This city becomes important in Biblical history at the time when Sarah, the wife of Abraham, died, and then this cave was purchased by Abraham as a family burying-place. It was the first spot possessed by any of the ancestors of the Hebrew race in Palestine. Here Sarah and Abraham were buried and in after times Leah and Isaac, and Jacob’s remains were, by his desire, removed from Egypt and placed by the side of his wife Leah.
Although Hebron has suffered several attacks and partial destruction, it is probable that the sacredness of the place may have protected it so that the actual remains of some of the bodies deposited there may yet be there, under Moslem guardianship.
After the birth of Isaac, Abraham remained in the region of Gerar, whose precise location is not known, although it must have been in the southwestof Canaan and in the land of the Philistines.From thence he removed to Beersheba.[55]
BEERSHEBA AND GERAR.
31. Beersheba bears, at the present day, the same name and contains two wells, one about 12 feet in diameter, the other about 5 feet. The larger appears to be very old and may well have existed since the days of the patriarch. It is about 40 feet deep to the water and is still used daily by the Arabs. The exact distance from Hebron to Beersheba is twenty-six and a half miles southwest. There are some ruins 24 miles southwest by south from Beersheba, called Umel Jerar, which possibly may indicate where the ancient Gerar was.
32. From Beersheba Abraham travelled with Isaac to Mt. Moriah, which was at the present site of Jerusalem and distant in an air line 45 miles northeast. Here his obedience and faith were severely tried in the command to offer up, as a burnt-offering, his only son Isaac. This act might have been more trying to the faith of Abraham because it was the practice of the Canaanites at that time. That the immolation of children was practised by the Phœnicians at that age and in the land of Chaldæa is proved byan Accadian text which expressly states that sin may be expiated by the vicarious sacrifice of the eldest son.[56] In after times it was practised by theMoabites, 2 Kings 3:27. But Abraham’s faith never failed him, and the offering was accepted, though the act was arrested.
33. Abraham after this purchased the cave of Machpelah, of which we have spoken, where Sarah was buried, and he himself was laid away in the same place at his death, having given all his possessions to his son Isaac, except some smaller gifts to his other children by his second wife Keturah, when he sent them away from Isaac his son “unto the east country.”
34. The character of Abraham has been revered among the Jews, Mohammedans, and Christians alike in all ages and parts of the world. His tomb now existing at Hebron is among the very few places in the East about which there has never been any doubt. The structure, now a mosque, is a Mohammedan addition to a building which was in part erected near the beginning of the Christian era.