“The Cave of Machpelah”

 

We are reaching the end of our story of Abraham and Sarah in the book of Genesis. We have finally come to the point where the promise of land gets answered. And what an answer this turns out to be. Today’s Scripture is the saga of the purchase of the burial cave in Machpelah. Thrilling! Don’t you think? 

 

This story has three major sections. 

1 - there is a little opener

2 - there is a long dialogue

3 - there is a conclusion

 

The chapter begins with the narrator telling us that Sarah had reached 127 years of age and she died. We are told she died at Kiriath Arba, which in Hebrew means, four cities, but the narrator helps us out by placing in parentheses, in the city of Hebron, in the land of Canaan. 

We read that Abraham spent time mourning the death of Sarah. Culturally, at that time Abraham would have changed his dress and the way he ate, for a period of anywhere from seven days to thirty days, in public, so everyone would know he was in a period of grief. 

 

At some point, Abraham got up from beside his dead wife, or he finished his mourning and went to speak to the Hittites. If we go back to Genesis 10, we discover these were descendants of Ham. 

 

Abraham begins his discussion with the understanding that he was a foreigner, a stranger among them. Abraham has been wandering ever since we met him. He asks for someone to sell him some property for a burial site in order to bury his dead. 

 

The word death has been repeated many times and is the major theme in this chapter.  

 

The Hittites reply with oh no, you are much more than an immigrant, you are royalty, you’re a mighty prince. It would be an honor for any of us to offer a place to bury your dead. In fact, take your pick, if you see something you like, you can have it.

 

Abraham rose and bowed down, such a ceremony. Abraham then requested that someone go approach Ephron, son of Zohar, on his behalf. The Hebrew root word for Ephron means “dust.” So Abraham requested that someone go find Dusty and ask him if Abraham could purchase the cave of Machpelah. Remember the Hebrew word for cave, comes from the Greek word “nakedness” or “exposure” and Machpelah means doubling or pair. 

Abraham was requesting the cave of the naked pair. Abraham wanted everyone to know that the cave at the edge of Dusty’s field was where he wanted to bury Sarah, and that he was willing to pay full price for the site.  

 

Dusty just happened to be sitting in the midst of the crowd, and in the hearing of all the Hittites who had come to the gate of this city. This was a very public conversation. Dusty responded to Abraham with, Oh no, you don’t need to purchase the field, I will give you the field you requested. In the presence of all his people he wanted it to be known that he had offered it to Abraham for free. There is definitely a sense of very diplomatic language occurring here. Each person is making sure they say the right thing in order to assure that they are doing the right thing and that everyone around them hears it. 

Abraham again bows down and repeats his intent to purchase the field for the allotted price. He requests that Dusty accept this so that Abraham may bury his dead. 

Dusty then tells Abraham what the land is worth and Abraham agrees to Dusty’s terms, weighing out for him the price mentioned, while everyone was watching and listening. 

 

The narrator then repeats that the transaction happened. Dusty’s field in Machpelah, near Mamre, both the field and the cave in it, and all the trees within the borders of the field were deeded over to Abraham. Did you catch where this field was next to? Mamre. Do you remember Mamre? That was the nice spot on a hill, with some sacred oaks, where Abram had placed his tent and had met with God several times. How coincidental? NOT!

Abraham finally has possession of some land. All of the Hittites that were at the gate of the city that day saw it happen. 

 

Abraham was then able to bury his deceased wife Sarah. And just to make sure that the reader doesn’t miss anything we read again, Sarah was placed, in the cave of the field of Machpelah, facing that little Eden spot Mamre, that is Hebron, in the land of Canaan. We are also told again that the field and cave were deeded over to Abraham, by the Hittites as a burial site. This repetition is crafted by the narrator to inform the reader we have just been told something significant. 

Is this really the land Yahweh had promised?  

We have all the markers of getting back to Eden. 

1) The word “cave” when looking at it written in Hebrew, looks like the word “naked.” It literally has all the letters of the word “nakedness” from the Eden story.

2) Machpelah = the pair

3) Notice the focus on the trees forming a nice border around it.

4) It’s next to Mamre, which has come up multiple times as an Eden image. 

This is symbolic association through wordplay and through places. 

However, Eden was the place where there was eternal life. This whole story has been focused on death. 

How interesting. 

If Eden is associated with life and it’s the place we want to get back to, why do we have the first generation of the chosen blessed ones, who were given the Eden blessing, for everyone else, ending up in an Eden-like place in their death? 

This couple, who had experienced barrenness for so long, had been given the promise of Yahweh bringing life out of the wilderness of the womb. Through Sarah’s death can the one who carried the seed bring life after her death? There seems to be some hope of this Eden place that something is going to come out of this cave. Eden is supposed to be a life place, but right now it seems like a place of death. 

Can God bring live things out of death?

Before we answer that question, there are some significant interactions that have occurred in this chapter I would like to explore. 

Abraham refuses to accept a burial spot for Sarah for free. We have seen Abraham make a similar decision where he had a chance to be given something of great value and he said no. Remember when Abraham saved his nephew Lot and the king of Sodom offered him a major part of the stuff they had captured? Abraham responded with, “Look, if I take all that stuff, you are going to forever remind me that I am in your debt and that you made me rich.” Call it pride, or uprightness, but a similar thing is happening here. Abraham wants his first possession of the land to be something he has purchased legally and rightfully. Look at the emphasis made on the public space, everyone at the gate is hearing. We are told that six times in this small chapter. 

The whole point is that everybody knew this was a rightful transfer of land and that Dusty, the king of Sodom, did not need the money. 

This becomes a theme throughout Scriptures. In 2 Samuel 24, David was tested by God to see if he trusted Him or not. David failed the test by counting his armies. Because David did not trust God, God offers three consequences from which David can choose. Each one of them is severe and not fair. Here were his choices:

1) Three years of famine

2) Three months of being chased by his enemies

3) Three days of a plague on the land

The first - will affect everybody.

The second - will affect David.

The third - will affect just the people.

David chose door number three. A whole bunch of people die. Is this fair? No. And David realizes it and responds with major grief. The prophet comes to him and tells David to, “Go build an altar on the threshing floor.” Ancient Hebrew is needed at this point. The word for threshing floor in Hebrew has the same letters as the word for garden. Oh, and that was the name people used for Jerusalem before David called it the City of David. It turns out the threshing floor was owned by a man named Araunah. Araunah sees king David, greets him with a bow and asks why he is there. David tells him he has come to purchase the threshing floor from him so he can build an altar and make a sacrifice to Yahweh in order to stop the plague. Like any good subject of the king, Araunah immediately offers the threshing floor to David for free. David responds with, “No, no, no! I’ve got to buy it, for its full price. I can’t make offerings to Yahweh that don’t cost me anything!” 

David buys the threshing floor for 50 shekels of silver, builds the altar and the story goes on. This story brings together both chapters 22 and 23 of Genesis. 

But it doesn’t stop here. This story gets retold in 1 Chronicles 21, one of our favorite books in the Bible to read?! The book of Chronicles is the result of a “chronicler” who has the entire Hebrew Scriptures in front of him and he is a total nerd. He has studied the Scriptures so much that he knows them backwards and forwards. He retells the story of David at the threshing floor but he weaves in the language of Genesis 23. He essentially fills out the conversation of David and Araunah, but uses the language of Abraham and Dusty. This tells us that the Hebrew Bible nerd sees the theme of the purchase of the cave of Machpelah as a way of Abraham surrendering himself over to the will of God just like he surrendered his son over to God. 

In today’s chapter, Abraham was surrendering his wife over to God in hope as he purchased this field. Biblical authors use this story as a sign of hope. Abraham gave up Isaac to death in the hope of his life being redeemed. He bought this field, fair and square and gave up Sarah in the hope of a possible resurrection. As far back as Genesis we are provided the hope of resurrection and a new creation.

Jump to the New Testament. In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus tells the story of a rich man, who is unnamed and the poor man, named Lazarus, which in Hebrew is a shortened name for Eleazar, which means God is my Ezer or my delivering help. They both die, but the poor man ends up in Abraham’s lap. Think about it. Abraham is going to be buried in a couple more chapters in Genesis in the place where he just buried Sarah, in the cave of the naked pair, the mini Eden. 

As the Jewish tradition reflected deeply on death and the idea that you could be alive to God, even though you are dead, as far as our five senses are concerned, where do they end up? Death means you are in the lap of Abraham. You go to the cave of Machpelah, to the hopes of resurrection. 

Fast forward in Luke, to Christ on the cross, and the man hanging next to him says, “Remember me when you come in your kingdom.” Jesus responds, “Actually, you don’t have to wait that long. Today you and I are going to meet in paradise.” Paradise is the Greek word, “paradeisos” which is a Persian word that entered into Hebrew and Greek. In Hebrew the word is “pardes” meaning garden. The Greek Septuagint translation of the Old Testament word for “garden” is “paradise.” 

Anyone reading the Greek translation reads, “God planted a paradise in Eden.” Basically Jesus was telling the man, “You will be with me in Eden.” 

What is Eden? 

Eden is Heaven and Earth in the same spot. Think about it. The reason no one has found Eden is because it’s a Heaven and Earth place which can appear anywhere. Jacob experienced it in the middle of a field on his way into exile. The Biblical authors realize Eden is a place that messes with our reality. They equated it to a dimension or a way of existing that could be called Eden or “the lap of Abraham.” How does Abraham’s lap get equated with paradise? This chapter, in Genesis, where they are buried is an Eden spot, where the two become one, just like Adam and Eve, in the cave of the naked pair, the cave of Machpelah. 

Later on, Jacob and Leah will be married there. All of these pairs are going to be joined at the Eden spot. 

Check in time. 

The theme of resurrection didn’t begin with Christ’s death on the cross. The language of resurrection gets developed throughout the books of the Bible beginning with this story of Abraham. The Biblical authors want us to see people who lived with the hope of Eden and that even death is not the end of God’s promises to any given generation. That is why reading and re-reading the Scriptures offers us more and more insight on the hope of resurrection, through Christ our Savior. The promise of eternal hope should bring us peace. 

Let’s pray. 

 

 

 

Benediction:

Psalm 1

1 

Blessed is the one
    who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
    or sit in the company of mockers,

2 

but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
    and who meditates on his law day and night.

3 

That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
    which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
    whatever they do prospers.