Genesis Chapter 19

Angels rescue Lot from wicked Sodom before the LORD destroys the cities by fire, yet Sodom’s influence follows Lot’s family into a mountain cave.

Genesis 19:1-3

Evening Welcome at Sodom’s Gate

Genesis 19:4-11

The Night Siege of Lot’s House

Genesis 19:12-22

Warning, Lingering, and Rescue

Genesis 19:23-29

Fire from Heaven and Abraham’s Witness

Genesis 19:30-38

The Cave and the Birth of Moab and Ammon

Genesis 19:1

“And there came two angels to Sodom at even.” The Hebrew has the article, “the two angels,” pointing back to the pair who left Abraham’s tent while the LORD remained to hear his intercession (18:22). In chapter 18 the narrator called them “men”; here the same visitors are named by their office. Their word describes someone sent on another’s business, and their business is grave: to confirm the outcry that has reached heaven (18:20–21). The road from the heights near Hebron down to the plain was long and steep, yet they arrive that same evening, a hint that their errand is no ordinary journey.

The time stamp matters. Abraham welcomed his guests in the full light of midday; Sodom receives them as darkness falls. The chapter will move from evening through night to dawn and sunrise, and the gathering dark of this first scene suits the moral condition about to be exposed.

Lot is found “in the gate of Sodom.” The gate complex of an ancient town was its civic heart, where elders heard disputes, transactions were witnessed, and news passed from mouth to mouth (Ruth 4:1–11; Deuteronomy 21:19). Lot’s story can be traced through his addresses: he pitched his tent toward Sodom (13:12), then dwelt in it (14:12), and now sits among its prominent men. Whatever office he held, the man who once chose the well-watered plain by sight has settled into its public life.

Yet Lot still bears the marks of Abraham’s household. He rises, goes to meet the strangers, and bows with his face to the ground, the same courtesy his uncle showed hours earlier (18:2). In a city that will soon prove hostile to outsiders, this welcome is the first sign that Lot is not wholly one with his neighbors. Peter would later call him “just Lot,” vexed by what he saw and heard (2 Peter 2:7–8). His faith had been compromised, but it had not been extinguished.

Study Links

Cross References

Genesis 18:2Genesis 13:12

Word / Phrase Notes

מַלְאָכִים (mal’akhim) — angels

The noun means a messenger, one sent with a commission, and can describe human envoys (Genesis 32:3) as well as heavenly ones. The context shows these are heavenly beings who appeared as men (18:2) and act with divine power (19:11). The Septuagint renders the word ἄγγελοι (angeloi), which likewise means “messengers” and gives English its word “angel.”

Genesis 32:3

בְּשַׁעַר־סְדֹם (besha‘ar-sedom) — in the gate of Sodom

The gate was the place of judgment, commerce, and public counsel. To sit there implied standing in the community, perhaps a place among the elders. The phrase measures how far Lot has traveled from the tent life of his uncle.