sheva the additional words “which is in Yehudah” would have been unnecessary. Ed.]

ויהי עשו בן ארבעים שנה, at that point Yitzchok was 100 years old seeing that he had been 60 years old at the time the twins had been born. The only reason the Torah draws our attention to the age at which Esau got married was to give us a better understanding of Yitzchok’s age when he is described as getting old, (27,1) He must have been well over 100 years old by then.

ויקח אשה את יהודית....ותהיין מורת אוח, seeing that Rivkah is reported in 27,46 as becoming fed up with her life if she would have to live to see Yaakov also marry a Canaanite girl, the Torah had to explain what had produced such a prejudice in Rivkah against the local girls. מורת רוח, the construction of the word מורת, with the vowel patach under the letter ר needs to be understood by comparing it to the root עשה, also a root ending with the letter ה. In Psalms 148,8 we have the formulation ossah devaro, which is feminine, seeing it describes the activity of the רוח סערה, a stormy wind, which is feminine. The construct form of the word ossah there would be ossat, Similarly, the word מורת in our verse is a construct form of the feminine form of the word מורה, not with the vowel segol under the letter ר but with the vowel kametz. [as in numerous similar nouns that appear sometimes as feminine and sometimes as masculine. Ed.] The word מורה meaning being contrary, rebellious, also appears in a slightly different form, i.e. ממרה as for instance, in Joshua 1,18 ימרה את פיך, “someone who will rebel against your orders.” When it appears in a genitive, construct form, it becomes morat. In Proverbs 14,10 we encounter a similar construction (though it is written with the vowel kametz under the letter מ) The verse reads: אבל לב יודעת מרת נפשו, “a heart knows its soul’s bitterness.” The use of the chataf kametz under the letter מ there converts the word from adjective to being a noun. It is derived from מררות, “something bitter.” (compare Deuteronomy 32,32) In our verse here the word מורת is not a noun but a construct form of a verb, similar to Lamentations 1,20 כי מרה מריתי, “for I am experiencing a great deal of distress.” Here (in our verse) the vowel cholem instead of kametz as in Lamentations, is a manifestation of the abbreviated, chataf vowel often found with the middle letter of the root