#Abraham and Sarah

[fionamccall]

Entertaining angels unawares

I've always loved this scene from St Vitale in Ravenna of Abraham and Sarah entertaining angelic visitors. I love the three angels, but Sarah's face is particularly good.

[biblebloodhound]

From Infertility to Laughter (Genesis 21:1-7)

I am heartened that Abraham kept bringing up Sarah’s infertility issue to God. And the Lord was never silent about it, but remained adamant that the divine promise would come from the two of them together.

The Lord was attentive to Sarah just as he had said, and the Lord carried out just what he had promised her. She became pregnant and gave birth to a son for Abraham when he was old, at the very time God had told him. Abraham named his son—the one Sarah bore him—Isaac. Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old just as God had commanded him. Abraham was 100 years old when his son…

[freebiblestudies]

Plagues in the Bible Lesson 01: Introduction

Lesson 01: introduction

Most people have a passing familiarity with plagues in the Bible like the ten plagues of Egypt.  Perhaps some people may have heard of the last seven plagues in Revelation.  Everyone understands plagues are a bad thing.  However, does God really allow plagues to happen for the sake of punishment and destruction?  Are there any spiritual lessons we can learn from plagues in the Bible?  Let’s find out together.

What is a plague?  According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, a plague is defined as a disastrous evil or calamity.  A plague could be an epidemic disease with a high mortality rate or a destructive influx of a noxious animal.

Let’s read together Genesis 12:1-20 and Genesis 17:1-19.

The first mention of plagues in the Bible is surprisingly not in the book of Exodus.  It appears in the book of Genesis.  Abram convinced his wife Sarai to lie to the Egyptians and tell them that she was his sister.  Pharaoh saw how beautiful she was and treated Abram well for her sake.  However, Pharaoh intended to take Sarai as his wife.

Why did God seemingly punish Pharaoh for Abraham’s deception?  Note that God made a covenant to make a great nation out of Abram and Sarai.  (We can confirm Sarai was part of the covenant promise a few chapters later when God rejected Ishmael as the heir of promise.)  Abram’s lie about Sarah was about to derail that promise.  God plagued Pharaoh’s household to prevent Pharaoh from consummating a marriage with Sarai.

When Pharaoh found out the truth, he rebuked Abram for potentially bringing disaster upon him.  Pharaoh then sent Abram and Sarai away in peace.

Let’s read together Jeremiah 29:11 and Romans 8:28.

Sometimes God’s will is seemingly thwarted by the actions of sinful men.  Sometimes God has to take drastic action to prevent a bad thing from happening.  In this case, we can see how a plague turned out for good.

Friend, will you continue studying the plagues in the Bible and see what you can learn from them?

[graceandpeacejoanne]

Isaiah 51: God As Ally Allays All Fear

Fear of people and our current circumstances, fear of what the future might hold, fear borne out of past pain can grow so large it pushes aside our fear of the Lord. That is part of what was happening with Isaiah’s audience. #Isaiah51 #JudeanExile

From God to Those of Faith Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness,    you who seek the Lord. Isaiah 51:1 (NRSV) God gave three admonitions, each that started with God saying, “Listen, pay attention to this” 1. Have the Faith of Abraham and Sarah Look to Abraham your father    and to Sarah, who bore you,for he was but one when I called him,    but I blessed him and made him many.For…

[biblechaptersummary]

Genesis 26 Isaac Lied about Rebekah

A severe famine struck the land, so Isaac moved to Gerar, where Abimelech, king of the Philistines, lived. God appeared to Isaac and confirmed that all these lands will be given to him and his descendants, just as God had solemnly promised Abraham. When some locals asked about Rebekah, Isaac immediately followed in his father's footsteps and told them she was his sister. He was afraid they would kill him to take her from him. In spite of this, God continued to bless Isaac by giving a hundredfold return on his crops in a season of famine. In fact, Isaac became so rich and powerful that old disputes about water rights crop up. Abimelech sent Isaac away. Later the king proposed a peace treaty between them. To honor the treaty, Isaac named the well his servants had dug after the word for "oath", called Beersheba (means 'well of the oath').

[daylerogers]

Worrisome Wounds

Rarely do John and I have moments where we sit at the table and just talk. Too often we’re both exhausted, and conversations drift away like bubbles on a breeze. Great intentions; non-existent energy. I was sitting on the bench at our table during one of those infrequent times as we discussed a variety of things, from work to the kids. John had an article he wanted me to read–I can’t even…

[heatherfield]

Brom sabotages Ichabod’s court date with an unexpected head.

Headless: A Sleepy Hollow Story, Ep. 5 “The Chaos in Court” - Sept. 26, 2022 [x]

[soracities]

Sarah Aziza, in a series of letters with George Abraham (excerpt from Nov. 2023), pub. The Nation [ID'd]

[cath-lic]

*gritting my teeth* god’s love is transformative, god’s love is transformative, god’s love is transformative

[biblebloodhound]

Impatient (Genesis 16:1-6)

Impatience is the ants-in-your-pants response of wanting something now, without all the fuss and effort of planting and cultivating.

Sarai and Hagar, by Cody F. Miller Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said. So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian slave Hagar and…

[vibingforjudaism]

chaverim they changed the fUCKING manischewitz box i can't handle this i'm on thin enough ice already

[librarycards]

For those who engage w/ poetry and poetics in the face of injustice, a new issue of Exceptional Poetry, which I write as associate editor of Frontier Poetry, is out, with some space for Palestinian poetics and other entries related to power, violence, and epistemic in/justice.

[greenflower21]

For women’s history month I’ve decided to draw Jewish women from the Torah.

Here’s Sarah ❤️

I used Golda from Fiddler as a reference. I’ve always imagined her wearing Red. Sarah is a woman who laughs, even at Hashem. So I’ve drawn her smirking just a little bit, with laugh lines around her face. She is married here, which is why her hair is covered, but you can still see a few grey curls, still dark with the remnant of her youth.

[artandthebible]

Pharaoh Gives Sarah Back to Abraham

Artist: Isaac Isaacsz (Dutch, 1598-1649)

Genre: Religious Art

Date: 1640

Medium: Oil on Canvas

Collection: Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

This painting depicts a moment from the story of Abraham and Sarah, when Pharaoh gives Sarah back to Abraham. It is set in an opulent palace with fine fabrics and tapestries adorning the walls. Pharaoh sits on his throne flanked by two attendants while Abraham stands humbly before him, pleading for Sarah's return.

Sarah

Sarah is an important biblical figure in the book of Genesis. She is a wife of Abraham (Gen 11:29) and the mother of Isaac, the second patriarch (“father”) of Israel (Gen 21:2). Yet, she has some rather eyebrow-raising events in her life. She is brought into the house, possibly “harem,” of two foreign rulers (Gen 12:15, Gen 20:2), laughs in anticipation about having sex with her husband in her old age (Gen 18:12), and expels her husband’s son by her slave (Gen 21:10). God changes her birth name from Sarai to Sarah and informs Abraham that her son, Isaac, will inherit God’s covenant (Gen 17:15-19). But Sarah is barren (Gen 11:30), and her slave, Hagar, bears Abraham a child before she does (Gen 16:15). Through it all, Sarah’s relationship with God is what protects her, often when her husband does not.

[biblechaptersummary]

Genesis 17  The Sign of the Covenant

13 years have passed since God first promised to make Abram a great nation. God again appeared to Abram who was 99 years old. Ishmael was 13 already. God confirmed His covenant with Abram that He would make him the father of a multitude of nations. God also gave Abram a new name Abraham, for he would be the father of many nations. Also, Abraham was commanded to circumcise every male in his household as a sign of the covenant. And the big news was within a year, Abraham's wife—now renamed Sarah—would bear Abraham a son to be named Isaac. Abraham laughed and rejoiced at this. He proceeded to circumcise every male in his household with him.

[mybeautifulchristianjourney]

Three Men Meet Abraham

1 The Lord appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he was sitting by the door to his tent during the heat of the day. 2 Abraham looked up, and he saw three men standing in front of him. When he saw them, he ran from the tent door to meet them, and he bowed down to the ground. 3 He said, “My lord, if I have now found favor in your sight, please do not pass your servant by. 4 Now let me get a little water so that all of you can wash your feet and rest under the tree. 5 Let me get some bread so that you can refresh yourselves. After that you may go your way. That is why you have come to your servant.”

They said, “Yes, do as you have said.”

6 Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah and said, “Quickly prepare twenty quarts of fine flour, knead it, and make some loaves of bread.” 7 Abraham ran to the herd, brought a good, tender calf, and gave it to the servant. He hurried to prepare it. 8 He took cheese curds, milk, and the calf that he had prepared and set it before them. He stood beside them under the tree while they ate.

9 They asked him, “Where is Sarah, your wife?”

He said, “She is over there in the tent.”

10 One of the men said, “I will certainly return to you when this season comes around next year. Then Sarah your wife will have a son.”

Sarah was listening to this from the tent door, which was behind him. 11 Now Abraham and Sarah were old, well into old age. Sarah was past the age for childbearing. 12 Sarah laughed to herself, saying, “After I am worn out, will I have pleasure, since my lord is also old?”

13 The Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh and say, ‘Will I really give birth to a child though I am old?’ 14 Is anything impossible for the Lord? At the set time next year I will return to you, and Sarah will have a son.”

15 Then Sarah denied it and said, “I did not laugh,” because she was afraid.

The Lord said, “Yes, you did laugh.”

16 The men got up from there and looked down toward Sodom. Abraham went with them to see them on their way. 17 The Lord said, “Should I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, 18 since Abraham will surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth will be blessed in him? 19 For I have chosen him, so that he may command his children and his household who follow after him to keep the way of the Lord by carrying out righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may deliver to Abraham what he has promised him.”

20 So the Lord said, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very flagrant, 21 I will go down now and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has come to me. If not, I will know.”

22 The two men turned from there and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the Lord. 23 Abraham approached him and said, “Will you really sweep away the righteous along with the wicked? 24 What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep them away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous who are in it? 25 You would never do such a thing, killing the righteous along with the wicked, treating the righteous the same as the wicked. You would never do such a thing. The Judge of all the earth should do right, shouldn’t he?”

26 The Lord said, “If I find fifty righteous people within the city of Sodom, then I will spare the entire place for their sake.”

27 Abraham answered, “See now, I who am but dust and ashes have taken it on myself to speak to my Lord. 28 What if there are five fewer than fifty righteous? Will you destroy the entire city if the number is five short?”

He said, “I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.”

29 He spoke to him yet again and said, “What if only forty are found there?”

He said, “I will not do it for the sake of the forty.”

30 He said, “Please, do not be angry, my Lord, but I will speak again. What if thirty are found there?”

He said, “I will not do it if I find thirty there.”

31 He said, “See now, I have taken it upon myself to speak to my Lord. What if there are twenty found there?”

He said, “I will not destroy it for the sake of the twenty.”

32 He said, “Please, do not be angry, my Lord, but I will speak just once more. What if ten are found there?”

He said, “I will not destroy it for the sake of the ten.”

33 As soon as he had finished speaking with Abraham, the Lord went on his way, and Abraham returned to his place. — Genesis 18 | Evangelical Heritage Version (EHV) The Holy Bible, Evangelical Heritage Version®, EHV®, © 2019 Wartburg Project, Inc. All rights reserved. Cross References: Genesis 3:8-9; Genesis 3:19; Genesis 11:5; Genesis 17:3; Genesis 17:22;; Genesis 19:1; Genesis 19:3; Genesis 19:27; Genesis 21:6-7; Genesis 24:31; Genesis 39:4; Genesis 44:18; Deuteronomy 1:16-17; Deuteronomy 32:14; Judges 6:18-19; Judges 6:39; Judges 13:15-16; 1 Samuel 28:24; Jeremiah 5:1; Jeremiah 23:14; Daniel 2:18; Amos 3:7; Matthew 13:33; Matthew 19:26; Luke 1:18; Luke 1:37; Luke 7:44; John 13:5; Acts 3:25; Romans 4:19; Romans 9:9; Galatians 4:23; Ephesians 6:4; Hebrews 11:9; Hebrews 11:11; Hebrews 13:2; James 5:16; 1 Peter 3:6

Why did Abraham bargain with God in regard to Sodom and Gomorrah?