Charles Ellicott Commentary Genesis 12:10

"And there was a famine in the land: and Abram went down into Egypt to sojourn there; for the famine was sore in the land." — Genesis 12:10 (ASV)

ABRAM’S VISIT TO EGYPT.

There was a famine in the land.—This famine must have happened within a few years after Abram reached Canaan; for he was seventy-five years of age on leaving Haran, and since Ishmael, his son by an Egyptian slave-woman, was thirteen years old when Abram was ninety-nine, only about eight years are left for the events recorded in Genesis 12–16.

As rain falls in Palestine only at two periods of the year, the failure of either of these seasons would be immediately felt, especially in a dry region like the Negeb, and at a time when, with no means of bringing food from a distance, people had to depend upon the annual products of the land.

Since Egypt is watered by the flooding of the Nile, caused by the heavy rains which fall in Ethiopia, it probably had not suffered from what was merely a local failure in South Palestine; and Abram, already far on his way to Egypt, was forced by the necessity of providing fodder for his cattle to run the risk of proceeding there.

In Canaan, he had found a thinly scattered Canaanite population, against whom he probably would have been a match in war. In Egypt, however, he would find a powerful empire and would be at the mercy of its rulers.

It is a proof of Abram’s faith that in this necessity he neither retraced his steps (Hebrews 11:15) nor sought a new home. For he went to Egypt with no intention of settling, but only to sojourn there, to remain for a brief period, after which, with returning rains, he would go back to Canaan.