History and Story (1)
just as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord, and you have become her children if you do what is right without being frightened by any fear. 1 Peter 3:6 NASB
Calling him lord – Peter places Sarah in the hall of saints. But of course he would. She is the matriarch of all matriarchs, the first, the original. Unfortunately, Peter’s assessment doesn’t seem to fit the events recorded in the Genesis text. Now you could argue that Sarah did obey Abraham, even to her own detriment. After all, she followed him out of Ur. She went along with Abraham’s self-protective scheme when he shipped her off to Pharaoh’s harem. She let him lead her across unknown lands. Perhaps she did call him “lord.” The Hebrew word, ba’al, allows this meaning, along with “husband,” and “man.” We might note that ba’al is also the word used to describe pagan deities. So I suppose there is a sense in which Peter is right. Sarah did obey.
But that is only a small part of the story. The rest of the story needs to address these inquires and questions:
In the first part of the story, Abraham has two women. He has two sons. Which one does he favor and why?
Sarah’s experience of betrayal in Egypt seems to set the tone for the rest of her life. From that point on, she attempts to control but never takes responsibility for the results. Why?
Sarah is quite clear about her hatred for Hagar, drawn into this family disaster by her own initiative. “Get rid of that handmaid.” Why would Abraham do that? How much does guilt act as motivator?
What is the resulting trauma to Ishmael? How does he respond?
Why does Isaac seek out Ishmael after his father attempts to kill him? Why does Esau marry Ishmael’s daughter?
What happens to the marriage of Abraham and Sarah? Why do they end up in two separate locations? Why is the only expression of Abraham’s love for Sarah found in the text about her death?
Sarah compares herself with Hagar. Does Abraham compare her? Which one is obedient? Which one is gentle?
Isn’t this story repeated in the life of Abraham’s grandson with Leah and Rachel? Does Jacob learn favoritism from Isaac and Rebekah. Are his two wives any different than Abraham’s?
To answer these questions, we need a much deeper look at Sarah. Let’s begin (this will take a few days).
“God has made a joke of me” Genesis 21:6
I don’t think we know the people of the Bible very well. We are the victims of years of watered-down teaching. The stories of the lives of our spiritual ancestors have been sanctified. We know the triumphs of their faith, but we have little appreciation for the times of humility, disobedience and failure. Of course, there are notable exceptions. We have heard of David’s adultery and Samson’s seduction. But most of the time, our attention is focused on the heroic acts, even if they come about as a result of sin.
This myopia damages our identification with these people. We see them as something special, living beyond our meager spiritual capabilities. But if we really look at the stories of their lives, we will discover something amazing. The Bible never glosses over the failures of people. It never avoids describing their disobedience. It never paints them as anything but completely human. There is a good reason for this. The Bible is not a book about past spiritual heroes. It is a book about God’s faithfulness to His promises in spite of the failures of the human beings whom He chose as the messengers of His grace. The Bible is God’s story, not ours. So, there is very little room for hero worship, saints on pedestals or spiritual supermen. The story of Sarah is a perfect example.
We know very little about Sarai, the wife of Abram. When the story opens, we are only told that she was married to Abram and accompanied him when he left home to follow God’s call. As the story unfolds, we discover that she is the half sister of Abram, but other than that, we know nothing of her lineage. However, we soon find out quite a bit about her temperament.
Marriage to Abram was not exactly the epitome of bliss. Sarai dutifully obeys Abram as he determines to leave behind family and possessions, but she soon discovers that Abram is not quite as protective as most wives would like. After a journey from Haran to Negev, they settle into a life of nomadic existence. Since Abram travels with his nephew and all their possessions, we can be fairly certain that life for Sarai was probably a routine Bedouin existence. The first sign of marital discontent comes after Abram decides to do the commonsense thing in the face of a famine. We find the story in Genesis 12:10-20.
Abram is called by Yahweh to go to a place Yahweh will show him. Yahweh promises that He will make Abram a great nation, that Abram will be famous and that anyone abusing Abram will fall under Yahweh’s curse (Genesis 12:1-3). This promise is not conditional. It is comprehensive in its scope. It does not depend on Abram’s circumstances or obedience. It is God’s doing. But soon after Abram responds to this call and accepts the promise, he runs into a challenging situation. The land is not able to provide food for his group. He determines to take matters into his own hands and do the commonsense thing—go to Egypt. After all, what good is a promise from God if Abram dies from starvation? Apparently, Abram did not consider the fact that Yahweh’s promise implied provision for life in spite of circumstances. Abram does what we would do. What we discover is that usually the commonsense thing leads us into problems. Abram’s story is no different.
As Abram approaches Egypt, he fears a potential threat. His wife is beautiful and alluring. He reasons that if Pharaoh should decide that such a woman is worth having in the harem, Pharaoh may conclude that the only way to have Sarai is to dispose of Abram. So, Abram propagates a lie. Sarai is not his wife but his sister. This lie enables Pharaoh to enjoy sexual intimacy with Sarai without any risk to Abram. In fact, Abram is rewarded for arranging Sarai’s availability. Everyone benefits—except Sarai. Pharaoh gets what he wants—a new woman in bed. Abram gets what he wants—protection and financial gain. But all of this is at Sarai’s expense who is asked to provide sexual favors to Pharaoh under the guise that she is a free woman.
It is important to note that this deception not only abuses Sarai but also abuses God. While the commandant “Thou shall not commit adultery” has not been given, Abram had every reason to believe that God’s protection certainly extended to his temporary domicile in Egypt. In fact, Abram summarily ignores God’s direct promise when he decides to take the journey to Egypt. He overturns God’s direction—“to a land that I will show you”—in favor of his own choice based on his reasonable assessment of the situation. As it turns out, this is the beginning of a long and difficult marital disaster.
This was a disaster of Abram’s making. Abram put an impossible moral dilemma on Sarai’s shoulders: lie for me or I might be killed – sleep with Pharaoh and pretend that you are my sister or you might lose your husband and become Pharaoh’s property anyway. So Sarai went along with the deception. Both men seemed content with the arrangement. But God was not so pleased. The entire episode results in plagues and distress for Pharaoh. Once Pharaoh perceives that God is inflicting punishment on him, he takes steps to expose the lie and then to expel Abram and his entire following. Nothing is mentioned about Sarai’s feelings regarding this event, but it takes little imagination to see that the bond between husband and wife is traumatically damaged. Sarai could no longer trust Abram as her protector. Her life of discontent began with her husband’s disobedience.
Tomorrow we will examine the results.
Topical Index: Sarai, Sarah, Abram, Genesis 21:6, 1 Peter 3:6
NOTE: Today Rosanne and I return to Italy, to Parma this time. So, internet replies to your comments or inquiries may be a little slow for the next few weeks. Be patient, please. Skip
Hello to everyone we know Skip will have a wonderful time, along with Roseanne, hopefully we will see some pictures.
Just to start off, it is so true that we need Old Testament Scholars and rabbis to help us with these texts… If I remember correctly this is the only Parsha Jewish reading of Old Testament that has a woman’s name Sarah. After all If Abraham is the father of our faith he had a wife and she must fit into the picture. And yes the not the first Dysfunctional Family. Now back then the new Norm wasn’t new at all. Dysfunctional was the normal, but it was how God played out faithfulness to his word. I need to remind myself of the Covenant promises that never were removed. After all the Lord did promise Abraham a family more no more than the Stars, or the grains of sand on the sea. And that includes you and me. Shalom
I get it that people had a hard time and that God’s purposes happened anyway, but it is a little hard for me to think that a God who thought it important to plague Pharoah would not think it would be important to plague him BEFORE he bedded Sarai, the mother of the promised nation. Most ancient kings had some sort of cleansing rituals they put their women through for many obvious reasons. Adding her to his harem does not automatically mean he bedded her right away, right? Especially if the text does not support it?
I also find it hard to believe that adultery was not understood before Sinai. Why else would it be important for the Bible to list Lamech’s two wives if everybody had a few? Why would God’s character (which the Ten Commands outline) not have been known to Adam and Eve, who personally knew Him? Why would there be a curse on Ham if nobody knew about sexual misconduct? For that matter, why would Cain have been held accountable for his brother’s murder if nobody knew that was wrong? And if they didn’t know it was wrong before, surely they knew it afterward? And why were the Israelites expected to have “remembered” the Sabbath long before Sinai, and expected to keep it, too? Why would Judah have been mad about Tamar deceiving him if lying was not considered wrong? I realize it is popular to assume nobody knew the Ten Commands before Sinai but the evidence does not support that supposition very well, does it?
I would be better convinced that nobody knew God’s character (or, righteousness, of which the Ten is the only template) or knew they were expected to copy it before Sinai if there was more (any?) evidence that they were ignorant. On the contrary, I see no evidence of ignorance; only textual acknowledgement that disobedience to them was sin, even before the Flood, and certainly long before Sinai. If Abraham was called “righteous” before righteous was defined, then was he only called that because he had cognitive ‘faith’, like it is popular to believe today, or was it because he was obedient to a God he personally talked to? For that matter, somebody please try to convince me that the patriarchs in general were blasphemers; mistreaters of parents; non-worshipers of the Creator Who rested on the Sabbath and walked with humans every day before the Fall; murderers; liars; sexual perverts or covetous thieves, because they were just ignorant. Please.
Why would God have left the planet ignorant of righteousness until Sinai? They would have quickly extinguished themselves! Why would God have determined to destroy the planet with a flood because it was “wicked” if He never told anybody about righteousness? Is that fair? Does that even make any sense?
Seeker pointed out that the original intention was for things of God to be passed down orally, and, until Sinai, they were. Can we automatically conclude, then, that there was nothing oral to have been passed down, or is it more likely that because people FAILED to do that in Egypt that another way of transmission – writing – was implemented?
Skip and Rosanne: bon voyage! (or would that be bon vol?)
Laurita, Excellent as usual. Thank you. I’m curious as to how you have gotten to where you’re at right now in your walk with God? Since I am fairly new to this blog, I’m curious. I enjoy, if that’s the correct word, because it doesn’t always feel good, your writings from the book “31 days of transformation”. Especially day 17, yesterday was really a lot for me to take in. If I have a mental picture it would be of you being in a group way ahead of me, pressing toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. “Been there, done that” type thing.
I have a great hunger to glean from
your experience. Just curious, hope you don’t mind. Isn’t that how it’s meant to be. We learn with those who are older than us in God.
Blessings!
Dear Larry,
I owe Skip more than you know for patiently putting up with me! A lot! I don’t think I am ‘ahead’ as that would entail being a part of a working community of faith, which I currently feel I am lacking. Such as it is here, this is what I have right now, and am incredibly grateful for what I have gotten from everybody. Everybody. Skip has handed me more puzzle pieces perhaps than just about any other person. If I presume (a lot!), it is because I have no better way to show my gratitude. I am usually sorry, too, because of my lacks.
As I have told much of my story the last few years, I won’t repeat it, but I will say that my background, as I have said before, is Seventh Day Adventist. I know everybody here comes from somewhere. That is where I come from. I have been ‘out in the cold’, however, for about 40 years now, and I feel it is because I am supposed to see something out here. What I see (as I write often) is that we all need to learn to act like a Body; irrespective of where we might have come from. That is my deepest conviction and assignment, I feel. So, here I am; starting over and learning. The more I learn, the more I owe everybody’s patience and input.
My favorite book is one on the life of Christ titled The Desire Of Ages, by Ellen White. There is more beauty in that book than in any other literature I have read. I read it almost every day and it is ever new. The rest of her series, written about Genesis to Revelation, is called “Conflict of the Ages”, I think. For today’s topic, I was relying on what she wrote in the first book, called Patriarchs and Prophets. It is all online and open source, these days. Of course, I read everything else, too!
Please keep writing, Larry. You may not feel you ‘know’ a lot, but the longer I live, the more I can see I am that way, too. None of us know much, but if we put it all together, I think that is the important thing. Believe it or not, I learn a lot from you, and you encourage me many days. I wanted to thank you many times for what you give me, and surely so many others. You have something we all need and none of us have. Please keep sharing!
Laurita, If I may (personal deduction of scriptures) the only reason why we do not read of how God’s Oracles were communicated is because Job and Genisis is setting the guideline or framework for the rest of the scriptures.
What we read of is in a nutshell a condensed version of how God called individuals and their struggle to follow the instructions as Skip highlights here.
This complete process is repeated by Moses with a lot of detail we call Totah
The same twisting results is found with this specific intervention. Even with the kings and prophets all a repetition of becoming the holy priesthood for God.
Still not achieved the last intervention Yeshua… With a slightly more humanistic approach.
After all as Skip confirms it is His Story not historical records…
Now take the things your mother or grandmother taught you. How many of these can you automatically link to the Ten Commandments?
This is not degrading the Torah it is just indicating how easy it can be achieved through the things we were taught in love. And that has been happening since the begining of relationships…
Sorry Skip a lot of deduction no academic proof…
Laurita,
I do not doubt that Genesis was compiled and edited by Moses but there is nothing in it that states that, 1, Moses was the original author, or, 2, that it was handed down to him orally by either God or earlier men.
To imagine that the Hebrews were unacquainted with, or had no written history at this late date is incredulous. Their patriarch, Abraham, was a very wealthy man and was from Ur, in the cradle of civilisation, where writing (cuneiform), was in frequent use a thousand years before Moses was born. Thousands of clay tablets have been found written before the patriarchal age. More than a quarter million cuneiform clay tablets are distributed among the museums of the world. In Babylon, they were used to record everyday trivial correspondence. Did Hammurabi, in the 1700s B.C., write his law for illiterates?
The Hebrews were not enslaved for 400 years but, more likely, about 115 years. Up until their enslavement, they were very prosperous. Just because they were enslaved does not mean they got stupid, illiterate, or lost all their records.
The literary structures within Genesis can be used to demonstrate this point.
Thank you for balance, Dan.
I, too, believe that Moses ‘published’ previous material – in Genesis, anyway – but we also do not have evidence that it was NOT orally transmitted, either. He spent 40 years in the desert next to Job’s neighborhood, after all, and his father-in-law was a priest of YHVH. There simply is no earlier Hebrew written material with which to compare; for us, anyway.
However, there is a Biblical statement that at least the Levitical code was (orally?) given him by “angels” (see above reference).
Moses, of course, was educated in Egypt and could read and write quite well. It’s interesting to me that, apparently, he did not write in Egyptian hieroglyphics!
Thank you for pointing out that their sojourn in Egypt was only a little over a hundred years. I, too, do not believe that they became illiterate or stupid during that short time. I used “forgot” in the similar manner that the Bible uses it; as in deliberate refusal to pass it along or obey. Their children did not know YHVH because they did not tell them, apparently. I blame the easy years in Goshen for most of their syncretism with Egypt. Life was just too cushy for too long. How many of us (who have enjoyed cushiness, too) could orally transmit the Bible to our children? I think we, too, are already much more slaves to our surrounding culture than we know. We have compromised our own freedom far too much, and our own precipice cannot be far away now. I guess we don’t have much excuse either!
Thank you, Dan, for cleaning up my edges. I value all interchanges with you. You must think and study a lot!
It’s quite obvious that missing the mark is played out again with Isaac and Rebekah,slightly different outcomes . Abraham was made to leave and Isaac stayed in the land of the Philistines ,digging Wells and the Philistines filling them up . they thought digging Wells was Paramount to a claim to the land. Isaac eventually settled in Beersheba and dug Wells but this time the Philistines came to him wanting a deal.As one would expect famines cause fear in people You die without food or water. Learning to trust God for everything especially when it comes to food and water was tough especially in ancient times. Most of us have no concept of death by starvation nor do we raise animals that could starve along with us. The journey with God is always our trust and faith in him ” does he really mean what he says” . Unfortunately our patterns of trust are developed first within family,than larger community.How many times have promises been broken even in a believing family or community .Our forefathers experienced it just like we do “what have we done to save our own skins?” Where God shows his faithfulness is when we can say “his way is the only way and come back to it”. As Yeshua says man does not live by bread alone but every word the proceeds out of the mouth of God. Through the years we hopefully learn through untrustworthiness Your trust in God is imperative and grows stronger.”And Where would I go Yeshua you have the words of life” becomes a heart pursuit . We can break bad family patterns maybe not everyones but I have seen it in my life and others.All of us are not doomed to dysfunction even in a very sick and dysfunctional world.
Thank you for this study. We as women do want that stalwart protector in our husbands. Sometimes we get some of that along with a lot of having to learn to trust and lean on the Lord. A good result, nevertheless…
“. The Bible is not a book about past spiritual heroes. It is a book about God’s faithfulness to His promises in spite of the failures of the human beings whom He chose as the messengers of His grace. The Bible is God’s story, not ours. So, there is very little room for hero worship, saints on pedestals or spiritual supermen”
Thanks for this. I entirely agree with this perspective, it helps express the vast difference between the Hebrews and the other ancient peoples. As I have quoted Camille Paglia “The Greeks made gods in the Image of men, the Hebrews made men in the Image of God”. The reason is simple. The Greek god’s simply did not have the power to write. Those two tablets and ten comandments God gave Moses really started something!