Why Zoar Was Spared and the Lifting of Faces

All the names spoken of regarding Lot are ordinary [not divine names], except this one: "Behold now, your servant has found favor in your eyes" (Genesis 19:19), since the One who has the power to kill and to make alive is the Holy One, blessed be He. (Genesis 19:20) Rav said: A person should always try to settle in a city whose settlement is recent, for since its settlement is recent its sins are few. Rav Chanan said: What is the verse? As it is written, "Behold now, this city is near" (Genesis 19:20). What does "near" mean? If you say it means it is close by and small, then look, he could see it. Rather, since its settlement is recent its sins are few. And Rabbi Yitzchak said: The settlement of Zoar was fifty-one years, for it is said, "let me escape there" (Genesis 19:20), and the word "there" [na] in gematria is fifty-one; and that of Sodom was fifty-two, and its tranquility was twenty-six, as it is written, "twelve years they served" and so on (Genesis 14:4). (Genesis 19:21) "And he said to him, Behold, I have lifted your face" and so on. Rabbi Chalafta of Caesarea said: If for Lot, because he honored an angel, He lifted his face, then to you shall I not lift My face, on account of you and on account of your fathers? As it says, "The LORD lift up His face toward you" (Numbers 6:26). (Genesis 19:23-24) "Hasten, escape there." This is like a province that had two patrons, one a native of the province and one a city dweller, and the king was angry and sought to chastise the people of the province. The king said: If I chastise them in the presence of the native, the people will say, had the city dweller been here he would have stood up for us; and if I chastise them in the presence of the city dweller, they will say, had the native been here he would have stood up for us. So it was that some of the Sodomites worshiped the sun and some the moon. The Holy One, blessed be He, said: If I chastise them by day, they will say, had the moon been here it would have protected us, and if I chastise them by night, they will say, had the sun been here it would have protected us. Rather, I will chastise them on the sixteenth of Nisan, at the hour when both stand together in the firmament. This is the meaning of what is written, "The sun was risen upon the earth" (Genesis 19:23), and it is written, "and the LORD rained upon Sodom" (Genesis 19:24).