Genesis 12:16
And they used Abram well for her sake. And he had sheep and oxen, and he asses, and men servants and maid servants, and she asses, and camels.
Open Genesis 12:16 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Abram vero bene usi sunt propter illam : fueruntque ei oves et boves et asini, et servi et famulæ, et asinæ et cameli.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- καὶ τῷ Ἀβρὰμ εὖ ἐχρήσαντο δι᾽ αὐτήν, καὶ ἐγένοντο αὐτῷ πρόβατα καὶ μόσχοι καὶ ὄνοι, παῖδες καὶ παιδίσκαι, ἡμίονοι καὶ κάμηλοι.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וּלְאַבְרָ֥ם הֵיטִ֖יב בַּעֲבוּרָ֑הּ וַֽיְהִי ל֤וֹ צֹאן וּבָקָר֙ וַחֲמֹרִ֔ים וַעֲבָדִים֙ וּשְׁפָחֹ֔ת וַאֲתֹנֹ֖ת וּגְמַלִּֽים
Haydock's commentary
Well. Perhaps they made him some presents to gain his favour; (Menochius) or, at least, they suffered him to remain quietly among them.
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
Tertullian On the Apparel of Women, Chapter II
You must know that in the eye of perfect, that is, Christian, modesty, (carnal) desire of one’s self (on the part of others) is not only not to be desired, but even execrated, by you: first, because the study of making personal grace (which we know to be naturally the inviter of lust) a mean of pleasing does not spring from a sound conscience: why therefore excite toward yourself that evil (passion)? why invite (that) to which you profess yourself a stranger? secondly, because we ought not to open a way to temptations, which, by their instancy, sometimes achieve (a wickedness) which God expels from them who are His; (or,) at all events, put the spirit into a thorough tumult by (presenting) a stumbling-block (to it). …
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Timothy, Titus, and Philemon, 1 Timothy 4:1-3
But do you not see the lucky men, says one, who with little labor acquire the good things of life? What good things? Money, houses, so many acres of land, trains of servants, heaps of gold and silver? Can you call these good things, and not hide your head for shame? A man called to the pursuit of heavenly wisdom, and gaping after worldly things, and calling them “goods,” which are of no value! If these things are good, then the possessors of them must be called good. For is not he good, who is the possessor of what is good? But when the possessors of these things are guilty of fraud and rapine, shall we call them good? For if wealth is a good, but is increased by grasping, the more it is increased, the more will its possessor be considered to be good. Is the grasping man then good? But if wealth is good, and increases by grasping, the more a man grasps, the better he must be. …