Genesis 19:30

The Origin of Moab and Ammon

30 Lot departed from Zoar and lived in the mountains along with his two daughters, because he was afraid to live in Zoar. Instead, he and his two daughters lived in a cave.

Genesis 19:30 Meaning and Commentary

Genesis 19:30

And Lot went up out of Zoar
Which lay in the plain, and therefore when he went from thence to the mountain, it was by an ascent:

and dwelt in the mountain;
which the Lord had directed him to go to before, but was unwilling, and chose Zoar, and desired he might flee thither, and that that might be spared; but now he likes God's advice for him better than his own, and therefore betook himself to the mountain, where he might think himself safest, and where he continued; very probably this was the mountain Engaddi, under which Zoar is said to lie by Adrichomius ^F14:

and his two daughters with him:
his wife was turned into a pillar of salt, and these two were all of his family that with him were saved from the destruction; and these are the rather mentioned for the sake of an anecdote hereafter related:

for he feared to dwell in Zoar;
it being near to Sodom; and the smoke of that city and the rest might not only be terrible but troublesome to him, and the tremor of the earth might continue and reach as far as Zoar; and perceiving the waters to rise and overflow the plain, which formed the lake where the cities stood, he might fear they would reach to Zoar and swallow up that; and especially his fears were increased, when he found the inhabitants were as wicked as those of the other cities, and were unreformed by the judgment on them; and so he might fear that a like shower of fire would descend on them and destroy them, as it had the rest, though it had been spared for a while at his intercession; and, according to the Jewish writers ^F15, it remained but one year after Sodom:

and he dwelt in a cave, he and his two daughters;
which was in the mountain, the mountain of Engedi. Josephus ^F16 makes mention of the mountains of Engedi; and here was a cave, where David with six hundred men were, in the sides of it, when Saul went into it, ( 1 Samuel 24:1 1 Samuel 24:3 ) ; and perhaps may be the same cave where Lot and his two daughters lived.

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FOOTNOTES:

F14 Theatrum Terrae S. p. 54.
F15 Juchasin, fol. 8. 1.
F16 Antiqu. l. 6. c. 13. sect. 4.

Genesis 19:30 In-Context

28 He looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and all the land of the plain, and he saw that smoke was going up from the land like the smoke of a furnace.

29 So it was, when God destroyed the cities of the plain, He remembered Abraham and brought Lot out of the middle of the upheaval when He overthrew the cities where Lot had lived.

30 Lot departed from Zoar and lived in the mountains along with his two daughters, because he was afraid to live in Zoar. Instead, he and his two daughters lived in a cave.

31 Then the firstborn said to the younger, "Our father is old, and there is no man in the land to sleep with us [as is] the custom of all the land.

32 Come, let's get our father to drink wine so that we can sleep with him and preserve our father's line."