CRITICAL NOTES.—
Genesis 16:1. Handmaid.] This term is used in the L
XX. and N.T. in the sense of a female slave. Hagar was a bondwoman, and according to ancient usage was entirely at the disposal of her mistress. (Galatians 4:22.) An Egyptian. She probably entered the family of the patriarch during his sojourn in Egypt, and may have been one of the “maid-servants” presented to him by Pharaoh. (Genesis 12:20.) Hagar. Flight, or a fugitive. The Arabs term the flight of Mohammed Hegira—a word derived from the same root. It is not likely that the name was given by her parents, but was bestowed afterwards in commemoration of the leading events of her history.
Genesis 16:2. I may obtain children by her.] Heb. I may be builded by her. In Heb. the ideas of building and the raising of a family are closely allied. Ben, a son, is derived from the verb bana, to build. (Deuteronomy 25:9; Ruth 4:11.)
5. My wrong be upon thee.] Heb. My wrong lieth upon thee; i.e., the wrong which I suffer. The Lord judge between me and thee. “I made the offer to thee, but the deed was thine; let God apportion the blame between us.” (Alford.)
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Genesis 16:1-3
FORESTALLING GOD’S APPOINTED TIME
Both Abram and Sarah had long been waiting for the fulfilment of God’s promise. They were sorely tried by the delays of Providence, for they were both far gone in the vale of years and the promised blessing had not come. Their hearts grew sore with hope deferred. In their impatience they seek by methods of their own to fulfil God’s word—to anticipate His time and purpose. They attempt to cross the ways of Providence with the lines of their own wisdom, and frantically to hasten their destination. This was their weakness; for God has His appointed time and way. Man’s duty is calmly to wait.
I. This may be the temptation of those who yet have faith in God. Abram and Sarah had the assured possession of God’s promise. They knew what was its meaning—that it pointed to a definite blessing. They believed in their hearts that the will of God concerning them, as so expressed, would be accomplished. Yet they are weary with waiting, and use an expedient of their own, as if they would assist Providence. Faith may be genuine, and yet betimes prove unsteady through the severe trials to which it is exposed. Faith has to seek its object through clouds and darkness, through delays, disappointments, and dangers; and it is therefore not surprising that it occasionally betrays weakness, or takes some unadvised step. The grace of God is pure and strong, but the results of it are modified injuriously by human infirmity, so that they fall beneath absolute perfection. Sarah, who is most to blame in this history, is yet declared by inspired authority to be an example of faith, and is classed among those renowned believers who all “obtained a good report through faith” (Hebrews 11:11; Hebrews 11:31).
II. Such a course appears to have a rational warrant. The conflict between faith and reason is not the growth of modern times, but one as old as human nature itself. The attempt to hasten the work of God by plans devised by our own wisdom can be defended on many plausible grounds. A sincere man must, in some way, justify such a course to himself, and reason can always aid him. Thus, a believer may unconsciously challenge Divine wisdom, while he thinks all the time that he is doing God’s service. The conduct of Abram and Sarah was capable of some defence on rational grounds. They were sincere, and no doubt their plan appeared to them right and reasonable.
1. There was no human hope that the promise would be accomplished in that form in which they first understood it. Abram thought that God would shortly give him a son, and Sarah expected to be the mother of the promised child. But Abram had now dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan. He was already an old man, and his wife had been hopelessly barren for upwards of twenty years. They both still clung to the promise of God, and believed that in some way it would be accomplished. But now there was no human hope that the promise would be fulfilled in that precise form in which they first expected it. Therefore they might reasonably imagine that God had some other way for making His Word good, and that, by using the means which their own wisdom suggested, they were but working out His plan. Abram was assured that He should have an heir, of his own body begotten: but there was no distinct promise that Sarah should be the mother (Genesis 15:4-5). In supposing that the blessing might be conveyed through another channel, they did not appear to be departing from the literal construction of the original promise.
2. They were conforming to the common custom of the country. In the East, such expedients were resorted to for perpetuating the household when all other hope seemed to be gone. “It was a method of raising a family by proxy, and it was a virtual adoption of the vicarious posterity—the concubine was said to bear the child ‘upon the knees’ of the wife” (Genesis 30:3).—[Jacobus.] They were only adopting methods which they never heard spoken of with censure, and which seemed to be justified by the necessities of the case.
3. The end they sought was worthy in itself. They were assured that, in some way, mighty nations should spring from them—above all the Promised Seed by whom all the families of the earth should be blessed. It was not base passion that prompted them, but a noble desire to fulfil their exalted destiny. They may have employed a questionable policy, but on Sarah’s part, at least, it involved some high moral qualities—generosity, self-denial, and zeal.
III. All attempts to be beforehand with Providence imply an infirmity of faith. Faith may be real and yet show weakness in the time of great trial and perplexity. A really strong faith looks to the promise, and to that alone; leaving the ways and means for its accomplishment entirely to God. Such was the nature of Abram’s faith at first until he was betrayed into weakness by his wife. All human anticipations of God’s time and purpose, which He Himself in His wisdom has exactly determined, are wrong.
1. They are signs of impatience. Faith has not only to believe the promise of God and to repose a loving confidence in Himself, but also patiently to wait for Him. Waiting is as much a part of our religion as believing. It is the proper attitude of the soul in this state of probation. The trial of our faith worketh patience, and, when patience fails, faith is in that degree impaired.
2. It is not our duty to aid God in the accomplishment of His promises. God knows the whole case, and He has power and wisdom to fulfil His gracious purpose. We are but partial and imperfect judges of the ends He has in view and of the fittest means for attaining them. There is but one path plain and clear to us—the path of present duty. We have but to follow that path, for it is the only certainty upon which we can rely. God will take care of the end, and cause us to realise what we have believed. Faith in duty is faith in God. “He that believeth shall not make haste” (Isaiah 28:16). He shall not make haste to fulfil God’s promises, but rest in them meanwhile, and patiently wait the appointed time. True faith imparts a certain modesty to the habits of the soul. The attempt to assist Providence by the contrivances of our own short-sighted wisdom is presumption.
3. Religion hereby degenerates into fanaticism. In the history of religion fanaticism has chiefly assumed this form, viz., that men strive to realise God’s purposes before their time, and by means which show the hasty, intemperate zeal of short-sighted mortals, and partake not of the solemn and measured progress of the Divine plan. As God’s power is most seen in space, through which His works are scattered, so His wisdom is developed throughout the course of time. The attempt to force His purposes into unnatural ripeness is the very essence of fanaticism. Of such a nature is the communist theory of a perfect and contented human society, and those human anticipations of God’s kingdom on earth which were indulged in by such as the Fifth Monarchy men.
4. Such an interference with the means by which God accomplishes His purpose shows a want of confidence in His power. Faith has one great resource when perplexed by present appearances, and that is the power of God. With Him nothing is impossible. It might, after all, have been God’s design to show forth His power in a most marvellous manner by giving strength to Sarah to conceive at a time when it was naturally impossible. The delay might have been only for the purpose of showing forth His great power by the distinct evidence of His working. When the strength of nature decays, the power of God is most manifest. The faith of Sarah had in it an element of distrust, for it showed a want of confidence in the power of Him who quickens the dead, and calls the things that are not, as though they were. (Romans 4:17-18.)
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Genesis 16:1. God held Abram long in suspense. The difficulties of faith are acknowledged in Scripture.
The faith of true believers may be exposed to a long trial, which may oppress the heart with a settled sorrow.
God’s providence may place natural difficulties in the very face of His most solemn promises.
God’s promises and covenant can scarcely maintain faith in His children against the discouragements of sense.
St. Paul, in the Galatians, dwells upon the name of Hagar, as being the name of Mount Sinai in Arabia, denoting the legal position. And it would seem that Sinai was so called because Hagar, in Arabic, signifies a rock. (Galatians 4.) And this incidental fact St. Paul uses to show the relation between the legal and the Gospel dispensations, and between the two classes of children in Abram’s house—the spiritual seed being those of Sarah (the free woman), represented by Isaac; the carnal being those of Hagar (the bondwoman), represented by Ishmael. Hagar represented the Mosaic Sinaitic dispensation, and her children were born in bondage to the law (Judaising), and yet, according to nature, having the husband; while Sarai typified the Gospel system, and represented the Church, long barren, till the gift of a progeny—the miraculous seed—according to promise. (Jacobus.)
Hagar, an Egyptian. Egypt stood then in the same relation to the covenant people as the world does now to the Christian Church. In their anxiety, believers are tempted to avail themselves of the provisions of the world instead of quietly waiting for God.
The things of faith are distant and mysterious. That which the world offers is near and clear. Egypt furnishes a ready solution; but God’s thoughts are above man’s thoughts.
In all their wanderings, the influence of the world follows the children of God, and becomes a constant source of trial and danger.
Genesis 16:2. Sarai attributes her barrenness to the will of God. (Psalms 127:3.) It is a noble form of faith which traces back all the events of the world to the highest cause; finds the origin and disposition of all things in the energy of a Living Will.
It is possible to acknowledge God’s power, and yet by our conduct virtually to deny it.
The virtue of a good confession may be well-nigh destroyed by those actions which really contradict our creed.
All the promises made to Abram depended upon “one who is to come forth out of his own bowels.” Such is the Lord’s express assurance, and yet he goes childless. His wife, as she herself represents the matter to him, is barren; and it would seem that she is contented to acknowledge her barrenness as hopeless, and to acquiesce in it as a dispensation of God. She does not speak angrily or impatiently, as Rachel did to Jacob, but meekly and submissively she says, “The Lord hath restrained me from bearing.” It is His will, and His will be done. But surely God can never intend that my barrenness should frustrate His purpose, and make void His promise. There must be some way of getting over this difficulty, and reconciling this apparent inconsistency between the promise that to thee a child is to be born—in whom, as the Great Reconciler, thou and thy posterity, and all the kindreds of men are to be blessed—and the Providence which allots to thee a barren, and now aged, spouse. There must be some new expedient to be adopted; some other plan to be tried. It may be that Sarai is to be a mother, as it were by substitute and by proxy, and is to obtain children by her maid; according to the custom already common. And if there be any hesitation about the lawfulness of the course recommended, may it not be justified by the manners of the country sanctioning the usage; by the entire absence of every grosser motive—the end sought being not self-gratification, but the higher good of himself, his children, and the whole human race; and by the necessity of the case, which shuts him up to some such plan? In circumstances so urgent and unprecedented, why should one so favoured and blessed of God have any remaining scruple? It is, in all views of it, an extraordinary position that he occupies; and what he does is not to be judged by common rules. Such was Abram’s temptation. (Candlish.)
Unbelief is very prolific of schemes; and surely this of Sarai is as carnal, as foolish, and as fruitful of domestic misery as could almost have been devised. Yet such was the influence of evil counsel, especially from such a quarter, that “Abram hearkened to her voice.” The father of mankind sinned by hearkening to his wife, and now the Father of the Faithful follows his example. How necessary for those who stand in the nearest relations, to take heed of being snares instead of helps one to another! The plea used by Sarai in this affair shows how easy it is to err by a misconstruction of Providence, and following that as a rule of conduct, instead of God’s revealed will. “The Lord,” says she, “hath restrained me from bearing,” and, therefore, I must contrive other means for the fulfilment of the promise. But why not inquire of the Lord? As in the crowning of Adonijah, the proper authority was not consulted.—(Fuller.)
There is a stage when grace itself, and the promise of fruitfulness which is connected with it, by acting on our impatience, may so excite as to lead the spirit of faith to try carnal means, even though for ends which God has promised. Indeed impatience, a zeal for God, without a corresponding faith in the zeal of the Lord of Hosts, is ever leading to this. Even to faith it is hard to wait on God, and let Him do His own work in His own way. Thus did Abram hearken to Sarai; and thus excited even by the truth, and with right ends, does the elect yet try his own resources. Christ the true seed is by many longed for ardently. Both in the Church and world we fain would see Him. But He tarries. Then Sarai speaks to those who, though men of faith, are so far from “being as dead,” that they are still full of self-will. The result is one scheme after another, all aiming to obtain the promised seed, by doing rather than by dying. Vain hope! Ishmaels enough may be thus gotten. Isaacs are not so born.—(Jukes: “Types of Genesis.”)
Abram’s temptation was similar to that of Jesus in the wilderness.
1. The temptation of Jesus had reference to a previous declaration of God. The voice from heaven, at His baptism, had declared that He was the Son of God. Therefore Satan rests his temptations upon that word. “If thou be the Son of God.”
2. Jesus was tempted to employ plausible means to secure His own preservation and advancement. Thus, to turn the stones into bread to preserve His life—by casting Himself from a pinnacle of the temple, to seek an extraordinary interference of Providence, and so attract public attention—by aiming at the world’s throne lest the world should give Him nothing but a cross. To Christ, therefore, we must look for a perfect example of uniform and complete resistance to temptation. Abram, as all other human examples, do but most serve for a beacon to warn us.
Nature may throw difficulties in the way of faith, but faith should be able to see through nature and behold God who is above it. The soul can only “endure as seeing Him who is invisible.”
Genesis 16:3. Human experiments for reconciling sense and faith are possible. But God’s purpose cannot in this way be discovered.
There may be a self-sacrifice, in itself praiseworthy, but of no value in the sight of God because He does not demand it. To offer up a service to God, suggested by our own short-sighted activity, and when He does not require it, is of the nature of will-worship.
It is easy to persuade ourselves that we are carrying out the will of God, and acting up to the requirements of true religion, when we are only showing a fanatical devotion to an idea.
Faith in God may require long and patient waiting for Him, but there is no need that we should be anxious as to how He intends to accomplish His will.
Sarai, the wife of Abram, was undoubtedly a godly woman. She is commended as an example to all Christian matrons, who are her daughters as long as they do well. She “obeyed Abraham, calling him Lord.” With him she came out from among her idolatrous kindred, and with him she was willing to lead the life of a stranger and pilgrim. During all the ten years which they had spent in the land of Canaan she was constantly and faithfully with her husband, sharing all his trials, and witnessing all the great things which the Lord did for him. She was heir, together with him, of the grace of life, and one by whom his prayers were not wont to be hindered. (1 Peter 3:7.) Strange and sad, that at such a season, and from such a quarter, temptation should arise; that after a ten year’s walk with God, in the very height of privilege, in the full assurance of faith, the faithful companion of his pilgrimage and the helper of his joy should beguile and betray him! After such an instance, who can be secure?—at what season, or on what side, secure?—(Candlish.)
“After Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan.” This clause is here thrown in as if to show the pressure of discouragement under which Sarai acted in this matter. Abram, after so long a sojourn in the land, yet remained childless. He was now eighty-five years old, and Sarai seventy-five. She was to be to Abram “for a wife”—to serve the purpose of a wife in this extremity. By the custom, the children of the concubine became the offspring of the wife herself, being regarded as obtained by proxy, and in a vicarious, substitutionary way, so that they were reckoned as hers by adoption. (Exodus 21:7; Deuteronomy 21:10.) Abram might have felt himself at liberty to accede to this proposed arrangement, inasmuch as nothing had been said of Sarai in the case. So the Hebrews have viewed Abram’s conduct. The slave girl was at the disposal of the mistress—her personal property—according to the oriental custom; and it was only by the consent of Sarai that she could become the secondary wife of Abram. And this step was taken for a declared purpose, and to fulfil the promise of God. But the wrong was in the unbelief which could not trust God to work out His own plans and to fulfil His own promise without such human device. Sarai herself would soon see the wrong, and reap the bitter fruits.—(Jacobus.)