Genesis 20:6

And the Word of the Lord said to him in a dream, Before Me also it is manifest that in the truthfulness of thy heart thou didst this, and so restrained I thee from sinning before Me; therefore I would not permit thee to come near her.

ויאמר...בתם לבבךsignificantly, G’d did not add the words ובנקיון כפיך when acknowledging part of Avimelech’s complaint. The fact that Avimelech had not touched Sarah was evident, could be proved, whereas Avimelech’s intentions were private, could not be proved. Only G’d Himself would know if he spoke the truth.

מחטו לי, the sin would have been directed against G’d only if he had transgressed the laws not to sleep with someone else’s wife, a command issued to all the descendants of Noach. Even if G’d had not issued a specific command in this regard, common sense would dictate such a law in a civilised society. The One Who had provided man with intelligence certainly expects that we use our intelligence to legislate such basic laws without which life on earth would become intolerable, anarchic. We must view our common sense as a messenger from G’d, an instrument that acts as a protection against man experiencing all kinds of harm and problems in his life on earth. When man commits violence against his fellow man this reflects an absence of common sense, i.e. a failure to use one’s common sense, seeing that the end result will be the termination of life on earth. If this is the result of violence perpetrated in order to secure land or chattels, how much more so would such a process of civilisation’s disintegration be accelerated if everyone would go assaulting people physically and raping his neighbour’s wife?

מחטו, the letter ו instead of the letter א in this word substitutes for the letter ל in the requisite mode of the verb.

על כן לא נתתיך, as we explained already, this is a reference to G’d having made Avimelech impotent. By doing this, G’d had done Avimelech a great favour. The reason why G’d extended Himself on his behalf was because He knew that Avimelech had indeed believed that Sarah was unattached. G’d did not want that Avimelech would become a sinner in regard to the wife of the prophet Avraham. Even though, granted that in the final analysis G’d intervened due to Avraham and Sarah being the potential victims, He could have saved Sarah from Avimelech’s clutches by a variety of other means. Seeing that Pharaoh’s thoughts at the time when Sarah was under his control were quite different from those of Avimelech, G’d had subjected Pharaoh and his household to a number of painful physical afflictions instead of appearing to him in a dream. The inhibitions G’d imposed on the entourage of Avimelech were temporary and left no permanent negative effect.