Hear us, my lord: you are a mighty prince among us: in the choice of our sepulchers bury your dead; none of us shall withhold from you his sepulcher, but that you may bury your dead.
Read Chapter 23
Clement Of Alexandria
AD 215
The subjects by a free decision obey the good man in their enthusiasm for virtue. The philosopher Plato puts forward happiness as the goal of life and says it consists in “the greatest possible likeness to God.” This may come from his going along with the general principles of the law (Philo the Pythagorean says in expounding the text of Moses, “Great natures free from passion aim fairly successfully in the direction of truth”). ..
Prince of God, powerful and holy, and worthy of respect. (Haydock)
A great prince. See Acts vii. 5, where St. Stephen says, that God did not give Abraham a foot of land, meaning as an inheritance; and that Abraham bought this double cave, for a sepulchre, of the sons of Hemor, the son of Sichem; (Calmet) from which latter he seems to derive the name of the place, which is here called Hebron. (Haydock)
Nothing is more common, than for men and places to have two names; though some think, the name of Abraham has been inserted in the Acts by a mistake of the copyists, when Jacob was meant. See chap. xxxiii. 19. (Calmet)
Sarah’s death was the occasion for the patriarch’s first instance of acquiring land. Sacred Scripture in fact shows us in every case the patriarch’s virtue, in that he passed all his time as an alien and a nomad. And it mentions this latest item for us to learn that the man who enjoyed so much assistance from on high, who had become so famous and had increased in number to such a vast multitude, could not call a place his own, unlike many people today, who give all their attention to acquiring land, whole towns and great wealth beyond telling. You see, he had sufficient riches in his attitude, and he put no store by these other things. Let those heed this who in the twinkling of an eye take to themselves every conceivable thing and, so to say, stretch out in all directions their passion for avarice. Let them also imitate the patriarch, who had not even a place to inter Sarah’s remains until, under pressure of very necessity, he bought the field and cave from the Hittites. For proof tha...
