“I am a foreigner and an outsider among you. Give me a burial site among you so that I can bury my dead.”
4. I am a stranger and a sojourner with you . This introductory sentence tends to one or other of these points; either that he may more easily gain what he desires by suppliantly asking for it; or that he may remove all suspicion of cupidity on his part.
Here is, I. The humble request which Abraham made to his neighbours, the Hittites, for a burying-place among them, Gen 23:3, Gen 23:4. It was strange he had this to do now; but we are to impute it rather to God's providence than to his improvidence, as appears Act 7:5, where it is said, God gave him no inheritance in Canaan.
Commenting on Genesis 23:3-15
I am a stranger and a sojourner with you,.... Not a native of the place, only dwelt as a sojourner among them for a time; but had not so much as a foot of ground he could call his own, and consequently had no place to inter his dead: give me a possession of a buryingplace with you; not that he desired it as a...