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HAGAR
AND THE GOD WHO SEES
Sometimes I am asked to talk about gender and the church, the Bible or
theology. In terms of our reading and use of the Scriptures, part of what
considering gender means is realising that the stories of women in the
Bible tend to be neglected.1 On
one occasion, rather than talking about this omission and the importance
of correcting it, I chose instead to illustrate the value of paying attention
to overlooked women in the biblical narrative by focusing on one such
story. I chose the story of Hagar in Genesis 16.
In the church service
in which this look at Hagar’s story was first presented, I had originally
intended to make use of the Dramatised Bible2
for the Scripture reading. This is the majority of the biblical text set
out in dramatised form to help when reading scripture out loud; it is useful
for handling long pieces of narrative and for choral and responsive readings.
However and to my surprise, the events of Genesis 16 were not included,
in spite of the dust jacket claiming that all the Bible narrative is dramatised.
The further incident with Hagar in Genesis 21 is included, although I suspect
that is because of the place of Abraham in that part of the story. For our
purposes in the church service we did a DIY dramatic reading of the passage
in Genesis 16.
This neglect of Hagar
is all the more strange given the importance placed on her story by Paul
in Galatians (4:21-5:1) when he uses her slavery to illustrate people’s
spiritual enslavement. In focusing on her story my intention was to unearth
a treasure not so much hidden in Scripture as hidden by our selective use
of the Bible. And of course, part of the reason for disregarding Hagar is
because she is a woman. As a careful look at her story shows, this prejudice
has kept many of us from an understanding of God which her life experience
reveals. Against this background, I introduced the story of Hagar as, to
a large extent, one of the Bible’s forgotten women.
To a large extent Hagar
is one of the Bible’s forgotten women. While people may know of her existence,
her story rarely receives detailed attention, suggesting that she is not
considered a key character in the biblical narrative. Ironically, Hagar
is overlooked now just as she was in her own time.
We meet Hagar because
of her connection with Abram and Sarai. While we are concerned here with
Hagar’s story, it is irretrievably intertwined with the fortunes of these
far better known characters. While not dwelling too much on their perspectives
and experiences, it is important to understand something of the dynamics
in their lives in order to understand more fully Hagar’s own story.
When Abram was 75 years
old and Sarai about 65, Abram was called by God to leave his home in Haran
and go where God would take him (Genesis 12:1). So Abram and his entire
household went to Canaan, which at the time was inhabited by the Canaanites.
Here God specifically promised that Abram’s offspring would be given the
land (Genesis 12:7). The well-known complication to this plan was that Abram
and Sarai had no children for Sarai, we are told in Genesis 11:30, was barren.
And it is this context that has to be encountered when we come to story
of Hagar.
Of course, we all know
what happens, how the story unfolds. The events around the birth of Isaac
are extraordinary. Indeed, ‘virtually no hero worth his salt in Genesis
is born under circumstances that are ordinary for his mother’.3
But Sarai and Abram, when we meet them in Genesis 16, did not have the benefit
of our hindsight and fuller record of events. Sarai had lived all her married
life hoping to have a child. She had lived through the waiting, the hoping,
the disappointment, and the guilt at not providing Abram with children.
In the Old Testament, where a woman’s status is very much defined by her
children, the lot of the childless woman is cruel and harsh. This is seen
also in the lives of Rebekah and Rachel, Rachel saying it all when she remonstrates
with Jacob and cries those haunting words, ‘Give me children, or I shall
die!’ (Genesis 30:1-2). And it is to me a staggering thought that after
all that Sarai must have endured, and surely towards a time when she had
given up expectations of her own pregnancy, that God gives the promise to
Abram of a child, and that she (and indeed Abram) actually have to wait
a further 25 years before that promise is fulfilled in the birth of Isaac.
I don’t know what you think a long time to wait is. For different people
one day seems unbearable, for others a matter of months or years. I think
Sarai had the kind of waiting that is almost unendurable and her actions
surely must be viewed in the light of this very specific traumatised situation.
Were it not for this
situation, of course, Hagar would remain anonymous to us, lost under the
designation of one of Sarai’s maidservants. Our story occurs some 10 years
after Abram was initially called by God to leave Haran and about 15 years
before Isaac was born.
So who was Hagar? She
was a slave girl, and an Egyptian. Very possibly she has been given to Abram
by the King of Egypt after the King had taken Sarai for his wife. In escaping
famine Abram travelled to Egypt and, because he feared the Egyptians would
kill him in order to have Sarai, who was very beautiful, he claimed Sarai
was his sister. The Pharaoh’s officials set their sights on Sarai, and hence
she was taken to the king and became his wife, for which Abram was bestowed
favours of ‘sheep, oxen, male donkeys, male and female slaves, female donkeys
and camels’ (Genesis 12:10-20). When the Pharaoh eventually realised Sarai
was already married she was returned to Abram. So what we have here really
are two women sold into slavery and used as objects - Sarai because of her
beauty and Hagar because of her youth and potential fertility.
There was a difference
between these two, of course, for Sarai at this point has access to wealth
and some power and Hagar has neither of these. She is a foreigner, a slave
girl, owns nothing, not even her own freedom and is given by Sarai to Abram
as his wife in order to bear children for her. The custom of having children
by another woman is seen also in the story of Rachel (Genesis 30:3) and
‘it is probably safe to assume that surrogate motherhood was an actual custom
in the ancient Near East ... and would have been eminently possible in a
world in which slavery was practiced and persons’ sexual services could
be donated by their masters or mistresses.’4
So Hagar is subjected to enforced sexual intercourse for the purpose of
becoming pregnant with a child who will be given over to her mistress and
will not be her own. These are not nice little bedtime stories for children
in the pages of the Old Testament. They are the kind of things not talked
about in polite company. And while it may be that we have to make these
stories accessible to children, I think that as adults we should not run
away from the traumatic events they describe.
Hagar does conceive
- things are going according to Sarai’s plan. But the result of this as
far as Hagar is concerned is that ‘she looked with contempt on her mistress’
(Genesis 16:4) or more literally, ‘her mistress was slight in her eyes’.
I don’t know how you react to Hagar’s contempt, what you feel towards her
at this point. Do your sympathies lie with Hagar or with Sarai? Megan McKenna
has used this story in numerous Bible study groups and she has observed:
‘Whenever this passage is read, reactions are split diametrically, depending
on the audience. There is indignation and interpretations of jealousy and
pettiness against Hagar among women who are educated and economically stable;
there is laughter and delight among poor women.’5
Megan McKenna tells that in using this story among immigrant women in North
America she learnt how some of them who were working as maids in wealthy
households had been made pregnant by the man of the house and had been thrown
out as a result. Others had run away, others been treated like old clothes
the rich get tired of and then thrown out with the rubbish. Therefore, their
identification with Hagar is very strong.
It is not possible to
know for sure what was going through Hagar’s mind and heart at this time.
Perhaps it could be that Hagar had for the first time in her life found
herself in a position that gave her some feeling of empowerment, which was
very much a previously unknown experience to her. For all her status as
a nobody, a nothing, a vessel to be used at someone else’s bidding, whether
it be for sexual or other purposes, she now knows that she has achieved
what her wealthy and relatively powerful mistress has been unable to do,
has indeed failed to do all her life. Alternatively, it could be that Sarai
becomes slight in Hagar’s eyes because of the way that her mistress has
used her as an object, as a means to an end and that she can no longer have
any respect for someone who treats her that way. Or it could be simply that
the hierarchy of power between these two women has been broken down by Hagar’s
pregnancy, that Hagar now views her mistress more like another woman than
she does a mistress. What is clear is that the plan that Hagar’s pregnancy
should elevate Sarai’s status is not working out - rather the reverse happens,
Sarai finds her esteem lowered. For Hagar is not just an object to be used.
She is a human being and here acts as a person in her own right.
All of this is too much
for Sarai. In the end she treats Hagar so harshly that Hagar runs away,
this flight in and of itself a risky thing for a slave to do. It is probable,
due to the location of the well of water mentioned in the narrative, which
was enroute to a region on the Egyptian border, that she was trying to make
her way back to her homeland.
It is in the desert,
in this desperate situation, that Hagar encounters God. In looking at the
story of Hagar it can be difficult for us to find a direct connection with
Hagar’s story and our own lives. Her circumstances seem so far removed from
our reality. But what we can do is learn about God through the very different
experiences of other people. If three people were to describe a mutual friend
it is likely that they would say some similar things about this person.
It is also true that each of them would highlight some aspect of the person’s
character that the others had not thought about or that certainly was not
uppermost in their minds. This is because in our relationships our various
needs, abilities, experiences, and situations create different dynamics
between us. I think the same can be true of our relationship with God. And
Hagar’s situation reveals something of God to us that, certainly up to this
point in Genesis, we had not known about before. We see this particularly
in her response to her encounter with God. To me Hagar’s response is the
most remarkable part in this whole episode. We are told that Hagar named
the Lord who spoke to her. It is not that she called on God’s name. Hagar
actually named God. The slave girl names the deity! It almost seems audacious
of her! So powerful is her encounter with God who up to this point had been
largely if not totally unknown to her that she needs a name for the One
she has now met so personally. In fact this is the only occasion in the
Bible where a human being uses the formal naming formula in ascribing a
name to God.
Names are very interesting
things. They convey meaning. Today most of the names that we have have meanings
although many of these are not commonly known any more. The Old Testament
is full of names for people and for God that have meanings and connections
and even explanations. The 1990 film ‘Dances with Wolves’ has as its title
the name given by a Sioux Indian tribe to the soldier John Dunbar because
they see him interacting with wolves. In that film the names of other individuals
were ‘Stands with a fist’ and ‘Smiles a Lot’ – names which described something
of their character. And what Hagar does here is give a name to God that
describes who God is for her at this moment, El-Roi - God who sees or a
God of seeing.
Why did she give God
that name? If you read this story and were asked to make up a name for God
that represented this encounter with Hagar would you have come up with ‘God
who sees’? Or would you have thought in terms of rescue, or saving, or maybe
justice? Hagar doesn’t use any of these terms. God is a God who sees. And
I think the reason for this was that in all of Hagar’s existence to date
she was someone who was unseen. She was virtually invisible. Certainly in
this passage, while we are told her name, Abram and Sarai do not use it
of her - she is always called just ‘the slave-girl’ - with no name. It is
not until the angel of the Lord finds her that she is addressed by her name,
‘Hagar’.
Perhaps the idea of
‘the God who sees’ is a negative trigger for some people. The idea of seeing
can have connotations of exposure: I can see what you are doing - God can
see what you are doing - you are going to be found out; and also the idea
of not being good enough. But the God who sees here is not this kind of
severe judge seeking out imperfections. Rather we are talking of God seeing
what others do not care to see, and what is more, knowing the full import
of what is seen. The slave girl who is nameless, unseen, and of no account
becomes, through the intervention of God, Hagar, seen and valued. This,
I think, is why Hagar chooses the name ‘God who sees’. Hagar does not know
God as the God of Abram, but as the God who sees.
Hagar introduces us,
therefore, to the God who cares for the oppressed, whoever the oppressed
in a society may be. We are overseen by a God who sees those who are more
usually overlooked. This is both a comfort and a challenge to us. It is
a comfort in that we are included in this seeing of God. Whenever we find
ourselves and our situations neglected or excluded by others, we do not
go unnoticed by the God who sees. It is a challenge to us to learn how to
see as God sees, valuing those who are not valued either in our society
or by us as individuals - those without wealth, power, possessions, ability,
social skills, or social standing. We can be sure that those who are marginalised
by our society or ourselves as individuals are seen by the God who sees.
We need to learn to see as God sees even as we are ourselves so seen.
It is a difficult reality
in this story to face up to that, in fact, in Hagar’s encounter with God
she is not liberated out of her situation. The first thing she is told is
that she is to return to her mistress so in many respects, in the immediacy,
there is no change for her. In fact she continues to know affliction - that
this is not condoned by God is evident in the name God gives for her son,
‘Ishmael’, which means 'the Lord hears' - this hearing relating specifically
to Hagar’s suffering. But Hagar is to return to the same position from which
she has run away. She returns to the same people, but with no change in
the power relations between them. We also know that with these same dynamics
operating some 13 or so years later she will return to the desert, with
her son, having been sent away by Abram. Here she is given a promise by
God that exactly parallels the one given to Abram - that her offspring would
be so numerous that they would be countless.
She is also given the
divine prediction about Ishmael’s future. This sounds somewhat strange to
us: that he would be a wild ass of a man. In Job 39:5-8 the wild ass is
described as a free, unrestrained creature going where it will. In other
words, Ishmael would be untameable as the wild ass is untameable - he would
be his own master, not somebody’s slave. This is a wonderful promise for
the son of a slave-girl, but Hagar’s own path remains a difficult and isolated
one. And at this particular point in her life she is not liberated out of
her situation. She does not flourish - she only survives. And it can be
that as part of today’s difficult reality sometimes all people can do is
survive. There are some occasions and some situations when it is not possible
to change circumstances which we wish were different, not possible to make
progress and move forward as we would want to, and not possible in any sense
of the word to flourish, but only to survive.
The psalms bear ample
witness to the difficulty of the experience of survival - be it physical
or emotional. Many of the first 50 psalms contain evidence of great soul
searching, anguish and pain. Hagar’s story tells us that such experiences
do not go unseen by God even if they are unacknowledged by other people.
Maybe at these times to survive is actually to achieve a great deal.
So Hagar survives. And
Hagar is seen by God. And Hagar gives God a name that tells us what she
has come to know about God through her experiences. And it seems to me that
if we can learn about God from Hagar, we can also learn about God from each
other and our many and varied experiences of God. So a final thought is
this: if out of your experience of God you were to give God a name, what
would it be?
1 I addressed this in
a previous article in Lion and Lamb: ‘Understanding Scripture: What about
Gender?’ Winter 1998/1999.
2 Michael Perry (ed) (1989) The Dramatised Bible, London: Marshall Pickering
and Swindon: Bible Society.
3 Susan Niditch, (1992) ‘Genesis’ in Carol A Newsom and Sharon H Ringe (eds)
The Women’s Bible Commentary, London: SPCK, p. 17.
4 Susan Niditch, (1992) ‘Genesis’ in Carol A Newsom and Sharon H Ringe (eds)
The Women’s Bible Commentary, London, SPCK, p. 17.
5 Megan McKenna, (1994) Not Counting Women and Children Neglected Stories
from the Bible, Tunbridge Wells: Burns and Oates, p. 175.
Fran
Porter is currently a Research Consultant with the Centre for Contemporary
Christianity in Ireland, exploring the church community and political
participation of evangelical women in Northern Ireland.
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