How Old is Ishmael?
According to the chronological
sequence of the Abraham cycle, Ishmael should be 16 or 17 at the time of his
expulsion. Ishmael was born when Abraham was 86 (16:16); he was circumcised at
13 (17:25), and Isaac was born one year later, when he was 14. Ishmael was
expelled when Isaac was weaned, presumably two or three years later. However, the
narrative seems to portray Ishmael as a young child. When Abraham sent Hagar
away, he “took some bread and a skin of water… He placed them over her
shoulder, together with the child, and sent her away” (14). A boy of sixteen
would not be placed on his mother’s shoulder. Some linked “the boy” to the
phrase “Abraham took [some bread and a skin of water]” instead of linking “the
boy” to Hagar’s shoulder; in other words, Abraham put the bread and water on
Hagar’s shoulder, and gave her the boy. The main motive for this interpretation
is Ishmael’s age, as Weinfeld wrote:
“The boy” is linked back to “he took.”
There is therefore no reason to wonder how she could have carried Ishmael on
her shoulders, since he was sixteen or seventeen years of age. A similar
grammatical structure can be found in the verse “So the men took that gift, and
they took with them double the money, and Benjamin” (43:15). “They took” also
refers to “Benjamin.” (Weinfeld 1992, 136)
This reading supports Wenham’s
assertion that delaying the phrase “the boy” to the end of the sentence is part
of a deliberate delay, intended to indicate Abraham’s difficulty. Abraham
places the bread and the skin of water on Hagar, and only when there was
nothing else left for him to do, he reluctantly gave her the child. However,
even if this interpretation is possible in the context of v. 14, it is
challenged throughout the narrative. In addition to certain specific details,
such as the angel’s instructions to Hagar to lift up her son, which is
unfathomable if Ishmael is 16, the general atmosphere of the chapter portrays Ishmael
as a small child: the heat and lack of water affect him sooner than they do his
mother; he requires his mother’s assistance, instead of helping her; and the
conclusion of the story is followed by God’s accompaniment of Ishmael’s
maturation: “God was with the boy and he grew up,” indicating that Ishmael had
not yet reached maturity.
This tension is simplified by the
documentary hypothesis, which attributes all chronological data in the Abraham
cycle to P, while the expulsion of Ishmael was authored by E, a source
uncommitted to the chronological details found in other narratives. But it is
hard to imagine that the story cycle was edited while omitting a chronological detail
that is so crucial to the narrative. Moreover, presenting Ishmael as מצחק
(according to the sexual interpretation mentioned above) is also appropriate to
his age (16–17) rather than to his portrayal as an infant in the continuation
of the story. Therefore, one must assume that there is a purpose to describing
Ishmael as a young child, even if the chronological sequence indicates that he
is a young adult. The design is linked with the overall purpose of the
narrative. (Jonathan Grossman, Abram to Abraham: A Literary Analysis of the
Abraham Narrative [Das Alte Testament Im Dialog 11; New York: Peter Lang,
2016], 419-21)
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