TORAH FOR CHRISTIANS
SEASON ONE EPISODE TWO
SARAH IS MY SISTER?
All of us know that Abraham’s wife is Sarah. But did you know that she was also his sister? Let me explain. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and this is Torah for Christians.
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Welcome to Torah for Christians. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr.
One of the most famous women of the Bible is, of course, Sarah. The wife of Abraham, we first meet her in Genesis 11.29, when the brothers Abram and Nahor took wives, Sarai and Milcah. Milcah is the daughter of Haran, Abram and Nahor’s brother. Haran is also the father of Lot, who also plays an important role in the Abraham saga.
In the Torah, Sarai has no parentage; we do not know the identity of her father. Nevertheless, the Torah then tells us that Sarai was barren, she had no children. Following this important disclosure, we read that the family traveled to Haran, at the northern edge of the Fertile Crescent, where Terah, Abram’s father, died. In the following chapter, we immediately read of God’s command to Abram to “Lech Lecha”. Get yourself to the Land of Canaan. Abram dutifully uprooted his family again and traveled to Elon Moreh, near Hebron. Here is Genesis 12, we also read that God bestowed the Covenant of land and people upon Abram. Notably, Sarai was still barren.
We’ll return to the motif of infertility in a later podcast. But for now, the fact that Sarai was childless plays a major role in two bizarre stories that we read about this couple. In this same chapter, we read of a famine in Canaan; Abram and Sarai traveled to Egypt, somewhat reminiscent of Jacob’s later charge to his sons to go to Egypt to procure grain.
But there is a twist to the story. Abram, realizing that Sarai is exceedingly beautiful, attempts to pass her off as his sister. If the Egyptians think that she is his wife, so he thought, Abram thought that Pharaoh would kill him. To save his life, he tells her to say that she is his sister, regardless of the cost to her.
Well, this didn’t go so well. Sarai eventually arrives in Pharaoh’s court and joins his harem.
But while it went well for Abram, it didn’t go so well for Pharaoh. God seemed to think that her marriage was more important than his scheming. God sent plagues upon Pharaoh on account of Sarai. Sound familiar? It should. When Pharaoh discovered the plot, as he eventually would, his army escorted the two of them out of Egypt. Abram left Egypt a rich man. Pharoah bribed Abram; he received cattle, sheep and even slaves to to leave. Did he traffic her? You get to decide.
This is a story that we don’t teach in Religious School. There are problems galore: what was Abram afraid of; why was he so selfish; did he run a scheme against Pharaoh? All these questions come to mind. And frankly, I really don’t want to teach this to my 5th Graders. Maybe the kids in High School.
We can also infer that Abram concealed his plan from Sarai until just before they were to enter Egypt. While not made explicit, this is the first of several times that Abram conceals his plans from his wife, most notably when he took Isaac to Mount Moriah and nearly killed him.
Notably, Sarai has no voice in this episode. This is strange since in later stories involving her, she does speak; at times she even drives the story, especially regarding Hagar, her Egyptian maidservant. But here, Sarai is unusually voiceless.
The Torah is silent about what happened when the Pharaoh took Sarai into his harem. We do not know if Pharaoh had sex with her, if she was a willing partner, or if she was raped. Or perhaps she was just left alone. We do not know.
But then, they did it again! In Genesis, Chapter 20 the now-named Abraham and Sarah traveled to Gerar, in the Negev Desert near the oasis of Kadesh. In Gerar, they came under the rule of King Avimelech. And again, Abraham said that Sarah was his sister. But before the king could have sex with Sarah, God approached him in a dream and told him the truth, that she was married to Abraham. This time, the Torah clearly states that King Avimelech had not had sex with her. Avimelech confessed the entire story to God, saying that Abraham had foisted Sarah upon him as his sister – and Sarah had also said that, “He is my brother.” God did not punish King Avimelech since he repented of this mistake. Avimelech then summoned Abraham, gave him more sheep and oxen, and more male and female slaves, and gave them to Abraham and Sarah. He also gave Sarah a thousand pieces of silver, in effect bribing them to leave. Here we go again.
We can forgive Abraham for his first indiscretion but for the second, I’m not so forgiving. These escapades show a pattern; Abraham routinely deceived people of power and influence to inflate his own wealth and his own power. Just as vile, he used his wife as bait. Abraham knew that God would not allow either Pharaoh or Avimelech to molest Sarah; Abraham also knew that these kings would pay dearly to expel this couple from their lands. Today, we would call the two of them grifters.
The second story also shows that Sarah had agency in this scam. King Avimelech said to God that Sarah said that she was Abraham’s. If Sarah had agreed to this scam, even to the point of giving up her body for gain, what does this tell us about Sarah? Honestly, I’m not too pleased with where this question might lead.
But at the end of Genesis Chapter 20, where the Avimelech story is located, Abraham tries to justify his actions. He tells the king that in a way, Sarah is his sister, that she was in fact his half-sister, daughter of his father but of a different mother. Where does this come from?
We have to go all the way back to the end of Genesis Chapter 11, which lists the genealogy tree from Noah to Abraham. We know that Abram’s father was named Terah, who lived in Ur of the Chaldeans. After 70 years, he fathered Abram, Nahor and Haran. Haran, the Torah tells us, is the father of Lot and he unfortunately died while the family was still in Ur. Prior to leaving for Haran, in the northern part of the Fertile Crescent, Abram and Nahor wed; Abram wed Sarai, who as I said earlier has no named father. Nahor wed Milcah, the daughter of his brother Haran. Haran also, and this is the point, was also the father of a woman named Iscah, who is only mentioned this one time in the Torah.
Midrash suggests that Iscah is Sarah. If we accept this, and we don’t have to accept it by the way, Abram married his niece, not his half-sister. We have no proof however that Terah had a second wife, who had a daughter.
Did Abraham lie again? Perhaps; we just don’t know; Midrash is interpretive, not literal.
But to Abraham’s credit, he took the fall for Sarah, saying that he told her to say that she was his sister. But to me, Sarah could have said no to him; she decided to be part of the grift.
There is a lot more to discuss about Sarah and we will continue her story next week. So, let’s summarize these two stories; they tell us a lot about the first couple.
We know from contemporaneous documents, that the Hebrews, also known as Apiru or Abiru, were unsavory nomads, who traveled the Fertile Crescent scheming and conniving their way through life. Settled civilizations despised these wanders; they posed a threat to their way of life. When they came to town, it was time to hide the jewelry and the silverware.
Knowing this, it’s no surprise that Abraham and Sarah dreamed up this scheme and attempted it twice. Perhaps they tried more than twice; the Torah is silent about other schemes. And it is worth knowing that later in the Torah, Abraham and Avimelech feuded over a well. They settled their dispute amicably; Abraham gave Avimelech seven ewes in return for the water rights. The oath they swore was called in Hebrew Be’ersheva, Beersheba, the Well of the Seven.
We’re not yet ready to pass judgement upon Sarah; we have to see what she does when she does have agency. For that, we’ll look next time at her relationship with her Egyptian handmaiden, Hagar, the mother of Ishmael. We’re going to see some interesting things when we do. Stay tuned.
I want to thank you for listening to Torah for Christians. Please like and review this and all my podcasts on our website, www.torahforchristians.net or on iTunes. You can also subscribe to my Substack column, Bible Stories They (Never) Taught You in Religious School, on the website or directly on Substack.
Next week, we will continue our study of Sarah. As I said, it promises to be interesting.
Again, thank you for listening to Torah for Christians. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and I wish you a wonderful week. Hinei Mah Tov… L’hitraot, till we meet again. I’m Rabbi Jordan Parr and this has been Torah for Christians.