And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me! And God granted him that which he requested.
Thou wouldest keep me from evil, х `aasiytaa (H6213) mªraa`ah (H7451)] - thou wouldest do so as abstain; i:e., thou wouldest abstain from evil. Others, says Gesenius, render less well 'thou wouldest do me from evil - i:e., keep me from harm.' The enterprise was in all probability the expulsion of the Canaanites from the territory he occupied; and as this was a war of extermination, which God himself had commanded, His blessing could be the more reasonably asked and expected in preserving them from all the evils to which the undertaking might expose him. In the words "that it may not grieve me," and which might be more literally, rendered, 'that I may have no more sorrow,' there is an allusion to the meaning of his name, Jabez, signifying grief; and the import of this petition is, let me not experience the grief which my name implies, and which my sins may well produce.
God granted him that which he requested. Whatever was the kind of undertaking which roused his anxieties, Jabez enjoyed a remakable degree of prosperity, and God, in his instance, proved that He was not only the hearer, but the answerer of prayer.