In March of this year,
I briefly discussed the chronological error found in Genesis 21. This discrepancy has been known for years, and is sometimes cited as evidence for the Documentary Hypothesis. I said the following in response to
a post by
Larsguy47:
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Thank you for segueing into another Bible contradiction. Genesis 16:16 says that, "Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore him Ishmael" and Genesis 21:5 says that, "Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him." Simple math says that Ishmael was 14 when Isaac was born. Genesis 21:8 states that Isaac was already weaned when Ishmael and Hagar were "cast out," so Ismael may have been as old as 15 or 16, maybe even older. (2 Maccabees 7:27 reads: But, leaning close to him, she spoke in their native language as follows, deriding the cruel tyrant: "My son, have pity on me. I carried you nine months in my womb, and nursed you for three years, and have reared you and brought you up to this point in your life, and have taken care of you.") So please tell me how Hagar could have carried a 15- or 16-year old on her shoulders while Ishmael sucked "from some makeshift water "'breasts.'" Tell me, too, how Hagar was able to "thr[o]w [Ishmael] under a bush as if dead" if he was a teenager. I know that what you relayed is what chapter 21 claims, but you have unwittingly demonstrated another inconsistency in the Bible.
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The New American Bible translates
Genesis 21:14 this way:
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14 Early the next morning Abraham got some bread and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. Then, placing the child on her back, he sent her away. As she roamed aimlessly in the wilderness of Beer-sheba,
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The NAB also afixes
this frank footnote:
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2 Placing the child on her back: the phrase is translated from an emended form of the Hebrew text. In the current faulty Hebrew text, Abraham put the bread and the waterskin on Hagar's back, while her son apparently walked beside her. This reading seems to be a scribal attempt at harmonizing the present passage with the data of the Priestly source, in which Ishmael would have been at least fourteen years old when Isaac was born; compare Genesis 16:16 with Genesis 21:5; cf Genesis 17:25. But in the present Elohist story Ishmael is obviously a little boy, not much older than Isaac; cf Genesis 15:18.
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Although the NAB doesn't mention the
LXX, the fact that
the LXX agrees with the NAB's translation is additional evidence that the text originally said that Ishmael was placed on Hagar's shoulders. It's much more likely that the more "difficult" reading (LXX) is correct, and that a later scribe "corrected" it rather than the LXX translator(s) of this verse changing it to make it inconsistent with earlier verses.
Quote:
Sir Lancelot C. L. Brenton 1851 LXX version:
14 And Abraam rose up in the morning and took loaves and a skin of water, and gave them to Agar, and he put the child on her shoulder, and sent her away, and she having departed wandered in the wilderness near the well of the oath.
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The New English Bible translates the verse in this way:
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Abraham rose early in the morning, took some food and a waterskin full of water and gave it to Hagar; he set the child on her shoulder and sent her away...
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The
NIV attempts to translate away the problem
thusly:
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14 Early the next morning Abraham took some food and a skin of water and gave them to Hagar. He set them on her shoulders and then sent her off with the boy. She went on her way and wandered in the desert of Beersheba.
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But even if we assume for argument's sake that translations like the NIV are correct in saying that the food and water--and not Ishmael--were what was placed on Hagar's shoulders, the obvious question is why Abraham loaded down Hagar with the supplies if there were a teenager available to carry some. Why would Hagar have to carry everything (keep in mind that water weighs 8 pounds per gallon and there were two people using it) while Ishamel simply walked beside her? If Ishmael were just a child, it is understandable why Hagar would shoulder the load, but it is not so easy to understand why a teenager was exempted from this duty.
And here is another piece of evidence to consider. In their book
Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis, 1964 edition, page 157, authors Robert Graves and Raphael Patai make mention of a Jewish tradition found in
Genesis Rabba, a midrash on the book of Genesis. The emphasis is mine:
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Some say that vexed by Hagar's presumption, Sarai turned her out of Abram's bed, threw shoes in her face, and cast the evil eye on her, so that Hagar's first-born, a girl, died at birth...Sarai then cast the evil eye on Ishmael, who grew so feeble and wizened that he could no longer walk. Therefore, when Abram sent Hagar away, she had to carry Ishmael on her back--though already seventeen years, or even twenty-five, of age...
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Obviously, this midrash's very existence is an unstated admission that there was an inconsistency which needed explaining, and is further evidence that the text stated that Ishmael was indeed placed on Hagar's back. A chronological error exists in Genesis 21, the explanations of apologists notwithstanding.
06-29-2007, 06:35 PM
How Old Was Ishmael in Genesis 21?
