To preserve you a posterity in the earth. — Heb., To put for you a remnant in the land, that is, to preserve a remainder for you, as the word is translated in 2 Samuel 14:7. During the seven years’ famine many races probably dwindled away, and the Hebrews, as mere sojourners in Canaan, would have been in danger of total extinction.
By a great deliverance. — That is, by a signal interference on your behalf. But the word rendered “deliverance,” more exactly signifies that which escapes (see 2 Kings 19:31, where, as here, it is joined with the word remnant, and 2 Kings 19:30, where it is itself rendered remnant). The two nouns really signify the same thing; but whereas in the first clause the words seem to forebode that only few would escape, in the second there is the assurance of their surviving in such numbers as to be able to grow into a great nation.