Genesis 23:9

For a possession, etc.] RV 'in the midst of you for a possession of a buryingplace.' Abraham wished that the Hittites should be present as witnesses of the purchase.

The cave of Machpelah] This spot, over which now stands the great Mohammedan mosque at Hebron, is generally admitted to be the original buryingplace of the Jewish patriarchs, and the spot where their remains still rest. It is most religiously guarded by the Mohammedans (who regard Abraham as the founder of their race through Ishmael) from all intrusion. The cave is a double one, and visitors are permitted entrance only to the upper storey, where there is little to see except counterfeit tombs. 'Only one European, Pierotti, an Italian architect in the service of the Sultan, has succeeded, at the risk of his life, in entering the lower cavern. He noticed there sarcophagi of white stone, the true tombs of the illustrious dead, in striking corroboration of the statement of Josephus, that these were of fair marble, exquisitely wrought' (Geikie). Machpelah] is not the name of the cave, but the name of the locality in which the piece of land containing the cave was situated: cp. Genesis 23:17; Genesis 23:19.