Genesis 16-19

Genesis 16

¹Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had given him no children; and she had a servant, a woman of Egypt whose name was Hagar.

²And Sarai said to Abram, See, the Lord has not let me have children; go in to my servant, for I may get a family through her. And Abram did as Sarai said.

³So after Abram had been living for ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai took Hagar, her Egyptian servant, and gave her to Abram for his wife.

⁴And he went in to Hagar and she became with child, and when she saw that she was with child, she no longer had any respect for her master's wife.

⁵And Sarai said to Abram, May my wrong be on you: I gave you my servant for your wife and when she saw that she was with child, she no longer had any respect for me: may the Lord be judge between you and me.

⁶And Abram said, The woman is in your power; do with her whatever seems good to you. And Sarai was cruel to her, so that she went running away from her.

⁷And an angel of the Lord came to her by a fountain of water in the waste land, by the fountain on the way to Shur.

⁸And he said, Hagar, Sarai's servant, where have you come from and where are you going? And she said, I am running away from Sarai, my master's wife.

⁹And the angel said to her, Go back, and put yourself under her authority.

¹⁰And the angel of the Lord said, Your seed will be greatly increased so that it may not be numbered.

¹¹And the angel of the Lord said, See, you are with child and will give birth to a son, to whom you will give the name Ishmael, because the ears of the Lord were open to your sorrow.

¹²And he will be like a mountain ass among men; his hand will be against every man and every man's hand against him, and he will keep his place against all his brothers.

¹³And to the Lord who was talking with her she gave this name, You are a God who is seen; for she said, Have I not even here in the waste land had a vision of God and am still living?

¹⁴So that fountain was named, Fountain of Life and Vision: it is between Kadesh and Bered.

¹⁵And Hagar gave birth to a child, the son of Abram, to whom Abram gave the name of Ishmael.

¹⁶Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar gave birth to Ishmael.

Genesis 17

¹When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord came to him, and said, I am God, Ruler of all; go in my ways and be upright in all things,

²And I will make an agreement between you and me, and your offspring will be greatly increased.

³And Abram went down on his face on the earth, and the Lord God went on talking with him, and said,

⁴As for me, my agreement is made with you, and you will be the father of nations without end.

⁵No longer will your name be Abram, but Abraham, for I have made you the father of a number of nations.

⁶I will make you very fertile, so that nations will come from you and kings will be your offspring.

⁷And I will make between me and you and your seed after you through all generations, an eternal agreement to be a God to you and to your seed after you.

⁸And to you and to your seed after you, I will give the land in which you are living, all the land of Canaan for an eternal heritage; and I will be their God.

⁹And God said to Abraham, On your side, you are to keep the agreement, you and your seed after you through all generations.

¹⁰And this is the agreement which you are to keep with me, you and your seed after you: every male among you is to undergo circumcision.

¹¹In the flesh of your private parts you are to undergo it, as a mark of the agreement between me and you.

¹²Every male among you, from one generation to another, is to undergo circumcision when he is eight days old, with every servant whose birth takes place in your house, or for whom you gave money to someone of another country, and not of your seed.

¹³He who comes to birth in your house and he who is made yours for a price, all are to undergo circumcision; so that my agreement may be marked in your flesh, an agreement for all time.

¹⁴And any male who does not undergo circumcision will be cut off from his people: my agreement has been broken by him.

¹⁵And God said, As for Sarai, your wife, from now her name will be not Sarai, but Sarah.

¹⁶And I will give her a blessing so that you will have a son by her: truly my blessing will be on her, and she will be the mother of nations: kings of peoples will be her offspring.

¹⁷Then Abraham went down on his face, and laughing, said in his heart, May a man a hundred years old have a child? will Sarah, at ninety years old, give birth?

¹⁸And Abraham said to God, If only Ishmael's life might be your care!

¹⁹And God said, Not so; but Sarah, your wife, will have a son, and you will give him the name Isaac, and I will make my agreement with him for ever and with his seed after him.

²⁰As for Ishmael, I have given ear to your prayer: truly I have given him my blessing and I will make him fertile and give him great increase; he will be the father of twelve chiefs, and I will make him a great nation.

²¹But my agreement will be with Isaac, to whom Sarah will give birth a year from this time.

²²And having said these words, God went up from Abraham.

²³And Abraham took Ishmael, his son, and all whose birth had taken place in his house, and all his servants whom he had made his for a price, every male of his house, and on that very day he gave them circumcision in the flesh of their private parts as God had said to him.

²⁴Abraham was ninety-nine years old when he underwent circumcision.

²⁵And Ishmael, his son, was thirteen years old when he underwent circumcision.

²⁶Abraham and Ishmael, his son, underwent circumcision on that very day.

²⁷And all the men of his house, those whose birth had taken place in the house and those whom he had got for money from men of other lands, underwent circumcision with him.

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.