Thursday, October 8, 2020

T. Desmond Alexander on the Age of Ishmael in Genesis 21

  

The age of Ishmael in chap. 21 presents a problem for some scholars from the chronological notices in 16:16, 17:24-25, 21:5 it is apparent that Ishmael must be some sixteen years old at the time of the events recorded in 21:1-21. Yet, it is maintained in chap. 21 Ishmael is portrayed as a young child. From these observations it is argued that the accounts in chaps. 16 and 21 were not originally part of the same document and must be assigned to separate sources.

 

This argument regarding the age of Ishmael centres on the belief that if 21:14 describes how Abraham placed Ishmael on Hagar’s back. Support for this view is derived from the LXX and Syriac translations of verse 14, ‘And he (Abraham) placed the child on her shoulder’. However, Speiser notes that the Hebrew text is obscure here and the word order of the LXX and Syriac may not represent the most original reading (Speiser, Genesis, 154-155). He translates verse 14 as follows: ‘Early next morning Abraham got some bread and a skin of water to give to Hagar. He placed them on her back and sent her away with the child.’ Support for this reading is provided by Wenham who notes (a) that it is improbable that Hagar could have carried on her back simultaneously a large water-skin (possibly weighing as much as thirty pounds), bread and a child and (b) that later the angel tells Hagar to take Ishmael by the hand (21:18) (Wenham, Genesis 16-50, 84). Furthermore, he observes that the term na’ar ‘lad’, used of Ishmael in 21:12 usually refers in Genesis ‘to young men capable of taking care of themselves’ (Idem, 83). In the light of these factors there is no reason to assume that Ishmael is merely a young child. This being so, his age lends no support to the idea that chaps. 16 and 21 come from different sources. (T. Desmond Alexander, Abraham in the Negev: A Source-Critical Investigation of Genesis 20:1-22:19 [Carlisle, U.K.: Paternoster Press, 1997], 67-68)