Genèse 21

¹The LORD took note of Sarah as he had said he would, and the LORD carried out for Sarah what he had spoken. ²Sarah conceived, and when Abraham was old she gave him a son, at the set time God had told him of. ³Abraham gave the name Isaac to the son who had been born to him, the son Sarah bore him. ⁴Abraham circumcised his son Isaac on the eighth day after his birth, following God’s command. ⁵Abraham was 100 years old when his son Isaac was born. ⁶Sarah said, “God has given me reason to laugh, and all who hear of it will share my laughter.”^{a 7}She went on, “Who would have dared to tell Abraham, ‘Sarah will be nursing babies’? But now, when he is old, I have borne him a son!” ⁸The boy grew older, and Abraham celebrated the day of his weaning with a large feast. ⁹Then Sarah saw the son that Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham poking fun.^{bc 10}and she told Abraham, “Send this slave woman and her boy away! No son of this slave is going to be an heir alongside my son Isaac.” ¹¹This grieved Abraham deeply, since it was his own son at stake. ¹²But God told Abraham, “Do not be troubled about the boy and your slave woman. Do as Sarah says, in everything. The descendants who will carry your name will come through Isaac. ¹³But I will make the slave woman’s son into a nation as well, because he too is your child.” ¹⁴Abraham was up at dawn. He took food and a skin of water and handed them to Hagar, setting them on her shoulder; he handed over the boy too, and sent her away. She left and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba. ¹⁵Once the skin had no water left, she laid the boy down under one of the shrubs. ¹⁶She moved away and sat down across from him at about the distance an arrow flies. “I will not watch while the boy dies,” she said to herself. There she sat, facing him from a distance, and she wept aloud.^{d 17}God heard the boy’s voice, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven. “What is wrong, Hagar?” he said. “Do not be afraid. God has heard the boy’s voice there where he lies. ¹⁸Get up, raise the boy to his feet and take him firmly by the hand. I will make a great nation of him.” ¹⁹God opened her eyes, and there she saw a well. She went over, filled the skin and gave the boy water to drink. ²⁰God stayed with the boy while he grew. He settled in the wilderness and became an expert with the bow. ²¹He made his home in the wilderness of Paran, and his mother found him a wife from Egypt.

²²Around that time Abimelech and Phicol, the commander of his army, spoke to Abraham: “God is with you in whatever you do. ²³So swear to me by God, here and now, that you will never play me false, nor my children, nor their descendants after them. I have kept faith with you; keep faith in the same way with me and with this land where you have made your home as a foreigner.” ²⁴Abraham replied, “I give you my oath.” ²⁵Abraham, however, took Abimelech to task over a well that Abimelech’s men had taken from him by force. ²⁶Abimelech said, “I have no idea who did this. You never told me, and this is the first I have heard of it.” ²⁷Abraham then presented Abimelech with sheep and cattle, and the two of them entered into a covenant. ²⁸Then Abraham took seven young ewes from the flock and placed them to one side. ²⁹Abimelech asked Abraham, “Why have you put these seven lambs off to one side?” ³⁰He answered, “Take these seven lambs from me. They will stand as my proof that I am the one who dug this well.” ³¹That is why the place was named Beersheba: the two of them took an oath there. ³²Once the covenant at Beersheba was made, Abimelech and his army commander Phicol got up and went home to the land of the Philistines. ³³Abraham planted a tamarisk at Beersheba. There he worshiped, calling on the name of the LORD, God Everlasting. ³⁴For a long time after that, Abraham lived as a resident foreigner in the land of the Philistines.