Chapter 10. Genesis 10. Hagar.
SARAI, the wife of Abram, had a maid who was also Abrams wife. Her name was Hagar. She behaved disrespectfully to her mistress, and this made Sarai angry, wherefore she treated her harshly, and Hagar ran away from her mistress and fled into the wilderness. There, an angel of the Lord found her by a fountain of water, and said to her: Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from, and where are you going? And she said: I have run away from my mistress, Sarai. And the angel of the Lord said to her, Return to thy mistress and be obedient to her. This was her duty, and she could not be blessed, nor happy while she forgot this, and gave way to her own pride and self-will. Was it not gracious of the Lord to seek her in that lonely place and give her this wise advise? How much sorrow we would spare ourselves if we would always hearken to God’s word and obey, as Hagar did. We like to have our own way and if not given it, we show our displeasure in many ways. God has told us what the end will be if we refuse to listen to His word. “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.” Prov. 14:1212There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death. (Proverbs 14:12). How needful then, that we should pray, “Teach me Thy way, O Lord.”
The angel of the Lord promised Hagar she would become the mother of a great nation, and the son who would be born of her should be called Ishmael, which means, “God shall hear,” because the Lord had heard her affliction. “And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him.”
Ishmael was born not long after that, and from him are descended the Arabians, who have always been a wild people, as the angel had foretold.
So Hagar was comforted, and she did as she was commanded, and returned to Sarai. But first she gave a name to the Lord who had appeared to her; she called Him, “Thou God seest me” for she said “Have I also here looked after Him that seeth me?” The well was called, “Beerlahairoi,”—which means, “The well of Him that liveth and seeth me.” The eyes of the Lord are in every place beholding the evil and the good, and He is as ready to comfort and help now, as He was in the time of Hagar.
And Abram was eighty-six years old when Ishmael was born.
ML 03/14/1909