Atlas Biblica

    Genesis · 34 verses

    Genesis 21

    Every verse links to the people and places named in it, and to the passages readers connect it with.

    The chapter

    What happens here

    Atlas's own reading, written from this chapter and nothing else, and published only once a person has approved it. Each scene names the verses it covers; the names inside it link to the people and places they name.

    A well dispute is settled with an oath, livestock, and exactly seven ewe lambs—an admirably specific bit of diplomacy.

    Laughter and inheritancevv. 1–14

    Isaac arrives precisely when God had promised, and Abraham marks the occasion with the name Isaac, circumcision, and a feast. Sarah's laughter begins as shared astonishment: “God has made me laugh, and everyone who hears of this will laugh with me.” Then, almost before the feast has settled, laughter becomes the charge of mocking, and Sarah demands that Hagar and Ishmael be expelled. Abraham is distressed, but God tells him to listen to Sarah while also promising that the slave woman's son will become a nation. So Abraham sends Hagar and the boy away with bread and a skin of water, which is a very small provision for a very large wilderness.

    The water that appearsvv. 15–21

    When the water is gone, Hagar puts Ishmael beneath a bush and moves away because she cannot bear to watch him die. She weeps, and God hears the boy. The angel of God calls to Hagar from heaven, tells her not to be afraid, and promises again that the boy will become a great nation. Then God opens Hagar's eyes, and she sees a well. Nothing is said about why she could not see it before; the well simply enters the story at the precise moment when the empty skin has done its worst. Ishmael grows in the wilderness, becomes a great archer, and his mother gets him a wife from Egypt while he is dwelling in Paran.

    Seven lambs and a wellvv. 22–34

    Abimelech and Phicol approach Abraham because God is plainly with him, and they ask him to swear that he will deal kindly with them and their descendants. Abraham agrees, then raises a complaint about a well seized by Abimelech's servants. Abimelech says he knew nothing of it. The covenant proceeds with sheep and cattle, followed by Abraham's curious separation of seven ewe lambs. Asked why, he explains that they are to witness that he dug the well. The place is called Beersheba because the two men swore an oath there. Abraham plants a tamarisk tree and calls upon the name of the LORD, the Eternal God; Abimelech and Phicol return to Philistia, while Abraham remains there for a long time.

    The text

    Read it

    Berean Standard Bible, public domain. Names the Hebrew and Greek put in the verse link to the person, place or people they name; the address beside each verse is a link to that verse, which is what a reader copies and shares.

    1. Gen 21:1Now the LORD attended to Sarah as He had said, and the LORD did for Sarah what He had promised.

    2. Gen 21:2So Sarah conceived and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised.

    3. Gen 21:3And Abraham gave the name Isaac to the son Sarah bore to him.

    4. Gen 21:4When his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham circumcised him, as God had commanded him.

    5. Gen 21:5Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.

    6. Gen 21:6Then Sarah said, “God has made me laugh, and everyone who hears of this will laugh with me.”

    7. Gen 21:7She added, “Who would have told Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”

    8. Gen 21:8So the child grew and was weaned, and Abraham held a great feast on the day Isaac was weaned.

    9. Gen 21:9But Sarah saw that the son whom Hagar the Egyptian had borne to Abraham was mocking her son,

    10. Gen 21:10and she said to Abraham, “Expel the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with my son Isaac!”

    11. Gen 21:11Now this matter distressed Abraham greatly because it concerned his son Ishmael.

    12. Gen 21:12But God said to Abraham, “Do not be distressed about the boy and your maidservant. Listen to everything that Sarah tells you, for through Isaac your offspring will be reckoned.

    13. Gen 21:13But I will also make a nation of the slave woman’s son, because he is your offspring.”

    14. Gen 21:14Early in the morning, Abraham got up, took bread and a skin of water, put them on Hagar’s shoulders, and sent her away with the boy. She left and wandered in the Wilderness of Beersheba.

    15. Gen 21:15When the water in the skin was gone, she left the boy under one of the bushes.

    16. Gen 21:16Then she went off and sat down nearby, about a bowshot away, for she said, “I cannot bear to watch the boy die!” And as she sat nearby, she lifted up her voice and wept.

    17. Gen 21:17Then God heard the voice of the boy, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven, “What is wrong, Hagar? Do not be afraid, for God has heard the voice of the boy where he lies.

    18. Gen 21:18Get up, lift up the boy, and take him by the hand, for I will make him into a great nation.”

    19. Gen 21:19Then God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. So she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink.

    20. Gen 21:20And God was with the boy, and he grew up and settled in the wilderness and became a great archer.

    21. Gen 21:21And while he was dwelling in the Wilderness of Paran, his mother got a wife for him from the land of Egypt.

    22. Gen 21:22At that time Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his army said to Abraham, “God is with you in all that you do.

    23. Gen 21:23Now, therefore, swear to me here before God that you will not deal falsely with me or my children or descendants. Show to me and to the country in which you reside the same kindness that I have shown to you.”

    24. Gen 21:24And Abraham replied, “I swear it.”

    25. Gen 21:25But when Abraham complained to Abimelech about a well that Abimelech’s servants had seized,

    26. Gen 21:26Abimelech replied, “I do not know who has done this. You did not tell me, so I have not heard about it until today.”

    27. Gen 21:27So Abraham brought sheep and cattle and gave them to Abimelech, and the two men made a covenant.

    28. Gen 21:28Abraham separated seven ewe lambs from the flock,

    29. Gen 21:29and Abimelech asked him, “Why have you set apart these seven ewe lambs?”

    30. Gen 21:30He replied, “You are to accept the seven ewe lambs from my hand as my witness that I dug this well.”

    31. Gen 21:31So that place was called Beersheba, because it was there that the two of them swore an oath.

    32. Gen 21:32After they had made the covenant at Beersheba, Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his army got up and returned to the land of the Philistines.

    33. Gen 21:33And Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and there he called upon the name of the LORD, the Eternal God.

    34. Gen 21:34And Abraham resided in the land of the Philistines for a long time.

    01 — Also here

    Who else the chapter reaches

    Names written in the English are linked in the text above. These are the ones that are not: an entity the Hebrew or Greek names under a spelling the translation does not use, or one reached only by an assertion about a verse of this chapter.

    Named in the Hebrew or Greek somewhere in this chapter, under a form the English renders differently — the registry's Ludim against the translation's Ludites — so there is no word in the sentence to hang the link on.

    Reached by an assertion Atlas extracted from a verse of this chapter rather than by a name written in it — a pronoun, a title, or a participant the sentence carries without naming. This layer is model-read and measured at 88.6–90.3% precision, and it is kept separate from the names above for that reason.

    02 — Read alongside

    Where this is echoed

    Readers' own connections, from OpenBible's crowd-voted cross-references — agreement about relevance, and not scholarly confidence. 335 passages were voted onto 33 verses of this chapter; the 16 shown lead on votes, and each is listed at the verse it was voted onto most strongly.

    • 1Psalms 12:6The words of the LORD are flawless, like silver refined in a furnace, like gold purified sevenfold.
    • 1Genesis 18:10Then the LORD said, “I will surely return to you at this time next year, and your wife Sarah will have a son!” Now Sarah was behind him, listening at the entrance to the tent.
    • 1Galatians 4:23His son by the slave woman was born according to the flesh, but his son by the free woman was born through the promise.
    • 1Genesis 17:19But God replied, “Your wife Sarah will indeed bear you a son, and you are to name him Isaac. I will establish My covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.
    • 11 Samuel 2:21So the LORD attended to Hannah, and she conceived and gave birth to three sons and two daughters. Meanwhile, the boy Samuel grew up in the presence of the LORD.
    • 1Matthew 24:35Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away.
    • 1Titus 1:2in the hope of eternal life, which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began.
    • 1Ruth 1:6When Naomi heard in Moab that the LORD had attended to His people by providing them with food, she and her daughters-in-law prepared to leave the land of Moab.
    • 1Romans 4:17–20As it is written: “I have made you a father of many nations.” He is our father in the presence of God, in whom he believed, the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being what does not yet exist.
    • 1Galatians 4:28Now you, brothers, like Isaac, are children of promise.
    • 1Exodus 4:31and they believed. And when they heard that the LORD had attended to the Israelites and had seen their affliction, they bowed down and worshiped.
    • 6Psalms 126:2Then our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with shouts of joy. Then it was said among the nations, “The LORD has done great things for them.”
    • 6Isaiah 54:1“Shout for joy, O barren woman, who bears no children; break forth in song and cry aloud, you who have never travailed; because more are the children of the desolate woman than of her who has a husband,” says the LORD.
    • 1Luke 1:68“Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, because He has visited and redeemed His people.
    • 6Genesis 17:17Abraham fell facedown. Then he laughed and said to himself, “Can a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Can Sarah give birth at the age of ninety?”
    • 331 Timothy 1:17Now to the King eternal, immortal, and invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

    Onward

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