The plain of Jordan, a great plain so called, because there the pleasant river Jordan divided itself into divers little streams or rivulets, which having no visible outlet into the sea, by degrees, and in several places, insinuated themselves into the earth, which made it very fruitful and excellent for Lot's purpose. But this lovely plain was afterwards transformed by Divine vengeance into a filthy lake or dead sea, Genesis 19:24. Even as the garden of the Lord; i.e. either,
1. Like that famous garden of Eden which God himself planted, Genesis 2:8. The like comparison we meet with Isaiah 51:3 Ezekiel 28:13 Ezekiel 31:8. Or,
2. Like some excellent garden; for excellent things are thus expressed, as, the host of God, 1 Chronicles 12:22, i.e. a great host; cedars of God, Psalms 80:10. Like the land of Egypt, a land of eminent fertility by the influence of that great river Nilus, anciently celebrated as the granary of other countries. See Ezekiel 31:1-18. Unto Zoar, i.e. to Bela, Genesis 14:2, afterwards called Zoar, Genesis 19:22, and here so called by a prolepsis. But these words are not to be joined with the words immediately going before, as if Egypt was commended for its fertility in that part of it from which men go to Zoar, but with the more remote words, and the sense is, as the words of the text are transplaced and rendered by some, that the plain of Jordan was (before the Lord destroyed it and its cities Sodom and Gomorrah) watered every where, even to Zoar; or, even until thou comest, i.e. till a man come, to Zoar, i.e. all the way which leads from the place where Abram then was to Zoar. And such transpositions are not unusual, as we shall see hereafter.