OEB GEN Chapter 21

Isaac

21 The Lord remembered what he had told Sarah, and he did as he had promised. 2 So Sarah had Abraham’s son in his old age at the fixed time of which God had told him. 3 Abraham named him Isaac[fn] 4 and when he was eight days old he circumcised him as God had told him to. 5 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born. 6 Sarah said, ‘God has made laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.’ 7 She added, ‘Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have born him a son in his old age.’

8 When the child grew up, Abraham made a great feast on the day that he was weaned. 9 But Sarah saw the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham, playing with her son Isaac. 10 She said to Abraham, ‘Drive out this slave-girl and her son, for the son of this slave-girl shall not be heir with my son Isaac’ 11 This request was very displeasing to Abraham because the boy was his son. 12 But the Lord said to Abraham, ‘Do not be displeased because of the boy and because of your slave-girl. Listen to all that Sarah says to you, for only through the line of Isaac will your name be perpetuated. 13 But I will also make of the son of the slave-girl a great nation, because he is your son.’

14 Then Abraham got up early in the morning and took bread and a skin of water and gave it to Hagar, and he put the boy upon her shoulder and sent her away. So she departed and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba. 15 When the water in the skin was gone, she left the child under one of the desert shrubs 16 and went a short distance away and sat down and said, ‘Let me not see the death of the child.’ So she sat there and wept.

17 Then the Lord heard the cry of the boy, and the messenger of the Lord called to Hagar from heaven and said, ‘What troubles you, Hagar? Don’t be afraid, for the Lord has heard the boy’s cry. 18 Rise, lift him up, and hold him fast by the hand, for I will make him a great nation.’ 19 The Lord opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. Then she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink.

20 The Lord was with the boy, and he grew up, 21 and lived in the wilderness of Paran, and became a bowman. His mother secured a wife for him from Egypt.

The pact with Abimelech

Students

22 It happened at that time that Abimelech and Phicol the captain of his army spoke to Abraham, saying, ‘God is with you in all you do. 23 Now therefore take an oath to me here by God that you will not be false to me, nor to my son nor to my descendants; but that you will treat me and the land you have stayed in according to the kindness which I have shown you.’ 24 Abraham said, ‘I swear it.’

25 Now as often as Abraham complained to Abimelech because of the well of water which Abimelech’s servants had seized, 26 Abimelech said, ‘I do not know who has done this thing, neither have you told me nor have I heard of it until today.’ 27 So Abraham took sheep and oxen and gave them to Abimelech, and made an agreement with each other. 28 But when Abraham set seven ewe lambs of the flock by themselves, 29 Abimelech said to Abraham, ‘What is the meaning of these seven ewe lambs which you have set by themselves?’ 30 Abraham answered, ‘Accept these seven ewe lambs from my hand so that you may be my witness that I dug this well.’ 31 The place was called Beer-sheba, because it was there they swore their oath. 32 So they made a solemn agreement at Beer-sheba, and Abimelech arose with Phicol the captain of his army, and they returned to the land of the Philistines. 33 Abraham, however, planted a tamarisk tree in Beer-sheba, and called there on the name of the Lord, the Everlasting God. 34 Abraham stayed in the land of the Philistines many days.