The covenant of the pieces, whereby the fortunes of his descendants
were revealed to Abraham, was made at a time when he was still
childless.[115] As long as Abraham and Sarah dwelt outside of the Holy
Land, they looked upon their childlessness as a punishment for not
abiding within it. But when a ten years' sojourn in Palestine found her
barren as before, Sarah perceived that the fault lay with her.[116]
Without a trace of jealousy she was ready to give her slave Hagar to
Abraham as wife,[117] first making her a freed woman.[118] For Hagar
was Sarah's property, not her husband's. She had received her from
Pharaoh, the father of Hagar. Taught and bred by Sarah, she walked in
the same path of righteousness as her mistress,[119] and thus was a
suitable companion for Abraham, and, instructed by the holy spirit, he
acceded to Sarah's proposal.
No sooner had Hagar's union with Abraham been consummated, and she felt
that she was with child, than she began to treat her former mistress
contemptuously, though Sarah was particularly tender toward her in the
state in which she was. When noble matrons came to see Sarah, she was
in the habit of urging them to pay a visit to "poor Hagar," too. The
dames would comply with her suggestion, but Hagar would use the
opportunity to disparage Sarah. "My lady Sarah," she would say, "is not
inwardly what she appears to be outwardly. She makes the impression of
a righteous, pious woman, but she is not, for if she were, how could
her childlessness be explained after so many years of marriage, while I
became pregnant at once?"
Sarah scorned to bicker with her slave, yet the rage she felt found
vent in these words to Abraham:[120] "It is thou who art doing me
wrong. Thou hearest the words of Hagar, and thou sayest naught to
oppose them, and I hoped that thou wouldst take my part. For thy sake
did I leave my native land and the house of my father, and I followed
thee into a strange land with trust in God. In Egypt I pretended to be
thy sister, that no harm might befall thee. When I saw that I should
bear no children, I took the Egyptian woman, my slave Hagar, and gave
her unto thee for wife, contenting myself with the thought that I would
rear the children she would bear. Now she treats me disdainfully in thy
presence. O that God might look upon the injustice which hath been done
unto me, to judge between thee and me, and have mercy upon us, restore
peace to our home, and grant us offspring, that we have no need of
children from Hagar, the Egyptian bondwoman of the generation of the
heathen that cast thee in the fiery furnace!"[121]
Abraham, modest and unassuming as he was, was ready to do justice to
Sarah, and he conferred full power upon her to dispose of Hagar
according to her pleasure. He added but one caution, "Having once made
her a mistress, we cannot again reduce her to the state of a
bondwoman." Unmindful of this warning, Sarah exacted the services of a
slave from Hagar. Not alone this, she tormented her, and finally she
cast an evil eye upon her, so that the unborn child dropped from her,
and she ran away. On her flight she was met by several angels, and they
bade her return, at the same time making known to her that she would
bear a son who should be called Ishmael—one of the six men who have
been given a name by God before their birth, the others being Isaac,
Moses, Solomon, Josiah, and the Messiah.[122]
Thirteen years after the birth of Ishmael the command was issued to
Abraham that he put the sign of the covenant upon his body and upon the
bodies of the male members of his household. Abraham was reluctant at
first to do the bidding of God, for he feared that the circumcision of
his flesh would raise a barrier between himself and the rest of
mankind. But God said unto him, "Let it suffice thee that I am thy God
and thy Lord, as it sufficeth the world that I am its God and its
Lord."[123]
Abraham then consulted with his three true friends, Aner, Eshcol, and
Mamre, regarding the command of the circumcision. The first one spoke,
and said, "Thou art nigh unto a hundred years old, and thou considerest
inflicting such pain upon thyself?" The advice of the second was also
against it. "What," said Eshcol, "thou choosest to mark thyself so that
thy enemies may recognize thee without fail?" Mamre, the third, was the
only one to advise obedience to the command of God. "God succored thee
from the fiery furnace," he said, "He helped thee in the combat with
the kings, He provided for thee during the famine, and thou dost
hesitate to execute His behest concerning the circumcision?"[124]
Accordingly, Abraham did as God had commanded, in bright daylight,
bidding defiance to all, that none might say, "Had we seen him attempt
it, we should have prevented him."[125]
The circumcision was performed on the tenth day of Tishri, the Day of
Atonement, and upon the spot on which the altar was later to be erected
in the Temple, for the act of Abraham remains a never-ceasing atonement
for Israel.[126]