Genesis 16

Sarai and Hagar

¹Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children. She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar.²And Sarai said to Abram, “Behold now, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. Go in to my servant; it may be that I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai.³So, after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram her husband as a wife.⁴And he went in to Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress.⁵And Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done to me be on you! I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the Lord judge between you and me!”⁶But Abram said to Sarai, “Behold, your servant is in your power; do to her as you please.” Then Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she fled from her.

⁷The angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur.⁸And he said, “Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from my mistress Sarai.”⁹The angel of the Lord said to her, “Return to your mistress and submit to her.”¹⁰The angel of the Lord also said to her, “I will surely multiply your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for multitude.”¹¹And the angel of the Lord said to her,

“Behold, you are pregnant

and shall bear a son.

You shall call his name Ishmael,

because the Lord has listened to your affliction.

¹²He shall be a wild donkey of a man,

his hand against everyone

and everyone's hand against him,

and he shall dwell over against all his kinsmen.”

¹³So she called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, “You are a God of seeing,” for she said, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.”¹⁴Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; it lies between Kadesh and Bered.

¹⁵And Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram called the name of his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael.¹⁶Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram.