C. F. Keil and Franz Delitzsch on Genesis 19:12-14

Gen 19:12-14

The sin of Sodom had now become manifest. The men, Lot’s guests, made themselves known to him as the messengers of judgment sent by Jehovah, and ordered him to remove any one that belonged to him out of the city. “Son-in-law (the singular without the article, because it is only assumed as a possible circumstance that he may have sons-in-law), and thy sons, and thy daughters, and all that belongs to thee” (sc., of persons, not of things). Sons Lot does not appear to have had, as we read nothing more about them, but only “sons-in-law (בנתיו לקחי) who were about to take his daughters,” as Josephus, the Vulgate, Ewald, and many others correctly render it. The lxx, Targums, Knobel, and Delitzsch adopt the rendering “who had taken his daughters,” in proof of which the last two adduce הנּמצאת in Gen 19:15 as decisive. But without reason; for this refers not to the daughters who were still in the father’s house, as distinguished form those who were married, but to his wife and two daughters who were to be found with him in the house, in distinction from the bridegrooms, who also belonged to him, but were not yet living with him, and who had received his summons in scorn, because in their carnal security they did not believe in any judgment of God (Luk 17:28-29). If Lot had had married daughters, he would undoubtedly have called upon them to escape along with their husbands, his sons-in-law.