CHAPTER 21
1 Forsooth God visited Sarah, as he promised, and [ful] filled those things, that he spake.
2 And she conceived, and childed a son in her eld age, in the time wherein God before-said to her.
3 And Abraham called the name of his son, whom Sarah childed to him, Isaac.
4 And Abraham circumcised him in the eighth day, as God commanded to him,
5 when he was of an hundred years; for Isaac was born in this age of the father.
6 And Sarah said, The Lord hath made laughing to me, and whoever shall hear shall laugh with me.
7 And again she said, Who should hear, and believe to Abraham, that Sarah should give sucking to a son, whom she childed to him, when he is now an eld [or old] man?
8 Therefore the child increased, and was weaned; and Abraham made a great feast in the day of his weaning.
9 And when Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, playing, or doing idolatry, with Isaac her son,
10 she said to Abraham, Cast out this handmaid and her son; for the son of the handmaid shall not be heir with my son Isaac.
11 Abraham took this heavily for his son;
12 and God said to him, Be it not seen sharp to thee on the child, and on thine handmaid; all things which Sarah saith to thee, hear thou her voice, for in Isaac seed shall be called to thee;
13 but also I shall make the son of the handmaid into a great folk, for he is thy seed.
14 And so Abraham rose early, and took bread, and a bottle of water, and put it on Hagar’s shoulder, and he betook to her the child*, and let go her; and when she had gone, she went out of the way in the wilderness of Beersheba.
15 And when the water in the bottle was ended, she cast away the child under a tree that was there;
16 and she went away, and she sat even against, as far as a bow may cast; for she said, I shall not see the child dying; and she sat against, and raised [up] her voice, and wept.
17 Forsooth the Lord heard the voice of the child, and the angel of the Lord called Hagar from heaven, and said, What doest thou, Hagar? do not thou dread, for God hath heard the voice of the child, from the place wherein he is.
18 Rise thou, and take the child, and hold his hand; for I shall make him into a great folk.
19 And God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water, and she went, and filled the bottle, and she gave drink to the child;
20 and God was with him, and he increased, and dwelled in wilderness, and he was made a young man an archer,
21 and dwelled in the desert of Paran; and his mother took to him a wife of the land of Egypt.
22 In the same time, Abimelech, and Phicol, prince of his host, said to Abraham, God is with thee in all things that thou doest;
23 therefore swear thou by God that thou harm not me, and mine heirs, and my kindred; but by the mercy which I did to thee, do thou to me, and to the land in which thou livedest as a comeling.
24 And Abraham said, I shall swear.
25 And he blamed Abimelech for the well of water, which his servants took away by violence.
26 And Abimelech answered, I wist not who did this thing, but also thou showedest not to me, and I heard not except today.
27 And so Abraham took sheep and oxen, and gave to Abimelech, and both smote together a bond of peace.
28 And Abraham set seven ewe lambs of the flock asides half.
29 And Abimelech said to him, What will these seven ewe lambs mean to themselves, which thou madest stand asides half?
30 And he said, Thou shalt take of mine hand seven ewe lambs, that those [or they] be into witnessing to me, for I digged this well.
31 Therefore that place was called Beersheba, that is, The Well of the Oath†, for ever either swore there;
32 and they made bond of peace for the well of an oath. Forsooth Abimelech rose, and Phicol, the prince of his chivalry, and they turned again into the land of Palestines.
33 Soothly Abraham planted a wood in Beersheba, and inwardly called there the name of [the] everlasting God;
34 and he was an earth-tiller, or a comeling, of the land of Palestines in many days.
* CHAPTER 21:14 Ishmael would be about 15 years old at this time. † CHAPTER 21:31 Beersheba also means ‘the Well of the Seven’.