Genesis 25, Abraham's death; Ishmael

Although the text refers to Abraham taking another wife after Sarah's death, verse 6 seems to indicate she was, in reality, his concubine. At any rate, Abraham left everything to Isaac but had given many gifts to his other children while he was alive. This is very much in keeping with the tradition of the times. Verse 9 indicates that Isaac and Ishmael cooperated in the burial of their father next to Sarah in the cave of Machpelah.

Now, with the next section, the descendants of Ishmael, there are some interesting points.

1. If the tablet hypothesis is right, then Ishmael was actually responsible for the text up to this point! Terah's account had ended in Genesis 11:27. Some commentators who hold the the Tablet Hypothesis consider Genesis 25:12-18 to be an insertion of Ishmael's text into Isaac's text. But this is hard to believe for two reasons: first because the section lists Ishmael's death (one does not live to write about one's death...), and second, verse 19a is Isaac's toledot, or signing off! If he was the author of the large portion since Terah, he could have signed off BEFORE the Ishamael material. So internal evidence here seems to indicate that it was actually Ishmael who ended up writing the history and then Isaac wrote the material on Ishmael which follows. Considering that the two brothers worked together to bury and mourn their father, we do have evidence of them not hating each other! Therefore, if the Tablet Hypothesis is correct, I would personally submit that it was actually Ishmael who put down the material from mid-Genesis 11 to mid-25, and that Isaac only added the very little bit from verses 13 to 19a.

2. The second interesting note is that many of the names of Ishmael's children are Arabic names. This would certainly support the claim of the Arab's that Ishmael is their ancestor!

3. There is a radical difference between the NIV and KJV translations of verse 18:

NIV: His descendants settled in the area from Havilah to Shur, near the border of Egypt, as you go toward Asshur. And they lived in hostility toward all their brothers.

KJV: And they dwelt from Havilah unti Shur, tht is before Egypt, as thou goest toward Assyria: and he died n the presence of all his brethren.

The NIV note mentions that instead of 'lived in hostility', the meaning could be 'live to the east of...'

So I present that as I found it, and unless someone else can come in on this having studied it, I'm not going to touch it with a ten-foot pole! I do not know Hebrew and I do not know what the real, or correct, meaning of the passage is.

Because there is so much to deal with where Jacob and Esau are concerned, I'll save that part of chapter 25 for tomorrow.

[ June 25, 2002, 02:36 AM: Message edited by: Helen ]

 

The Koran declares that it was Ishmael who was to be sacrificed, not Isaac, as Ishmael would have been the 'only' son at that time.

http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Contrad/MusTrad/sacrifice.html

And here is the Islamic version of what happened to Hagar and Ishmael:
http://www.amaana.org/ISWEB/zamzam.htm

You will see some radical differences compared to the Biblical version!

This page has an interesting introduction to Islam in which it is claimed that the Jews/Christians altered the original Scriptures:
http://www.islam101.com/religions/sacrifice.htm

Those are interesting sites and you don't have to read any Koran!

God bless.