Bible Strands
Genesis 18:26
So the LORD replied, “If I find fifty righteous ones within the city of Sodom, on their account I will spare the whole place.”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — God responds to Abraham’s intercession regarding Sodom’s impending judgment. The exchange occurs as Abraham questions whether the Judge of all the earth will treat the righteous and wicked alike.
The words — The Hebrew terms אִם־ (’im-, “if”) and אֶמְצָ֥א (’emṣā’, “I will find”) frame God’s conditional response. צַדִּיקִ֖ם (ṣaddîqîm, “righteous [ones]”) identifies the specific group whose presence would trigger the sparing of the city.
The thread — The conditional search for righteous individuals appears in Jeremiah 5:1, where God commands a search through Jerusalem’s squares for even one person who acts justly. The principle of preservation for the sake of a specific group recurs in Matthew 24:22, where the days of tribulation are shortened for the elect’s sake.
Why it lands — The text establishes that divine judgment is contingent upon the presence of righteous individuals within a community. It requires readers to recognize that God’s mercy operates through specific, countable conditions rather than arbitrary intervention.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And the Lord said, If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare all the place for their sakes.
Cross-references
- Jeremiah 5:1 “Go up and down the streets of Jerusalem. Look now and take note; search her squares. If you can find a single person, anyone who acts justly, anyone who seeks the truth, then I will forgive the city.
- Matthew 24:22 If those days had not been cut short, nobody would be saved. But for the sake of the elect, those days will be cut short.
- Isaiah 65:8 This is what the LORD says: “As the new wine is found in a cluster of grapes, and men say, ‘Do not destroy it, for it contains a blessing,’ so I will act on behalf of My servants; I will not destroy them all.
- Ezekiel 22:30 I searched for a man among them to repair the wall and stand in the gap before Me on behalf of the land, so that I should not destroy it. But I found no one.
- Isaiah 6:13 And though a tenth remains in the land, it will be burned again. As the terebinth and oak leave stumps when felled, so the holy seed will be a stump in the land.”
- Isaiah 10:22 Though your people, O Israel, be like the sand of the sea, only a remnant will return. Destruction has been decreed, overflowing with righteousness.
- Isaiah 19:24 In that day Israel will join a three-party alliance with Egypt and Assyria—a blessing upon the earth.