[Teachldsseminary] TEACH: Abraham, posterity, and Sarah

[Marji]

Visitors from Zion: Three Holy Men and Their Mission
Chapter 8, part 1 of The Blessings of Abraham:  Becoming a Zion People
By E. Douglas Clark

    I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on
your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels
round about you, to bear you up. — Doctrine and Covenants 84:88

Looking Forward with an Eye of Faith

>From the first divine promise made to Abraham about his posterity, the
years of continuing childlessness had turned into decades of delay.
And yet, as one scholar observes, still Abraham "believed the promise,
although from a human aspect everything spoke against it." [1] Or, as
eloquently expressed by the Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard,

By faith Abraham received the promise that in his seed all races of
the world would be blessed. Time passed, the possibility was there,
Abraham believed; time passed, it became unreasonable, Abraham
believed ... There is no song of Lamentations by Abraham. He did not
mournfully count the days while time passed, he did not look at Sarah
with a suspicious glance ... Abraham became old, Sarah became a
laughingstock in the land, and yet he was God's elect and inheritor of
the promise that in his seed all the races of the world would be
blessed ... What is it to be God's elect? It is to be denied in youth
the wishes of youth, so as with great pains to get them fulfilled in
old age. [2]

How had Abraham maintained his faith in the long-delayed promises? We
have already seen his constant gratitude and praise to God for
blessings already bestowed — apparently a key to Abraham's faith. For
as one of his faithful latter-day descendants observed, "I have
discovered that if I insist on tormenting myself with obvious facts, I
cannot hold on to the precious peace that is His Gift. But if I give
heartfelt praise to our Father in Heaven while in the midst of my
trials, He grants me instant peace, strength, and abiding hope." [3]

It is an expression of the principle articulated by Moroni, who
explained that God has never worked miracles for men "until after
their faith," so that when they finally "saw with their [mortal] eyes"
what they had hoped for, it was only after "they had beheld [it] with
an eye of faith" (Ether 12:18–19).

So had Abraham looked ahead with an eye of faith, continually leaning
upon the divine promises through the years as he offered "myriad
prayers," says Josephus, for the fulfillment of those promises. [4] In
the words of the Apostle Paul, Abraham "against hope believed in hope,
that he might become the father of many nations, according to that
which was spoken" (Rom. 4:18). Meanwhile, in selfless exercise of his
faith and priesthood, he offered prayers for the welfare of others,
including prayers for childless women, and they would conceive. [5]

God had confirmed to Abraham that his heir would be a son issuing from
his own body, but nothing had been said about Sarah being the mother.
Her faith had been firm as she had interpreted the promises of
posterity to Abraham as any reasonable wife would, to mean that she
was to be the mother. As the promises had been renewed from heaven
time after time, her hope and expectation had been renewed and
reinvigorated. But months had turned into years as they endured "the
anguish of childlessness." [6]

Such an anguishing trial might well have damaged many a marital
relationship, but not this one. He "had simply loved her the more
tenderly, making the deepening of his love for her entirely clear. Not
only had he made no complaints, never even mentioned the word
'barren,' he had refused to allow anyone else to do so either." [7]

But at some point Sarah, who had always thought of the promises of
posterity as applying to her also, begin to consider another
possibility. For those promises, she reasoned, had never mentioned her
directly. A decade after their return out of Egypt, she came to
Abraham and suggested that he marry her maid, Hagar, whom Sarah had
taught in the things of righteousness and who, as reported in Jewish
tradition, "walked in the same path of righteousness as her mistress."
[8] Sarah's words to Abraham are reported in Genesis, the very first
time Sarah speaks in the Bible: "See how the Lord has prevented me
from bearing children. I beg you [or 'please' [9] ] now, go and sleep
with my maid, and perhaps I will have a son through her." [10]

By those words, according to Jewish tradition, Sarah "took the blame
for childlessness upon herself rather than seeking to blame her
husband," [11] and thereby demonstrated her "spiritual strength: she
was not jealous of her handmaid, but acted with the purest of motives"
and even with the prompting of the Holy Spirit. [12] Modern rabbi Amos
Miller comments:

The secret of the wonderful marital relationship between Abraham and
Sarah was that when things went wrong neither sought to blame the
other or to find fault with the other. If fault was to be found, each
found it within himself. This remains the secret of a happy marriage
to this day. [13]

Abraham and Sarah were living the law that the Lord would give to
their latter-day descendants seeking to build Zion: "See that ye love
one another. . . . Cease to find fault one with another. . . . And
above all things, clothe yourselves with the bond of charity, as with
a mantle, which is the bond of perfectness and peace" (D&C 88:125).

Sarah's language also suggests, according to the nineteenth-century
rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, that Abraham was reluctant to do what his
wife was suggesting. "Sarah wants to do it only for his sake, but she
knows that he would not do it for his own sake; hence she says …
'perhaps I [will have a son through her].' If Abraham would not want
to do it for his own sake, then let him do it for the sake of his wife
because she wants it so badly." [14]

Such was the mutual love and loyalty of this couple, each putting the
other first even in the matters that touched their hearts most deeply.
Their relationship illustrates the truth taught by President Gordon B.
Hinckley that "if you will make your first concern the comfort, the
well-being, and the happiness of your companion, sublimating any
personal concern to that loftier goal, you will be happy, and your
marriage will go on throughout eternity." [15]

Modern revelation adds that Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham "because this
was the law" (D&C 132:34), a statement confirmed by Bible scholars who
note the obligation of an infertile wife after ten years to bring her
husband a second wife to bear children. [16]

But it was also one of the great acts of Sarah's life, noted Erastus
Snow, done out of "love and integrity to her husband" so "that he
might not be childless because she was childless." [17] It was the
ultimate sacrifice, a decision made, no doubt, after much soul
searching and prayer. Sarah was by no means giving up, nor did this
mark a loss of hope; both Rashi and Nachmanides held that Sarah still
harbored the expectation that God would yet bless her some day to
conceive, but that for now, as throughout her life, Sarah was acting
in righteous and under divine guidance in the matter. [18]

She was acting out of love, and "did not render herself distant" from
Abraham, [19] but kept her heart knit together in love with his.
According to a modern Muslim scholar, it was because of this unselfish
act of Sarah that God would eventually reward her with a son of her
own. [20]

But up to now the yearning of her heart was not forthcoming, having
grown more elusive with each passing year. Indeed, as difficult as
Abraham's long trial of childlessness had been to him, "Sarah must
have been the one most deeply hurt by her barrenness." [21] And yet,
at this time of profound personal grief, out of the greatness of her
loving heart poured forth only soothing words of hope for Abraham, as
reported by Philo:

Do not let the trouble of my barrenness extend to you, or [your] kind
feeling to me to keep you from becoming what you can become, a father,
for I shall have no jealousy of another woman ... And if our prayers
for the birth of children are answered the offspring will be yours in
full parenthood, but surely mine also by adoption. But to avoid any
suspicion of jealousy on my part, take if you will my handmaiden ...
proved and tested by me for many years from the day when she was first
brought to my house, an Egyptian by birth, but a Hebrew by her rule of
life. [22]

Philo further reports that Sarah's words instilled in Abraham
"increased admiration for the wifely love, which never grew old and
was ever showing itself anew, and her careful forethought for the
future." [23] Even still, Abraham accepted Sarah's proposal only after
receiving revelation on the matter, [24] whereupon Sarah magnanimously
declared to Hagar, "Happy art thou to be united to so holy a man."
[25] Abraham married Hagar, who immediately became pregnant — even
though, in the poignant words of modern writers, "as Hagar's belly
swelled with child, Sarah's womb remained empty." [26]

Hagar, although remembered as a woman of righteousness and faith, [27]
began to "despise" (NIV Gen. 16:4) Sarah and treat her with "contempt"
(NRSV Gen. 16:4) and "disdain." [28] Her unbearable insolence included
claiming that Sarah's infertile condition proved her spiritual
inferiority. [29] Sarah's reaction is reported by Genesis, which tells
that she went to Abraham and said: "The wrong done to me is your
fault! I myself put my maid in your bosom; now that she sees that she
is pregnant, I am lowered in her esteem" (JPST Gen. 16:5).

Genesis then reports the following words by Sarah, words which the
English reader would automatically suppose were part of what Sarah
said to Abraham: "The LORD decide [or, 'Let the LORD judge' (GTC Gen.
16:5) [30] ] between you and me" (JPST Gen. 16:5). These adversarial
words color the immediately prior sentences, making Sarah's entire
communication to Abraham appear angrily divisive.

But it was Judaism's greatest grammarian and all-time Torah authority,
Rashi, who pointed out that the Hebrew word "between you" in this
passage is written with a feminine indicator for the person being
addressed, showing — according to Rashi and other Jewish sources —
that Sarah's statement about the Lord judging was addressed not to
Abraham but to Hagar. [31]

Other Jewish sources agree that Sarah was invoking the Lord not
against Abraham, but against anyone who would try to cause dissension
between her and Abraham. [32] Sarah's commitment to build Zion by
being of one heart with her husband was of highest priority, even when
she felt wronged.

By Abraham's supportive response to Sarah — "Your maid is in your
hands; deal with her as you think right" (JPST Gen. 16:6) — he was
apparently hoping that his soft answer would turn away Sarah's wrath.
[33] In any event, Abraham's reaction to Sarah shows that "he
willingly accepts any corrections that come from her." [34]

As Genesis tells, the pregnant Hagar fled. But an angel appeared to
her by a spring of water in the wilderness, and instructed her to
return to Sarah. That her child would play an important role in God's
plan is evident from the blessing the angel then pronounced upon
Hagar, in the name of the Lord: "I will so greatly multiply your
offspring that they cannot be counted for multitude" (NRSV Gen.
16:10). The angel even designated the name of the son she was carrying
in her womb: he would be called Ishmael, meaning "God has heard." For,
as the angel explained, the Lord had heeded Hagar in her distress.

The angel further assured Hagar that the freedom that she had sought
would in fact be enjoyed by her son. The closest an English
translation can come to what the angel then said about Ishmael is that
he would be "a wild donkey of a man" (NJB Gen. 16:12), a phrase that
can strike the modern ear as pejorative. But the Hebrew word is not
the term for a domesticated donkey, but rather for a particular
species that lives wild in the desert and, according to biblical
scholar Gordon Wenham, "looks more like a horse than a donkey, and is
used in the Old Testament as a figure of an individualistic lifestyle
untrammeled by social convention." [35] As explained by some of
Judaism's most prominent authorities, the angel's description of
Ishmael carries no negative sense whatsoever, but means "a free man
among men," enjoying the freedom of the desert. [36]

And according to Samson Raphael Hirsch, the angel's words in naming
Ishmael and then prophesying about his freedom constituted instruction
to Hagar in the "basic ideal" she must seek to instill in her son, and
which alone would truly make him free: an awareness of that Divine
Providence — memorialized by the name Ishmael, "God has heard" — that
watches over the deeds of men and assists them in their suffering.
[37] In short, Ishmael was, according to the words of the angel,
destined to be a great man.

Hagar returned and bore Ishmael, giving Abraham a son at long last. It
was part of the divine plan, for as latter-day revelation explains,
"from Hagar sprang many people. This, therefore, was fulfilling, among
other things, the promises" (D&C 132:34). Islamic texts tell of the
tenderness of the relationship between Abraham and Ishmael, while
Jewish tradition reports that Abraham loved him. [38]

Meanwhile, the faithful Sarah remained barren. What trials God
requires of His most faithful!

1.  Rendtorff, Men of the Old Testament, 16.

2.  Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 32.

3. Gretchen Clark, private correspondence to family members, March 20,
2001 (quoted by permission).

4.       Judean Antiquities 1.228, in Feldman, Josephus, 90, reporting
what Abraham told Isaac years later.

5.       Genesis Rabbah 39:11, in Freedman, Midrash Rabbah, Genesis, 1:320.

6.       Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, 2:214.

7.       Mastro, All the Women of the Bible, 382.

8.       Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 1:237.

9.       Hirsch, T'rumath Tzvi, 79. Or "pray," in Fox, Five Books of
Moses, 68, and Alter, Genesis, 66.

10.   Genesis 16:2, in Mitchell, Genesis, 29.

11.   Miller, Abraham Friend of God, 69, quoting Tanchuma Buber, Vayera 32.

12.   Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, 2:215.

13.   Miller, Abraham Friend of God, 69.

14.   Hirsch, T'rumath Tzvi, 80.

15.   Gordon B. Hinckley, "Excerpts from Recent Addresses of President
Gordon B. Hinckley," Ensign, December 1995, 66.

16.   "What Sarah did, then, was ... in conformance with the family
law of the Hurrians, a society whose customs the patriarchs knew
intimately and followed often." Speiser, Genesis, 121. As emphasized
by other commentators, the practice was far more widespread than the
Hurrians. See Wenham, Genesis 16–50, 7; Sarna, Genesis, 119;
Westermann, Genesis 12–36, 239; and von Rad, Genesis, 191.

17.   Journal of Discourses, 23:228.

18.   See Tuchman and Rapoport, Passions of the Matriarchs, 14–15.

19.   Chavel, Ramban, 211.

20.   Moyers, Genesis 193.

21.   Hirsch, T'rumath Tzvi, 79.

22.   On Abraham 43, in Philo VI, 123.

23.   On Abraham 43, in Philo VI, 123, 125.

24.   Doctrine and Covenants 132:34–35: "I, the Lord, commanded it."
Jewish sources similarly report that Abraham accepted Sarah's proposal
only after being "instructed" to do so "by the holy spirit." Ginzberg,
Legends of the Jews, 1:237.

25.   Genesis Rabbah 45:3, in Freedman, Midrash Rabbah, Genesis, 1:381.

26.   Tuchman and Rapoport, Passions of the Matriarchs, 16.

27.   See Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, 2:219.

28.   Genesis 16:4, in Vawter, On Genesis, 214.

29.   Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, 2:216–18.

30.   Or, as in NRSV, "May the LORD judge . . ."

31.   Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, 2:217–18,
quoting Rashi; Rashi on Genesis 16:5, in Rashi, Commentary, 135;
Scherman and Zlotowitz, Bereishis: Genesis, 1(a):544–545; Culi,
Magriso, and Argueti, Torah Anthology, 2:111.

32.   Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical Interpretation, 2:217.

33.   So Wenham, Genesis 16–50, 8–9.

34.   Didymus the Blind, On Genesis 2:41, in Oden, Ancient Christian
Commentary, 2:45.

35.   Wenham, Genesis 16–50, 10–11, spelling out "Old Testament" where
original has "OT."

36.   For example, Rashi said this phrase (from Genesis 16:12) means
"liking the wilderness." Rashi, Commentary, 137. Ibn Ezra, the learned
Spanish commentator of the twelfth century, interpreted the phrase to
mean "free among men." Kasher, Encyclopedia of Biblical
Interpretation, 2:221. Nineteenth-century scholar Samson Raphael
Hirsch translated the phrase as "a free man among men." Hirsch,
T'rumath Tzvi, 81.

37.   Regarding the rest of what was prophesied of Ishmael in Genesis
16:12, the next phrase is "his hand against everyone, and everyone's
hand against him" (JPST). Nahum Sarna has suggested that this is a
general prediction regarding Ishmael's descendants with regard to the
"unceasing tension that exists between the sedentary and nomadic
populations in the Near East." Sarna, Genesis, 121. But if this phrase
refers personally to Ishmael, then in context it again seems to speak
of a desert existence where, in the open spaces, danger could come
from any quarter. Accordingly, speaking of the entire verse, modern
scholar Gordon Wenham notes that it "describes Ishmael's future
destiny, to enjoy a free-roaming bedouinlike existence. The freedom
his mother sought will be his one day." Wenham, Genesis 16–50, 10–11.

38.   The meaning of the final phrase that the angel tells Hagar — "He
shall dwell alongside all is kinsmen" (JPST) — is disputed, but the
most likely translation seems to be that Ishmael will dwell
"alongside" or "in the face of" or "in the presence of" his brothers
or kin. See Speiser, Genesis, 117: "in the face of"; Fox, Five Books
of Moses, 68: "in the presence of."

39.   Hirsch, T'rumath Tzvi, 81.

40.   See Levner, Legends of Israel, 87; Bialik and Ravnitzky, Book of
Legends, 40.