Matthew Poole and continuators on Genesis 13:10

10. And Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the plain of Jordan , that it was well watered every where, before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrha, even as the garden of the LORD , like the land of Egypt , as thou comest unto Zoar .

A great plain so called, because there the pleasant River Iordan divided it self into divers little streams or rivulets, which having no visible out-let into the Sea, by degrees, and in several places insinuated themselves into the Earth, which made it very fruitful and excellent for Lot's purpose. But this lovely plain was afterwards transformed by divine vengeance into a filthy Lake or dead Sea, Gen. 19.

(i. e.) Either 1. Like that famous Garden of Eden which God himself planted, Gen. 2. 10. The like comparison we meet with, Isa. 51. 3. Ezek. 28. 13. and 31. 8. Or 2. Like some excellent Garden: for excellent things are thus expressed, as the host of God, 1 Chron. 12. 22. i. e. a great host: Cedars of God, Psal. 80. 10.

A Land of eminent fertility by the influence of that great River Nilus: Antiently celebrated as the Granary of other Countries. See Ez[illegible: 1+ letters]k. 31.

(i. e.) To Bela, Gen. 14. 2. afterwards called Zoar, Gen. 19. 22. and here so called by a Prolepsis. But these words are not to be joyned with the words immediately going before, as if Egypt was commended for its fertility in that part of it, from which men go to Zoar, but with the more remote words, and the sense is, as the words of the Text are transplaced and rendred by some, that the plain of Iordan was (before the Lord destroyed it and its Cities Sodom and Gomorrha) watered every where, even to Zoar; or, even until thou comest, i. e. till a man come to Zoar. i. e. all the way which leads from the place where Abram then was to Zoar. And such transpositions are not unusual, as we shall see hereafter.