9. Abimelech called him in and said, “Rebekah must be your wife! Why did you say she is your sister?”“Because I thought someone would kill me,” Isaac answered.
10. “Don't you know what you've done?” Abimelech exclaimed. “If someone had slept with her, you would have made our whole nation guilty!”
11. Then Abimelech warned his people that anyone who even touched Isaac or Rebekah would be put to death.
12. Isaac planted grain and had a good harvest that same year. The Lord blessed him,
13. and Isaac was so successful that he became very rich.
14. In fact, the Philistines were jealous of the large number of sheep, goats, and slaves that Isaac owned,
15. and they stopped up the wells that Abraham's servants had dug before his death.
16. Finally, Abimelech said, “Isaac, I want you to leave our country. You have become too powerful to stay here.”
17. Isaac left and settled in Gerar Valley,
18. where he cleaned out those wells that the Philistines had stopped up. Isaac also gave each of the wells the same name that Abraham had given to them.
19. While his servants were digging in the valley, they found a spring-fed well.
20. But the shepherds of Gerar Valley quarrelled with Isaac's shepherds and claimed the water belonged to them. So the well was named “Quarrel”, because they had quarrelled with Isaac.
21. Isaac's servants dug another well, and the shepherds also quarrelled about it. So that well was named “Jealous”.
22. Finally, they dug one more well. There was no quarrelling this time, and the well was named “Lots of Room”, because the Lord had given them room and would make them very successful.
23. Isaac went on to Beersheba,
24. where the Lord appeared to him that night and told him, “Don't be afraid! I am the God who was worshipped by your father Abraham, my servant. I will be with you and bless you, and because of Abraham I will give you many descendants.”
25. Isaac built an altar there and worshipped the Lord. Then he set up camp, and his servants started digging a well.