Abraham and Sarah...

[tribeofjudah]

I've been reading over the story of Abraham once again and found it to be so interesting. A few questions/thoughts come to mind.

1. Is Sarai the niece or cousin of Abraham? As I read, it looks like his brother's daughter...but I could be wrong.

2. Many relative-marrying going on in this family line: Isaac/Rebekah, Jacob/Rachel

3. Marrying relative is taboo today. Is this an example of when the Lord "winked" as man...?

The Story of Terah's Family in Genesis:

27 This is the family history of Terah. Terah was the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Haran was the father of Lot.28 While his father, Terah, was still alive, Haran died in Ur in Babylonia, where he was born.29 Abram and Nahor both married. Abram's wife was named Sarai, and Nahor's wife was named Milcah. She was the daughter of Haran, who was the father of both Milcah and Iscah.30 Sarai was not able to have children.

31 Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot (Haran's son), and his daughter-in-law Sarai (Abram's wife) and moved out of Ur of Babylonia. They had planned to go to the land of Canaan, but when they reached the city of Haran, they settled there.

[John317]

I've been reading over the story of Abraham once again and found it to be so interesting. I few questions/thoughts come to mind.

1. Is Sarai the niece or cousin of Abraham? As I read, it looks like his brother's daughter...but I could be wrong.

Sarai was the daughter of Abraham's father, Terah, by another wife.

Genesis 20: 12 says,

And yet indeed [she is] my sister; she [is] the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife.

Doubtless it was not Abram's idea to marry Sarai but it was an arranged marriage.

Of course Abraham's reasoning did not make it right for him to try to deceive people about his true relationship with Sarai. He should have trusted God instead of thinking he had to lie in order to protect his life.

Originally Posted By: tribeofjudah

2. Many relative-marrying going on in this family line: Isaac/Rebekah, Jacob/Rachel

3. Marrying relative is taboo today. Is this an example of when the Lord "winked" as man...?

It is wrong today because, being further removed from Adam, the marriage between brother and sister results in hereditary defects.

It was at one time necessary for men to marry sisters and other close relatives. If they hadn't, there would have been no human race.

Today it is still common in some cultures for people to marry first and second cousins. For instance, we have Muslim friends from Afghanistan who married their first cousins. They lived in different parts of Afghanistan so they had never seen one another until the day they got married. The first time he saw her face was when he went into her bedroom. Of course, as still happens there, it was a marriage arranged by the parents of both husband and wife.

[tribeofjudah]

Thanks John317. In the case of your friends, I hope that she was Beautiful is Sarai was Beautiful. I think all men want someone good looking to have as a wife.

[John317]

Yes, you're right. And women want a handsome man, too, but most important for both in the long run is that people are beautiful on the inside. The physical prettiness of a woman and the handsomeness of a man don't last for all that long, but if they're beautiful inside as well as on the outside, they continue to be pleasant to live with for a lifetime.

But in the case we're talking about here, yes, she turned out-- fortunately for him-- to be beautiful.

However, she was diagnosed with breast cancer in just the last few years. So, to be quite honest about it, it has caused a lot of stress in their marriage.

Both their parents died during the years of the Taliban rule because the Taliban prohibited the Afghan people to talk with relatives living in America. So they went quite a few years without being able to talk to their parents. It was very hard especially on the wife.

He was put in jail for almost two years shortly after 9/11 because he made a big mistake, ignoring letters from the Immigration Service. When he finally reported to them, they arrested him, and came close to deciding to deport them. He told me when he was released that he was always well treated and had good food (compared to how it would have been in an Afghanistan prison!). But since then, it has all been resolved in their favor. They visited Afghanistan for the first time last summer. They, and their three sons, are really glad to live in America.

[Windsor]

It wasn't God winking at man's (Abraham) sin. It simply wasn't a sin to marry a sibling and did not become one until the Levitical laws were written. Marrying your first cousin has never been a sin and is common in many parts of the world. For example in Saudia Arabia, first and second cousin marriages exceed 50%. In Qatar it's 54% which is about 15% greater than the last generation so it's only increasing. As John alluded to, Afghanistan and Iran have rates around 30-40%. In approximately half of US states, some form of first cousin marriage is allowed. Maine allows it if genetic counseling occurs first. Frankly I see nothing wrong with cousin marriage as long as rare genetic diseases are ruled out.

[Kevin H]

This is a story where archaeology gives a lot of insight, and the important question of first asking "What did it mean to the original readers and listeners" and from that drawing lessons for what it means to us. Too often we know what something means to us and we impose this back on to the text instead of knowing what it meant back then.

In Ammerite law there were 2 types of wifes. The first was the regular wife which was considered property of the husband and husband's family. But there was also a second kind of wife, maybe if she came from an important family or something, but where the father-in-law addopted the girl and she would be called the daughter of my father but not my mother. In this marriage the woman was not property but a liberated woman who was seen as her husband's equal and needed to be consulted as they would make family decisions.

With what we know about the culture Sarah could well have not been a relative of Abraham, or a more distant relative, and became his sister by adoption for her legal status in the marriage.

[Windsor]

OTOH there was no Biblical pronouncement against incest at the time of Abraham and the practice was known to be rampant in Egypt (and continued even into the first centuries AD), a country Abraham was known to visit.

[Kevin H]

Windsor, while that is true, we still have the laws from Abraham's culture, and what they say about the two different types of wifes, and when you read the Bible does Sarah sound like a piece of property or a woman of influence? Her sister status was a legal status and an illustration of our status with God, justification by faith. Sarah was an addopted sister, or in the legal terminology the daughter of my father but not my mother. So much of this ancient status and ways of viewing things is what the Bible builds on and as we keep trying to squeeze these ideas into 20th century Greek thinking we miss the message.

[tribeofjudah]

Kevin H, yes you are right that we need to read the Bible "contextually" and then see how it applies to our day through Gods leading.

I also agree that cousin marriages are still rampant in Egypt. My friend here in Cal has told me that her mom/dad are cousins and the rest of her "clan" are also married to other cousins.... She is not shy about it and tells it laughingly. I've met them and they're nice people.

[tribeofjudah]

Moreover, I wonder if the King of Egypt had "relations" with Sarah upon taking her as wife...? He was cursed and then he gave her back to Abraham.

I'd like to think that God did not allow for the king to touch Sarah as HE protected her too.....