#Genesis 16:1-6

Sarah vs. Hagar

Even in this brief passage, we have two sources telling us about Hagar. (Not so surprising, since both J and P know that Abraham has a son, Ishmael, who is older than his son with Sarah, Isaac).

P gives it straight: Sarah hasn’t had any children. This is the first P has mentioned it, but that’s also sensible: there hasn’t been any significant narrative to this point in P. Abraham arrived in Canaan and split up from Lot, that’s it. This is the first notable event.

Sarah has no children, but she has an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar (16:1). So she gives Hagar to Abraham as a second wife/concubine (16:3). Totally straightforward. The note that this was ten years after Abraham arrived may signal how long they were trying to conceive.

(If you like, you can jump ahead to the end of P’s “story” here, in 16:15-16, where Hagar bears a son and Abraham names him Ishmael. That’s all, folks - typical P, more of a notice than a narrative.)

In J, we get more. Sarah has a personality in J - she’s bitter about her barrenness, blaming YHWH for it. She offers her maidservant (as her unnamed) to Abraham not as a concubine or wife, but just as a surrogate.

Sarah uses the great word אבנה, straddling the line of “I will have a son through her” and “I will be built up through her,” both, especially the latter, referring to the social status that is gained by a wife who can produce male offspring.

(On the social status of the childless mother in ancient Israel and surrounding areas, see my book with @candidamoss, Reconceiving Infertility: https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691164830/reconceiving-infertility.) Long story short: Sarah has every right to be concerned about her situation, and want a remedy for it.

Abraham agrees (16:2), and he sleeps with Hagar, and she conceives (16:4). The superiority she feels toward Sarah is entirely tied up in all of the social shame and stigma that accompanied barrenness in Israelite culture.

Note, though, how the text carefully avoids making Hagar into a villain: not “she thought less of Sarah,” but “Sarah appeared cursed to her.” The word קלל has a range of meanings, but I like this one, because it plays off Sarah’s own claim, that YHWH is responsible.

It also makes Hagar into a mere observer of facts that Sarah has already entered into evidence, so to speak, rather than positioning her as cruel or vindictive. (For contrast, see Hannah’s nemesis, Peninah, who is decidedly put in the role of antagonist.)

Sarah’s behavior in 16:5-6 feels indefensible. Hagar is entirely without agency throughout: she is forced into the role of surrogate, and then abused for it. Abraham is totally passive; Sarah is the definition of the abusive slaveholder. Not a role usually associated with her.

I think this is a case where the text itself makes Sarah out to be pretty bad. She abuses (ענה) Hagar, the same word that in J is used for how the Egyptians treat the Israelites (Exod 1:11-12). I’d like to read this as condemning Sarah for her mistreatment of Hagar.

The other option, though, is that this is a conscious, almost gleeful, reversal of Egypt’s abuse of Israel, and Sarah’s treatment of Hagar is meant to be a sort of proleptic vengeance. I don’t like that reading, but I also can’t rule it out.

For more on Hagar and her reception, check out @NyashaJunior’s book, Reimagining Hagar: https://www.amazon.com/Reimagining-Hagar-Blackness-Biblical-Refigurations/dp/019874532X/ref=nodl_