Genesis 18-21

Genesis 18

¹Now the Lord came to him by the holy tree of Mamre, when he was seated in the doorway of his tent in the middle of the day;

²And lifting up his eyes, he saw three men before him; and seeing them, he went quickly to them from the door of the tent, and went down on his face to the earth;

³And said, My Lord, if now I have grace in your eyes, do not go away from your servant:

⁴Let me get water for washing your feet, and take your rest under the tree:

⁵And let me get a bit of bread to keep up your strength, and after that you may go on your way: for this is why you have come to your servant. And they said, Let it be so.

⁶Then Abraham went quickly into the tent, and said to Sarah, Get three measures of meal straight away and make cakes.

⁷And running to the herd, he took a young ox, soft and fat, and gave it to the servant and he quickly made it ready;

⁸And he took butter and milk and the young ox which he had made ready and put it before them, waiting by them under the tree while they took food.

⁹And they said to him, Where is Sarah your wife? And he said, She is in the tent.

¹⁰And he said, I will certainly come back to you in the spring, and Sarah your wife will have a son. And his words came to the ears of Sarah who was at the back of the tent-door.

¹¹Now Abraham and Sarah were very old, and Sarah was past the time for giving birth.

¹²And Sarah, laughing to herself, said, Now that I am used up am I still to have pleasure, my husband himself being old?

¹³And the Lord said, Why was Sarah laughing and saying, Is it possible for me, being old, to give birth to a child?

¹⁴Is there any wonder which the Lord is not able to do? At the time I said, in the spring, I will come back to you, and Sarah will have a child.

¹⁵Then Sarah said, I was not laughing; for she was full of fear. And he said, No, but you were laughing.

¹⁶And the men went on from there in the direction of Sodom; and Abraham went with them on their way.

¹⁷And the Lord said, Am I to keep back from Abraham the knowledge of what I do;

¹⁸Seeing that Abraham will certainly become a great and strong nation, and his name will be used by all the nations of the earth as a blessing?

¹⁹For I have made him mine so that he may give orders to his children and those of his line after him, to keep the ways of the Lord, to do what is good and right: so that the Lord may do to Abraham as he has said.

²⁰And the Lord said, Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is very great, and their sin is very evil,

²¹I will go down now, and see if their acts are as bad as they seem from the outcry which has come to me; and if they are not, I will see.

²²And the men, turning from that place, went on to Sodom: but Abraham was still waiting before the Lord.

²³And Abraham came near, and said, Will you let destruction come on the upright with the sinners?

²⁴If by chance there are fifty upright men in the town, will you give the place to destruction and not have mercy on it because of the fifty upright men?

²⁵Let such a thing be far from you, to put the upright to death with the sinner: will not the judge of all the earth do right?

²⁶And the Lord said, If there are fifty upright men in the town, I will have mercy on it because of them.

²⁷And Abraham answering said, Truly, I who am only dust, have undertaken to put my thoughts before the Lord:

²⁸If by chance there are five less than fifty upright men, will you give up all the town to destruction because of these five? And he said, I will not give it to destruction if there are forty-five.

²⁹And again he said to him, By chance there may be forty there. And he said, I will not do it if there are forty.

³⁰And he said, Let not the Lord be angry with me if I say, What if there are thirty there? And he said, I will not do it if there are thirty.

³¹And he said, See now, I have undertaken to put my thoughts before the Lord: what if there are twenty there? And he said, I will have mercy because of the twenty.

³²And he said, O let not the Lord be angry and I will say only one word more: by chance there may be ten there. And he said, I will have mercy because of the ten.

³³And the Lord went on his way when his talk with Abraham was ended, and Abraham went back to his place.

Genesis 19

¹And at nightfall the two angels came to Sodom; and Lot was seated at the way into the town: and when he saw them he got up and came before them, falling down on his face to the earth.

²And he said, My masters, come now into your servant's house and take your rest there for the night, and let your feet be washed; and early in the morning you may go on your way. And they said, Not so, but we will take our night's rest in the street.

³But he made his request more strongly, so they went with him into his house; and he got food ready for them, and made unleavened bread, of which they took.

⁴But before they had gone to bed, the men of the town, all the men of Sodom, came round the house, young and old, from every part of the town;

⁵And crying out to Lot, they said, Where are the men who came to your house this night? Send them out to us, so that we may take our pleasure with them.

⁶And Lot went out to them in the doorway, shutting the door after him.

⁷And he said, My brothers, do not this evil.

⁸See now, I have two unmarried daughters; I will send them out to you so that you may do to them whatever seems good to you: only do nothing to these men, for this is why they have come under the shade of my roof.

⁹And they said, Give way there. This one man, they said, came here from a strange country, and will he now be our judge? now we will do worse to you than to them; and pushing violently against Lot, they came near to get the door broken in.

¹⁰But the men put out their hands and took Lot into the house to them, shutting the door again.

¹¹But the men who were outside the door they made blind, all of them, small and great, so that they were tired out with looking for the door.

¹²Then the men said to Lot, Are there any others of your family here? sons-in-law or sons or daughters, take them all out of this place;

¹³For we are about to send destruction on this place, because a great outcry against them has come to the ears of the Lord; and the Lord has sent us to put an end to the town.

¹⁴And Lot went out and said to his sons-in-law, who were married to his daughters, Come, let us go out of this place, for the Lord is about to send destruction on the town. But his sons-in-law did not take him seriously.

¹⁵And when morning came, the angels did all in their power to make Lot go, saying, Get up quickly and take your wife and your two daughters who are here, and go, for fear that you come to destruction in the punishment of the town.

¹⁶But while he was waiting, the men took him and his wife and his daughters by the hand, for the Lord had mercy on them, and put them outside the town.

¹⁷And when they had put them out, he said, Go for your life, without looking back or waiting in the lowland; go quickly to the mountain or you will come to destruction.

¹⁸And Lot said to them, Not so, O my Lord;

¹⁹See now, your servant has had grace in your eyes and great is your mercy in keeping my life from destruction, but I am not able to get as far as the mountain before evil overtakes me and death;

²⁰This town, now, is near, and it is a little one: O, let me go there (is it not a little one?) so that my life may be safe.

²¹And he said, See, I have given you your request in this one thing more: I will not send destruction on this town.

²²Go there quickly, for I am not able to do anything till you have come there. For this reason, the town was named Zoar.

²³The sun was up when Lot came to Zoar.

²⁴Then the Lord sent fire and flaming smoke raining down from heaven on Sodom and Gomorrah.

²⁵And he sent destruction on those towns, with all the lowland and all the people of those towns and every green thing in the land.

²⁶But Lot's wife, looking back, became a pillar of salt.

²⁷And Abraham got up early in the morning and went to the place where he had been talking with the Lord:

²⁸And looking in the direction of Sodom and Gomorrah and the lowland, he saw the smoke of the land going up like the smoke of an oven.

²⁹So it came about that when God sent destruction on the towns of the lowland, he kept his word to Abraham, and sent Lot safely away when he put an end to the towns where he was living.

³⁰Then Lot went up out of Zoar to the mountain, and was living there with his two daughters, for fear kept him from living in Zoar: and he and his daughters made their living-place in a hole in the rock.

³¹And the older daughter said to her sister, Our father is old, and there is no man to be a husband to us in the natural way:

³²Come, let us give our father much wine, and we will go into his bed, so that we may have offspring by our father,

³³And that night they made their father take much wine; and the older daughter went into his bed; and he had no knowledge of when she went in or when she went away.

³⁴And on the day after, the older daughter said to the younger, Last night I was with my father; let us make him take much wine this night again, and do you go to him, so that we may have offspring by our father.

³⁵And that night again they made their father take much wine; and the younger daughter went into his bed; and he had no knowledge of when she went in or when she went away.

³⁶And so the two daughters of Lot were with child by their father.

³⁷And the older daughter had a son, and she gave him the name Moab: he is the father of the Moabites to this day.

³⁸And the younger had a son and gave him the name Ben-ammi: from him come the children of Ammon to this day.

Genesis 20

¹And Abraham went on his way from there to the land of the South, and was living between Kadesh and Shur, in Gerar.

²And Abraham said of Sarah, his wife, She is my sister: and Abimelech, king of Gerar, sent and took Sarah.

³But God came to Abimelech in a dream in the night, and said to him, Truly you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken; for she is a man's wife.

⁴Now Abimelech had not come near her; and he said, Lord, will you put to death an upright nation?

⁵Did he not say to me himself, She is my sister? and she herself said, He is my brother: with an upright heart and clean hands have I done this.

⁶And God said to him in the dream, I see that you have done this with an upright heart, and I have kept you from sinning against me: for this reason I did not let you come near her.

⁷So now, give the man back his wife, for he is a prophet, and let him say a prayer for you, so your life may be safe: but if you do not give her back, be certain that death will come to you and all your house.

⁸So Abimelech got up early in the morning and sent for all his servants and gave them word of these things, and they were full of fear.

⁹Then Abimelech sent for Abraham, and said, What have you done to us? what wrong have I done you that you have put on me and on my kingdom so great a sin? You have done to me things which are not to be done.

¹⁰And Abimelech said to Abraham, Why did you do this thing?

¹¹And Abraham said, Because it seemed to me that there was no fear of God in this place, and that they might put me to death because of my wife.

¹²And, in fact, she is my sister, the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife:

¹³And when God sent me wandering from my father's house, I said to her, Let this be the sign of your love for me; wherever we go, say of me, He is my brother.

¹⁴Then Abimelech gave to Abraham sheep and oxen and men-servants and women-servants, and gave him back his wife Sarah.

¹⁵And Abimelech said, See, all my land is before you; take whatever place seems good to you.

¹⁶And he said to Sarah, See, I have given to your brother a thousand bits of silver so that your wrong may be put right; now your honour is clear in the eyes of all.

¹⁷Then Abraham made prayer to God, and God made Abimelech well again, and his wife and his women-servants, so that they had children.

¹⁸For the Lord had kept all the women of the house of Abimelech from having children, because of Sarah, Abraham's wife.

Genesis 21

¹And the Lord came to Sarah as he had said and did to her as he had undertaken.

²And Sarah became with child, and gave Abraham a son when he was old, at the time named by God.

³And Abraham gave to his son, to whom Sarah had given birth, the name Isaac.

⁴And when his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham made him undergo circumcision, as God had said to him.

⁵Now Abraham was a hundred years old when the birth of Isaac took place.

⁶And Sarah said, God has given me cause for laughing, and everyone who has news of it will be laughing with me.

⁷And she said, Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would have a child at her breast? for see, I have given him a son now when he is old.

⁸And when the child was old enough to be taken from the breast, Abraham made a great feast.

⁹And Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian playing with Isaac.

¹⁰So she said to Abraham, Send away that woman and her son: for the son of that woman is not to have a part in the heritage with my son Isaac.

¹¹And this was a great grief to Abraham because of his son.

¹²But God said, Let it not be a grief to you because of the boy and Hagar his mother; give ear to whatever Sarah says to you, because it is from Isaac that your seed will take its name.

¹³And I will make a nation of the son of your servant-woman, because he is your seed.

¹⁴And early in the morning Abraham got up, and gave Hagar some bread and a water-skin, and put the boy on her back, and sent her away: and she went, wandering in the waste land of Beer-sheba.

¹⁵And when all the water in the skin was used up, she put the child down under a tree.

¹⁶And she went some distance away, about an arrow flight, and seating herself on the earth, she gave way to bitter weeping, saying, Let me not see the death of my child.

¹⁷And the boy's cry came to the ears of God; and the angel of God said to Hagar from heaven, Hagar, why are you weeping? have no fear, for the child's cry has come to the ears of God.

¹⁸Come, take your child in your arms, for I will make of him a great nation.

¹⁹Then God made her eyes open, and she saw a water-spring, and she got water in the skin and gave the boy a drink.

²⁰And God was with the boy, and he became tall and strong, and he became a bowman, living in the waste land.

²¹And while he was in the waste land of Paran, his mother got him a wife from the land of Egypt.

²²Now at that time, Abimelech and Phicol, the captain of his army, said to Abraham, I see that God is with you in all you do.

²³Now, then, give me your oath, in the name of God, that you will not be false to me or to my sons after me, but that as I have been good to you, so you will be to me and to this land where you have been living.

²⁴And Abraham said, I will give you my oath.

²⁵But Abraham made a protest to Abimelech because of a water-hole which Abimelech's servants had taken by force.

²⁶But Abimelech said, I have no idea who has done this thing; you never gave me word of it, and I had no knowledge of it till this day.

²⁷And Abraham took sheep and oxen and gave them to Abimelech, and the two of them made an agreement together.

²⁸And Abraham put seven young lambs of the flock on one side by themselves.

²⁹Then Abimelech said, What are these seven lambs which you have put on one side?

³⁰And he said, Take these seven lambs from me as a witness that I have made this water-hole.

³¹So he gave that place the name Beer-sheba, because there the two of them had given their oaths.

³²So they made an agreement at Beer-sheba, and Abimelech and Phicol, the captain of his army, went back to the land of the Philistines.

³³And Abraham, after planting a holy tree in Beer-sheba, gave worship to the name of the Lord, the Eternal God.

³⁴And Abraham went on living in the land of the Philistines as in a strange country.