Typically ancient Near Easterners buried family members in their native land. [1] Abraham"s desire to bury Sarah in the Promised Land shows that he had turned his back on Mesopotamia forever ( Genesis 23:4). Canaan was his adopted homeland. [source][source][source]
God had made Abraham a powerful person, which his neighbors acknowledged ( Genesis 23:6). [2][source]
"Abraham has put himself at the bottom of the social ladder, and they put him at the top." [3][source]
"Their warm and generous reply apparently gave Abraham all he wanted, but permission to bury Sarah was only part of what he had requested. He had asked for a burial plot, not simply for the use of one of their graves. Despite the warmth of their reply, the Hittites, by omitting any mention of this point, probably indicate their reluctance to transfer land to Abraham, for then he would no longer be a landless sojourner." [4][source]
These Hittites (Hethites) were residents of Canaan, not members of the mighty Hittite Empire that later flourished north of the Promised Land in Syria. [5][source]
Why did Ephron want to sell Abraham the entire plot of ground in which the cave lay rather than just the cave as Abraham requested ( Genesis 23:8-11)? Hittite law specified that when a landowner sold only part of his property to someone else the original owner had to continue to pay all taxes on the land. However if he sold the entire tract the new owner was responsible to pay the taxes (cf. 1 Chronicles 21:24). Consequently Ephron held out for the entire tract knowing that Abraham needed to make his purchase quickly so he could bury Sarah. [6][source]
Abraham"s willingness to pay what appears to have been an unusually large price for the land further demonstrates his faith ( Genesis 23:15-16). An average field cost four shekels per acre, and garden land cost40 shekels per acre. [7] Abraham was willing to pay400 shekels. Of course, the text does not give the exact area of the property, but it appears to have been relatively small. [source][source][source]
"The piece of property was no bargain for Abraham; 400 shekels would be more than a hundred pounds of silver. David paid only one-eighth that amount-50 shekels of silver-for the purchase of the temple site from Araunah ( 2 Samuel 24:24)." [8][source]
Ephron"s responses to Abraham"s requests sound very generous, but he was really making it difficult for Abraham to pay less than his asking price. Ephron"s object may have been to get a present from Abraham for having given him the field and cave that would compensate for the value of the land. Such a gift was customary. On the other hand he may have wanted to preclude Abraham"s offering to pay him less than his asking price ( Genesis 23:15). [9][source]
"Did the patriarchs who forsook everything for the sake of the promises go unrewarded? No, answers our narrative. In death they were heirs and no longer "strangers." A very small part of the Promised Land-the grave-belonged to them; therefore they did not have to rest in "Hittite earth" or in the grave of a Hittite (cf. Genesis 23:6), which Israel would have considered a hardship difficult to bear." [10][source]
"At a time when the children of Israel were on their way to take possession of the land, Moses did well to remind them how in faith their forefathers had secured at least "a grave which was his own property," and thus to arouse in them the desire to finish the work of taking into full possession what had so long ago been promised to them." [11][source]