"I am a stranger and a sojourner with you."--_Genesis 23:4._
ABRAHAM and his wife Sarah had lived together many years; but at last
Sarah died, and Abraham wanted to bury her. You know in all the country
he had not one morsel of ground of his own; he was a stranger there,
but he knew it would all belong to his children by-and-by. But he
wanted to make sure of the one bit where his wife should lie. So he
went to the prince to whom Hebron belonged, and begged to buy a field
with trees in it, and a rock where there was a deep cave that was
called Machpelah.
The prince said he would give it; but Abraham could not feel sure
that it would be always safe till he had bought it. So he weighed out
the price. It was not in little bits of money like ours, but lumps of
silver all the same weight, and each with a mark stamped on it--four
hundred of them. Then the cave was given to Abraham, and he had his
good true wife Sarah buried there, rolled in linen with spices. He was
buried there afterwards himself, and so was his son Isaac, and Isaac's
son after him, in the cave of Machpelah.
That cave has been kept sacred ever since. There is a building over it
now, and no stranger is allowed to go into it; but deep down there is
a golden grating, and far within lie these holy men and women of old.
Their bodies are waiting to rise again at the Last Day, and then I hope
we shall see them and know them.