Beersheba the Well of the Oath and Abraham's Tamarisk

Bible story

The Biblical Story: the Oath at the Well

A dispute over a well

In Genesis 21:22-34, Abimelech king of Gerar, together with Phichol, the commander of his army, comes to offer Abraham a covenant. Abraham first complains about a well that Abimelech's servants have seized, then sets apart seven ewe lambs and gives them to Abimelech as a sign of good faith.

"For these seven ewe lambs shalt thou take of my hand, that they may be a witness unto me, that I have digged this well."

Genesis 21:30

This is how Beersheba got its name: well of the oath or well of seven.

A lasting covenant of peace

"Thus they made a covenant at Beersheba: then Abimelech rose up, and Phichol the chief captain of his host, and they returned into the land of the Philistines."

Genesis 21:32

The oath establishes Beersheba as a place of covenant and peace, of mutual recognition between people under the gaze of God. A generation later, Isaac would reopen his father's wells and renew the covenant with Abimelech in this very place (Genesis 26).

Beersheba in the story of the patriarchs

• Genesis 21:14 — Hagar and Ishmael wander "in the wilderness of Beersheba" until God shows them a well.
• Genesis 22:19 — After the binding of Isaac on Mount Moriah, Abraham returns to live at Beersheba.
• Genesis 26:23-33 — Isaac builds an altar there, and his servants dig a well called Shibah.
• Genesis 28:10 — Jacob sets out from Beersheba for Haran.
• Genesis 46:1 — Before going down to Egypt, Jacob offers sacrifices at Beersheba to the God of his father.

Bible story

What the Name Beersheba Means

• Be'er (בְּאֵר)well
• Sheva (שֶׁבַע)seven
• Shevu'ah (שְׁבוּעָה)oath

The name plays on two words from the same root: sheva, "seven", and the verb nishba', "to swear" — perhaps because swearing an oath originally meant "binding oneself by seven". The place name thus points both to the seven lambs and to the oath that was sworn. Beersheba becomes a symbol of a promise sealed in faithfulness and of faith made tangible: a well dug, a word kept.

"Wherefore he called that place Beersheba; because there they sware both of them."

Genesis 21:31

In the time of the Judges and the Kings, Beersheba marked the southern limit of the land: the phrase "from Dan even to Beersheba" means the whole of Israel, from Tel Dan at the springs of the Jordan to the Negev (Judges 20:1; 1 Samuel 3:20).

Bible story

The Tamarisk: Faith That Takes Root

After the oath, Abraham plants a tamarisk (eshel in Hebrew) at Beersheba. Planting a tree in the desert is an affirmation of life in the midst of drought. The Negev tamarisk (Tamarix aphylla), deep-rooted and tolerant of salt, gives precious shade for decades: it becomes the visible sign of an enduring, forward-looking faith.

"And Abraham planted a tamarisk-tree in Beer-sheba, and called there on the name of the LORD, the Everlasting God."

Genesis 21:33 (JPS 1917)

The gesture binds together land, water and faith, turning Beersheba into a sanctuary of a living covenant. Jewish tradition has also read it as an act of hospitality: the Talmud (Sotah 10a) debates whether the eshel was an orchard or an inn, and a later reading sees in its letters the initials of "eating, drinking, lodging" — Abraham welcoming desert travellers.

Bible story

Isaac at Beersheba: the Wells and the Renewed Covenant (Genesis 26)

A generation later, Beersheba becomes Isaac's main home. Driven out of Gerar by the envy of the Philistines, who had stopped up the wells dug in Abraham's time, he reopens his father's wells and "called their names after the names by which his father had called them" (Genesis 26:18). In the valley of Gerar his servants dig three wells whose names tell of a passage from conflict to peace: Esek ("contention"), Sitnah ("hostility") and Rehoboth ("wide spaces", 26:20-22). Then "he went up from thence to Beersheba" (26:23).

"I am the God of Abraham thy father: fear not, for I am with thee, and will bless thee, and multiply thy seed for my servant Abraham's sake."

Genesis 26:24

On the very night of his arrival, God renews for the son the promise made to the father. Isaac answers with three gestures that sum up the life of the patriarchs: "he builded an altar there, and called upon the name of the LORD, and pitched his tent there"; and his servants dig a well (26:25).

The pact with Abimelech and the well of Shebah

Abimelech then comes from Gerar with Ahuzzath and Phichol: "We saw certainly that the LORD was with thee" (26:28). Where Abraham had sworn an oath with a king of the same name, Isaac renews a pact of peace, sealed with a feast. That same day his servants report: "We have found water." Isaac names the well Shebah, "therefore the name of the city is Beersheba unto this day" (26:33).

Beersheba thus becomes Isaac's spiritual centre. It is probably here that he blesses Jacob and Esau (Genesis 27), since Jacob "went out from Beersheba" towards Haran (28:10). Isaac ends his days at Hebron, where he rests with Rebekah; his ordeal on Mount Moriah has a page of its own.

Archaeology

Archaeology: Tel Be'er Sheva and Bir Abu Matar

Tel Be'er Sheva: a fortified town and ancient wells

About 4 km east of the modern city, Tel Be'er Sheva (Tell es-Seba') was excavated by Yohanan Aharoni (1969–1976) and later by Ze'ev Herzog. It reveals a small planned town of the Iron Age, with:

• a large well dug near the city gate, often linked in popular memory with the patriarchal traditions;
• a sophisticated water system: a vast underground cistern fed by floodwater, reached by a staircase from inside the walls;
• a four-horned altar of dressed stone, found dismantled and reused in a wall, then reassembled;
• a ring-shaped town plan, with a circular street and houses built against the city wall — rare in the Levant.

Inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2005 together with Megiddo and Hazor (the "Biblical Tels"), the site illustrates the continuity of Abraham's memory: a place where water, oath and altar come together. The fortified town visible today, however, is much later than the period tradition assigns to the patriarchs.

Bir Abu Matar: a Chalcolithic village long before Abraham

Excavated in the 1950s by the French archaeologist Jean Perrot, Bir Abu Matar, on the banks of Nahal Beersheba, dates back to the Chalcolithic period (c. 4500–3700 BCE). It revealed:

• semi-subterranean dwellings dug into the loess;
• a network of silos and wells;
• copper metallurgy among the earliest known;
• cult objects and decorated pottery.

This "Beersheba culture" shows a very early mastery of water and of survival in the Negev, long before the patriarchs.