And Sarah died at Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham went in to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her.
2. And Sarah died in Kirjath-arba . It appears from Joshua 15:54, that this was the more ancient name of the city, which afterwards began to be called Hebron. But there is a difference of opinion respecting the etymology. Some think the name is derived from the fact, that the city consisted of four parts; as the Greeks call the city divided into three orders...
We have here, 1. Sarah's age, Gen 23:1. Almost forty years before, she had called herself old, Gen 18:12. Old people will die never the sooner, but may die the better, for reckoning themselves old. 2. Her death, Gen 23:2. The longest liver must die at last. Abraham and Sarah had lived comfortably together many years; but death parts those whom nothing else could part.
Commenting on Genesis 23:1-2
And Sarah died in Kirjatharba,.... Which was so called, either, as Jarchi says, from the four Anakims or giants that dwelt here, Jos 15:13; or else, as the same writer observes, from the four couple buried here, Adam and Eve, Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Leah; but then it must be so called by anticipation; rather, as Aben Ezra thinks, it had...