16 ¹ Abram's wife Sarai had borne him no children. Now she had an Egyptian slave-girl whose name was Hagar, 16 ² and she said to Abram, 'You see that the LORD has not allowed me to bear a child. Take my slave-girl; perhaps I shall found a family through her.' Abram agreed to what his wife said; 16 ³ so Sarai, Abram's wife, brought her slave-girl, Hagar the Egyptian, and gave her to her husband Abram as a wife Or concubine. When this happened Abram had been in Canaan for ten years. 16 ⁴ He lay with Hagar and she conceived; and when she knew that she was with child, she despised her mistress. 16 ⁵ Sarai said to Abram, 'I have been wronged and you must answer for it. It was I who gave my slave-girl into your arms, but since she has known that she is with child, she has despised me. May the LORD see justice done between you and me.' 16 ⁶ Abram replied to Sarai, 'Your slave-girl is in your hands; deal with her as you will.' So Sarai ill-treated her and she ran away.

16 ⁷ The angel of the LORD found her by a spring of water in the wilderness on the way to Shur, 16 ⁸ and he said, 'Hagar, Sarai's slave-girl, where have you come from and where are you going?' She answered, 'I am running away from Sarai my mistress.' 16 ⁹ The angel of the LORD said to her, 'Go back to your mistress and submit to her ill-treatment.' 16 ¹⁰ The angel also said, 'I will make your descendants too many to be counted.' 16 ¹¹ And the angel of the LORD said to her:

'You are with child and will bear a son.
You shall name him Ishmael That is God heard,
because the LORD has heard of your ill-treatment.
16 ¹² He shall be a man like the wild ass,
his hand against every man
and every man's hand against him;
and he shall live at odds with Or live to the east of all his kinsmen.' 16 ¹³ She called the LORD who was speaking to her by the name El-Roi That is God of a vision, for she said, 'Have I indeed seen God and still live God and still live: prob. rdg, Heb. hither after that vision' 16 ¹⁴ That is why men call the well Beer-lahai-roi That is the Well of the Living One of Vision, it lies between Kadesh and Bered.

16 ¹⁵ Hagar bore Abram a son, and he named the child she bore him Ishmael. 16 ¹⁶ Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael.

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