Genesis 25:7 Commentary and Bible Study

Finally Abraham’s life comes to an end. Even this greatest of the patriarchs and the man who was loved by God and called the friend of God must die. His death was consistent with God’s love for him, since it was the removal of his soul to a better place where he would wait the resurrection of the body in which he hoped. Though he died, the Lord God chose to be known to Israel as the God of Abraham (Psalm 47:9). By this He indicated that His servant was yet living and that He would raise him up again at the last day, for Lord Jesus teaches us that God is not the God of the dead but of the living.Abraham lived to a great age far in excess of ages today. The decline in ages of men following the flood continued but did not drop to its present value immediately. Accumulated errors in the genome perhaps accounts for this. His father Terah had lived to two hundred and five years (Genesis 11:32).Abraham did not regret his death but was ready to depart earth. He had finished all the great tasks that God had given him and now saw his son married though not yet his grandsons. ‘He went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise: For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. (Hebrews 11:8-10). Yet he did not receive the promise, ‘God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us’ (Hebrews 11:40). Abraham was satisfied with the life that God had given and did not wish to stay on earth any longer, knowing that it is appointed to all men to die once. Abraham understood the reason for death and believed that God will provide a remedy for death. He lived to see the birth of Esau and Jacob, receiving further evidence of the fulfillment of God’s promise to him. He was gathered to his people. This echoes the words of God to him, ‘Now as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age’ (Genesis 15:15). His fathers must be understood of his spiritual fathers for he was called out of a background of idolatry and his father had been an idol worshipper (Joshua 24:2). It may be that given the knowledge of God that Rebekah and her family had, that Terah had been converted before his death.Ishmael joins Isaac to bury his father. It is likely that Ishmael was informed by Isaac that Abraham was approaching death and came to see him in his final moments. We know that Abraham loved Ishmael and the sending away of the sons to other regions was not intended to cut off all contact between them. Isaac was content having received the inheritance and would not exclude Ishmael unnecessarily from his father’s affection.Abraham was buried with his wife Sarah in the cave he had purchased, the only plot of land he owned in Canaan, and a token of his descendants’ future inheritance. There his body will remain until the last day when he will rise victorious over death forever.