Genesis 19:14-20:18

English Standard Version

¹⁴So Lot went out and said to his sons-in-law, who were to marry his daughters, ^(A)“Up! Get out of this place, for the Lord is about to destroy the city.” But he seemed to his sons-in-law to be jesting.

¹⁵As morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, “Up! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be swept away in the punishment of the city.” ¹⁶But he lingered. So the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, ^(B)the Lord being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city. ¹⁷And as they brought them out, one said, “Escape for your life. ^(C)Do not look back or stop anywhere in the ^(D)valley. Escape to the hills, lest you be swept away.” ¹⁸And Lot said to them, “Oh, no, my lords. ¹⁹Behold, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have shown me great kindness in saving my life. But I cannot escape to the hills, lest the disaster overtake me and I die. ²⁰Behold, this city is near enough to flee to, and it is a little one. Let me escape there—is it not a little one?—and my life will be saved!” ²¹He said to him, “Behold, I grant you this favor also, that I will not overthrow the city of which you have spoken. ²²Escape there quickly, for I can do nothing till you arrive there.” Therefore the name of the city was called ^(E)Zoar.^[a]

God Destroys Sodom

²³The sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar. ²⁴Then ^(F)the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven. ²⁵And he overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. ²⁶But Lot's wife, behind him, looked back, and she became ^(G)a pillar of salt.

²⁷And Abraham went early in the morning to the place where he had ^(H)stood before the Lord. ²⁸And he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the valley, and he looked and, behold, the smoke of the land went up like the smoke of a furnace.

²⁹So it was that, when God destroyed the cities of the valley, God ^(I)remembered Abraham and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow when he overthrew the cities in which Lot had lived.

Lot and His Daughters

³⁰Now Lot went up out of Zoar and ^(J)lived in the hills with his two daughters, for he was afraid to live in Zoar. So he lived in a cave with his two daughters. ³¹And the firstborn said to the younger, “Our father is old, and there is not a man on earth to come in to us after the manner of all the earth. ³²Come, let us make our father drink wine, and we will lie with him, that we may preserve offspring from our father.” ³³So they made their father drink wine that night. And the firstborn went in and lay with her father. He did not know when she lay down or when she arose.

³⁴The next day, the firstborn said to the younger, “Behold, I lay last night with my father. Let us make him drink wine tonight also. Then you go in and lie with him, that we may preserve offspring from our father.” ³⁵So they made their father drink wine that night also. And the younger arose and lay with him, and he did not know when she lay down or when she arose. ³⁶Thus both the daughters of Lot became pregnant by their father. ³⁷The firstborn bore a son and called his name Moab.^[b] ^(K)He is the father of the Moabites to this day. ³⁸The younger also bore a son and called his name Ben-ammi.^[c] ^(L)He is the father of the Ammonites to this day.

Abraham and Abimelech

20 From there Abraham journeyed toward the territory of the Negeb and lived between ^(M)Kadesh and Shur; and he ^(N)sojourned in ^(O)Gerar. ²And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, ^(P)“She is my sister.” And Abimelech king of Gerar sent and took Sarah. ³^(Q)But God came to Abimelech ^(R)in a dream by night and said to him, “Behold, you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken, for she is a man's wife.” ⁴Now Abimelech had not approached her. So he said, ^(S)“Lord, will you kill an innocent people? ⁵Did he not himself say to me, ‘She is my sister’? And she herself said, ‘He is my brother.’ In the integrity of my heart and the innocence of my hands I have done this.” ⁶Then God said to him in the dream, “Yes, I know that you have done this in the integrity of your heart, and it was I who kept you from sinning ^(T)against me. Therefore I did not let you touch her. ⁷Now then, return the man's wife, ^(U)for he is a prophet, so that he will pray for you, and you shall live. But if you do not return her, know that you shall surely die, you ^(V)and all who are yours.”

⁸So Abimelech rose early in the morning and called all his servants and told them all these things. And the men were very much afraid. ⁹Then Abimelech called Abraham and said to him, “What have you done to us? And how have I sinned against you, that you have brought on me and my kingdom a great sin? You have done to me things that ought not to be done.” ¹⁰And Abimelech said to Abraham, “What did you see, that you did this thing?” ¹¹Abraham said, “I did it because I thought, ^(W)‘There is no fear of God at all in this place, and ^(X)they will kill me because of my wife.’ ¹²Besides, ^(Y)she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father though not the daughter of my mother, and she became my wife. ¹³And when ^(Z)God caused me to wander from my father's house, I said to her, ‘This is the kindness you must do me: at every place to which we come, ^(AA)say of me, “He is my brother.”’”

¹⁴Then Abimelech ^(AB)took sheep and oxen, and male servants and female servants, and gave them to Abraham, and returned Sarah his wife to him. ¹⁵And Abimelech said, “Behold, ^(AC)my land is before you; dwell where it pleases you.” ¹⁶To Sarah he said, “Behold, I have given ^(AD)your brother a thousand pieces of silver. It is ^(AE)a sign of your innocence in the eyes of all^[d] who are with you, and before everyone you are vindicated.” ¹⁷Then ^(AF)Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech, and also healed his wife and female slaves so that they bore children. ¹⁸For the Lord ^(AG)had closed all the wombs of the house of Abimelech because of Sarah, Abraham's wife.