Hagar is Abraham's concubine and Ishmael is her son. They live with Abraham and seem to be having a jolly old time in Beer-sheba, when trouble begins to brew. Sarah catches Ishmael doing something she doesn't like, (it's difficult to tell what exactly, as the sentence is very ambiguous, and the Hebrew word there is quite rare) and tells Abraham to kick them both out. In Beer-sheba, kicking people out to fend for themselves basically amounts to a death sentence. It is so dry there that there is little chance of anyone surviving on their own. One would think that Abraham would just tell Sarah to get over herself, and it seems like he might be considering just that course of action, when God appears and tells Abraham to kick them out, and tells him that Ishmael will survive to have children.
It seems terrible to imagine that God would have a family separated like this, but that's not the only questionable thing God does in the Abraham story. According to Abraham 2:22-24, God tells Abraham to lie to the Egyptians and tell them that Sarai is his sister, not his wife. (My brilliant wife informs me that there is a word in Egyptian that means both wife and sister, so this is not quite a lie, but he wanted the Egyptians to think his wife was single, so it still counts as a lie in my book.)
Of course, the most egregious offence that God seems to commit in the Abraham story is when He asks Abraham to sacrifice Isaac to him. This ruling was reversed at the last minute, but that almost makes God look even more capricious. So what is really going on here?
I think it is possible to see Abraham's story as a story of loss and recovery. Over the course of Abraham's life God asks him to sacrifice everyone close to him, and then God makes sure he gets most of them back.
At the beginning of Abraham's life, he has some family problems (his dad tries to kill him,) so God tells Abraham to get out of Ur and go to Canaan (via Haran.) He knows this will mean leaving his family behind, even those he may have loved, but he does it because God asks him to.
Shortly thereafter, Abraham goes down to Egypt, where God asks him to, temporarily, sacrifice his relationship with this wife. It is clearly meant to be short term, but for a time, God asks him to give up Sarai as his wife. He does so. Abrahams sacrifice of Sarai is very temporary, but it certainly seems that God asks him to give her up for a short time, even if it is mostly a symbolic gesture.
Then, Abraham marries Hagar but, as noted above, God asks Abraham to give Hagar and Ishmael up. Abraham does so. This sacrifice of Ishmael and Hagar makes the sacrifice of Isaac even more moving because when God tells Abraham in the next chapter to go and sacrifice his only son, it simply drives home the message that Abraham has no one left. He just "sacrificed" Ishmael the chapter before, and now he has to sacrifice Isaac. He is about to do so, and is stopped at the last minute.
But now you may be asking yourself, "What about Ishmael? He practically falls off the face of the earth after Genesis 21. How does Abraham get him back?" The answer to this may be provided by a much later text, the Quran. According to some Muslim traditions, Hagar and Ishmael move down south to Mecca. Abraham is eventually told they are living there, so Abraham begins to go down to visit them on a regular basis, and even builds something of a temple, the Kaaba, with Ishamel. This might just be wishful thinking on the part of the Muslims, trying to make sense of a difficult story, but I think it just might be what really happened.
Finally, there is Abraham's restitution with his immediate family back in Ur. This comes to Abraham indirectly through his son, Isaac. In Genesis 24, Isaac marries Rebekah, who is Abraham's brother's granddaughter. Initially this may seem odd, as we know Abraham's family were not the most upstanding people, but it seems that they got better a few generations down the line, such that it was said of Rebekah that no man had "known the like unto her." Her marriage to Isaac can be seen as a re-joining of Abraham's immediately family with his brother's family, the family he had to leave behind so many years before.
With that, Abraham's life has come full circle. He is asked by God to give up his brother, his wives, and his sons, but slowly, over the course of his life, he gets them all back again. God certainly asked Abraham to sacrifice a lot, but once God saw that Abraham was completely dedicated to him, God made sure that Abraham got it all back and more. I can't help but wonder if that is the way it will be for us. Sometimes we have to go through great periods of loss, but I think that God is in the business of restitution. No matter how much we lose, if we lose it in His name, God will make sure our losses get made up, in this life or the next.
Of course, the most egregious offence that God seems to commit in the Abraham story is when He asks Abraham to sacrifice Isaac to him. This ruling was reversed at the last minute, but that almost makes God look even more capricious. So what is really going on here?
I think it is possible to see Abraham's story as a story of loss and recovery. Over the course of Abraham's life God asks him to sacrifice everyone close to him, and then God makes sure he gets most of them back.
At the beginning of Abraham's life, he has some family problems (his dad tries to kill him,) so God tells Abraham to get out of Ur and go to Canaan (via Haran.) He knows this will mean leaving his family behind, even those he may have loved, but he does it because God asks him to.
Shortly thereafter, Abraham goes down to Egypt, where God asks him to, temporarily, sacrifice his relationship with this wife. It is clearly meant to be short term, but for a time, God asks him to give up Sarai as his wife. He does so. Abrahams sacrifice of Sarai is very temporary, but it certainly seems that God asks him to give her up for a short time, even if it is mostly a symbolic gesture.
Then, Abraham marries Hagar but, as noted above, God asks Abraham to give Hagar and Ishmael up. Abraham does so. This sacrifice of Ishmael and Hagar makes the sacrifice of Isaac even more moving because when God tells Abraham in the next chapter to go and sacrifice his only son, it simply drives home the message that Abraham has no one left. He just "sacrificed" Ishmael the chapter before, and now he has to sacrifice Isaac. He is about to do so, and is stopped at the last minute.
But now you may be asking yourself, "What about Ishmael? He practically falls off the face of the earth after Genesis 21. How does Abraham get him back?" The answer to this may be provided by a much later text, the Quran. According to some Muslim traditions, Hagar and Ishmael move down south to Mecca. Abraham is eventually told they are living there, so Abraham begins to go down to visit them on a regular basis, and even builds something of a temple, the Kaaba, with Ishamel. This might just be wishful thinking on the part of the Muslims, trying to make sense of a difficult story, but I think it just might be what really happened.
Finally, there is Abraham's restitution with his immediate family back in Ur. This comes to Abraham indirectly through his son, Isaac. In Genesis 24, Isaac marries Rebekah, who is Abraham's brother's granddaughter. Initially this may seem odd, as we know Abraham's family were not the most upstanding people, but it seems that they got better a few generations down the line, such that it was said of Rebekah that no man had "known the like unto her." Her marriage to Isaac can be seen as a re-joining of Abraham's immediately family with his brother's family, the family he had to leave behind so many years before.
With that, Abraham's life has come full circle. He is asked by God to give up his brother, his wives, and his sons, but slowly, over the course of his life, he gets them all back again. God certainly asked Abraham to sacrifice a lot, but once God saw that Abraham was completely dedicated to him, God made sure that Abraham got it all back and more. I can't help but wonder if that is the way it will be for us. Sometimes we have to go through great periods of loss, but I think that God is in the business of restitution. No matter how much we lose, if we lose it in His name, God will make sure our losses get made up, in this life or the next.
