Genesis 26:12-22 - Conflicts Over Wells

¹² Then Isaac planted [seed] in that land [as a farmer] and reaped in the same year a hundred times [as much as he had planted], and the Lord blessed and favored him. ¹³ And the man [Isaac] became great and gained more and more until he became very wealthy and extremely distinguished; ¹⁴ he owned flocks and herds and a great household [with a number of servants], and the Philistines envied him. ¹⁵ Now all the wells which his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines stopped up by filling them with dirt. ¹⁶ Then Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from here, because you are far too powerful for us.”

¹⁷ So Isaac left that region and camped in the Valley of Gerar, and settled there. ¹⁸ Now Isaac again dug [and reopened] the wells of water which had been dug in the days of Abraham his father, because the Philistines had filled them up [with dirt] after the death of Abraham; and he gave the wells the same names that his father had given them. ¹⁹ But when Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found there a well of flowing [spring] water, ²⁰ the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with Isaac’s herdsmen, saying, “The water is ours!” So Isaac named the well Esek (quarreling), because they quarreled with him. ²¹ Then his servants dug another well, and they quarreled over that also, so Isaac named it Sitnah (enmity). ²² He moved away from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over that one; so he named it Rehoboth (broad places), saying, “For now the Lord has made room for us, and we shall be prosperous in the land.”