When I went to Christian college, men always got the bad rap. I remember several times when at a Bible study or something all the men would get together and the leaders would just let into us. They would say things like, “Don’t go preying on young, innocent girls! Keep it in your pants!” and “You young men are demons on the loose!” I asked a friend why they said that about men. He said, “Well you know that they used to do it to women, they used to blame just women for sexual sin!” My question to him was, “Why don’t they do it with men and women since unless it is rape (and men get raped too), Aren’t both the man and the woman equally responsible for sexual sin?”

Also during the ’80s there were a lot of famous pastors who got caught in extra-marital affairs. The media portrayed the women as all poor, poor victims. They never considered that most of the affairs were between two consensual adults. I know that some of them said they were raped. But I know that often women are just as much to blame as men are in committing sin together, including sexual sin (when it is not rape). Eve is as much to blame as Adam was. Job’s wife told him to “curse God and die” and in the case of Hagar, Sarah was as lacking in faith as Abraham.

Not everyone agrees with this. In going on Chabad.org and researching what they had to say about Sarah, I was told a very different story about what I read in the book of Genesis. According to Chabad.org:

….Sarah also had another name—Yiskah (“Jessica”), meaning “Seer,” because she was a prophetess and had the ability to see into the future. Another reason for the name “Seer” was that people used to gaze at her beauty (Talmud, Megillah 14a). Sarah was exceptionally beautiful, and all other women, by comparison with her, looked like monkeys (Talmud, Bava Batra 58a). It is therefore no wonder that when Abraham and Sarah went to Egypt, the Egyptians praised Sarah to King Pharaoh of Egypt, and he wanted to take her and make her queen.

As beautiful as Sarah was physically, she was even more beautiful in her nature. She was entirely free of sin, and she was exceptionally modest… (bold mine).

They also state that what happened to Hagar was Hagar’s own fault.

…Pharaoh’s daughter Hagar had become acquainted with Sarah when she was in her father’s palace. Sarah had made such a great impression on Hagar that she readily left her royal home to become a maidservant to Sarah. Sarah treated Hagar with respect and consideration. And when other princesses would come to visit Sarah, she would say to them: “Go and greet Hagar, the Egyptian princess, also. I don’t want her to feel slighted or shamed.”

Hagar, however, did not appreciate Sarah’s kindness, and talked about her behind her back. She would say to the visiting princesses: “Don’t think Sarah is such a saint. Why has G d punished her, so that in all the years she has not given birth to even one child?” (bold mine) Sarah was exceedingly grieved that she had been unable to become a mother. She decided to make a supreme sacrifice and offer Hagar to Abraham to be his second wife, to give him a child.

This I certainly have trouble with. Granted in last week’s devotional, I used the same website to show the history of Hagar but while Sarah was a hero of faith, I do not believe that she was as innocent as depicted here.

I am not trying to demonize Sarah either, though. If anything, I am trying to humanize her. Even we as men, can relate to her can’t we? In Genesis 18:12 where it is recodred that Sarah laughed at the Lord’s promise that she would have a child, I have to think of myself. How many times have I read the Lord’s Word and said to myself that that would never happen for me? I could never expect to fulfill God’s promise to me, recorded in His word for X, Y, or Z? Promises from the creator of the universe seem the hardest to believe, don’t they? Even when we may accept (intellectually) that the Lord made everything, he heals and makes miracles even today. Maybe it took the time between when the angel delivered the promise from the creator of the universe till the time it actually happened for it to get down from her head to her heart. However, the problems and the pain that it caused to Hagar are evidences of what happens when we cannot accept the promises of the One Above All.

Hebrews 11:11 It was by faith that even Sarah was able to have a child, though she was barren and was too old. She believed that God would keep his promise.

—————————————————————————————-W.