Chapter 21 - God fixed Sarah's inability to have children as promised and she bore Abraham a son while he was 100 years old.
Abraham named him Isaac. He had his foreskin circumcised when he was 8 days old to keep The Covenant with God.
When Isaac was able to be weaned off his mother's milk and eat regular food, Abraham threw him a huge feast!
One day Sarah saw Ishmael (14 years old?) mocking (2 brothers are rivals? try 2 wives!). She demanded to Abraham that he cast out both Hagar and Ishmael so that Isaac would be his lone heir.
Abraham was troubled by this. (no kidding)
God reassured Abraham that this would be ok. So he gave Hagar and son bread and water and sent them away.
Hagar and Ishmael wandered the wilderness of Beersheba. (The fountain was Beerlahairoi, so no idea where this is. Probably south towards Egypt again, her old home)
When she ran out of water, she had him stay under a bush and wandered a bowshot away.
She hoped that she wouldn't have to watch him die, then went over to hold him and cry.
God heard her cry, and an angel of the lord told told her not to worry, that from him would come a great nation. (God only talks directly to prophets now maybe? Lot of angels lately
)
A well full of water appeared, and they drank from it. As the years went by and Ishmael grew, God was with him and he became an archer in the wilderness of Paran. His mother brought a wife for him from Egypt.
Now one day Abimelech, the king who Abraham nearly got killed, arrived with his troop leader Phichol. He tells Abraham that he wants him to swear to God that he will deal with him and his truthfully and that any kindness shown will be reciprocated in turn.
Abraham agrees. The issue of a disputed well comes up that Abraham thinks Abimelech's people took unfairly. He gives Abimelech some sheep, oxen, and 7 ewes and gets the well back.
They name the place Beersheba and Abimelech departed back to the land of the Philistines. (I guess that's where Gerar is?)
Abraham sojourned many days in the Philistines (uh oh, you know what that usually means
)
Chapter 22 - And it came to pass that God tempted Abraham.
God tells him to take his only son Isaac to Moriah and offer him as a burnt sacrifice on one of the mountains specified.
So Abraham takes his son Isaac, and 2 young men, and the wood and journeys there on a donkey.
He tells the 2 men to stay with the donkey while he goes up a mountain to worship God with his son.
Isaac asks his dad where the animal offering is and Abraham tells him that God will provide the offering.
Abraham ties Isaac up and is about to slay him with a dagger when he is interrupted by an Angel of the Lord telling him to stop for it is evident that he fears God. (phew!)
A ram appears, and Abraham sacrifices it instead. He names the place Jehova-Jireh.
The Angel of the Lord tells him that he will be rewarded with blessings.
His descendants will be even more numerous and through them will all the nations of Earth be blessed.
Abraham and Isaac go back to Beersheba.
Then there's a list of 8 descendants from Abraham's brother Nahor and his wife/niece Milcah. (Still back in Ur I assume)
Chapter 23 - Sarah dies at 128 years old in Kirjatharba/Hebron in the land of Canaan.
Abraham asks the locals to give him a place to bury his wife.
They confer, and eventually Abraham offers money to Ephron of Zophar to buy the cave named Machpelah in Ephron's field to bury his wife in.
Ephron offers to just give it to him, but Abraham insists on paying fair value, so he ends up paying 400 shekels of silver and buries his wife there.
Chapter 24 - Now when Abraham was old and stricken with age (has to be older than 129 now), he summoned his eldest servant.
Abraham made him swear that he'd find his son Isaac a wife from his homeland and kindred instead of a local wife from Canaan. (Guess someone is going back to Ur)
His servant asked if he should take Isaac along in case the woman refused to travel to Canaan, but Abraham said if that happened then the oath was released.
Abraham also said that an angel would go before him.
So the servant took 10 camels and set off towards Mesopotamia. He arrived at the city Nahor. (I guess Abraham's brother was prosperous enough to get his own city?)
The servant prayed to God for kindness, that the first young woman to come outside the city to draw water would offer him and his camels some would be the wife for Isaac.
And a young woman named Rebekah did exactly that.
The servant wondered if his prayer was indeed answered and his journey over, so he gave her a gift of golden jewelry and asked who her family was.
She replied that she was the granddaughter of Milcah and Nahor.
The servant was overjoyed that she was kindred to Abraham, and asked to stay the night.
Rebekah's brother Laban invites him in after Rebekah tells her mother's house what happened.
The servant tells them his story, and that an angel would prepare the way.
The father and the brother say that the thing is from God, and they can say neither good or bad, and to take Rebekah to be Isaac's wife.
Gifts are given to Rebekah and her family.
Her family asks that she stay for 10 days, but the servant wants to go immediately, and Rebekah agrees.
They meet Isaac as he is coming back from the well Lahairoi in the south. (Hagar's well I think)
Rebekah veiled herself before the servant explained all that had happened to Isaac. Then Isaac took Rebekah to his mother's tent and married her.
Chapter 25 - Abraham took another wife Katurah (Dang, feisty old man!)
She bore him 6 more children: Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah.
Isaac got everything that Abraham owned, and the sons of the concubines were given gifts and sent east.
Abraham died when he was 175 years old and was buried next to his wife Sarah in the cave Machpelah.
Ishmael has 12 sons who became princes.
They were Nebajoth, Kedar, Abbeel, Mibsam, Mishma, Dumah, Massa, Haddar, Tema, Jetur, Naphish, and Kedemah.
Ishmael lived to be 137 years old, and died in the presence of his family.
Now Rebekah Isaac's wife was barren just like his mother Sarah had been. So Rebekah prayed to God and she was able to conceive.
Only, it was twins! So she asked God about them.
He said there are 2 nations in her womb. One will be stronger than the other, and the elder shall serve the younger.
And when the first baby was born, it was named Esau. The other was born holding onto his heel and was named Jacob.
Esau grew into a hunter and Jacob grew into an ordinary man, a tent dweller.
Isaac loved Esau and Rebekah loved Jacob.
And one day when Jacob was boiling stew, Esau appeared faint with hunger and asked for some.
Jacob said he'd agree, but only if Esau sold him his birthright first (what?)
Esau agreed and ate the food. (not sure what just happened)
Not even the original sin thing can hide that one. But it was a smart move, putting that story at the beginning.
