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Context No. 132 of 4322 · Genesis

Context · Reflection

Genesis 21:8-17: in context

8The child grew and was weaned. Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. 9Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, mocking. 10Therefore she said to Abraham, “Cast out this servant and her son! For the son of this servant will not be heir with my son, Isaac.” 11The thing was very grievous in Abraham’s sight on account of his son. 12God said to Abraham, “Don’t let it be grievous in your sight because of the boy, and because of your servant. In all that Sarah says to you, listen to her voice. For your offspring will be named through Isaac. 13I will also make a nation of the son of the servant, because he is your child.” 14Abraham rose up early in the morning, and took bread and a container of water, and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder; and gave her the child, and sent her away. She departed, and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba. 15The water in the container was spent, and she put the child under one of the shrubs. 16She went and sat down opposite him, a good way off, about a bow shot away. For she said, “Don’t let me see the death of the child.” She sat opposite him, and lifted up her voice, and wept. 17God heard the voice of the boy. The angel of God called to Hagar out of the sky, and said to her, “What troubles you, Hagar? Don’t be afraid. For God has heard the voice of the boy where he is.

Sarah, unable to conceive, had given her Egyptian slave Hagar to Abraham, and Hagar bore Ishmael. Then Sarah had Isaac. This passage is the feast held when Isaac is weaned, and what Sarah demands at it.

She sees Ishmael playing, or mocking, the Hebrew is uncertain, and tells Abraham to cast out this slave woman and her son, because he will not share the inheritance with Isaac. The text says the thing was very distressing to Abraham on account of his son. Ishmael is his son too, his firstborn, about fourteen years old. God tells him to do what Sarah says, and adds a promise for the boy: I will make a nation of him also, because he is your offspring.

So Abraham gets up early, puts bread and a skin of water on Hagar's shoulder, and sends her into the desert with the child. The water runs out. She puts the boy under a bush and sits a bowshot away, because she cannot watch him die. Then the line that turns it: God heard the voice of the boy. Not her weeping, his voice. The name Ishmael means God hears. He was named for this before it happened. Whose cry am I too far away to hear, having placed myself at exactly the distance where I would not have to?

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