reat feast on the day that he was weaned. But Sarah saw the son of
Hagar the Egyptian and of Abraham playing with her son Isaac. And she
said to Abraham, "Drive out this slave girl and her son, for the son of
this slave girl shall not be heir with my son Isaac." This request was
very displeasing to Abraham because the boy was his son. But Jehovah
said to Abraham, "Do not be displeased because of the boy and because of
your slave girl. Listen to all that Sarah says to you, for Isaac only
and his children shall bear your name. But I will also make of the son
of the slave girl a great nation, because he is your son."

Then Abraham rose early in the morning and took bread and a skin of
water and gave it to Hagar; and he put the boy upon her shoulder and
sent her away. So she set out and wandered in the desert of Beersheba.
When the water in the skin was gone, she left the child under one of the
desert shrubs and went a short distance away and sat down opposite him,
for she said, "Let me not see the child die."

While she sat there, the boy began to cry; and Jehovah heard the cry of
the boy, and said, "What troubles you, Hagar? Fear not, for Jehovah has
heard the cry of the boy. Rise, lift him up, and hold him fast by the
hand, for I will make him a great nation." And Jehovah opened her eyes
and she saw a well of water. Then she went and filled the skin with
water and gave the boy a drink.

And Jehovah cared for the boy; and when he grew up, he lived in the
wilderness of Paran and became a bowman. And his mother secured a wife
for him from Egypt.

ABRAHAM'S LOYALTY TO GOD

Later Jehovah tested Abraham, saying to him, "Abraham"; and he answered,
"Here am I." Jehovah said, "Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you
love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a
burnt-offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you."

[Illustration: (C) _Curtis Publishing Company_

_Hagar and Ishmael in the Wilderness_ Painted by W. L. Taylor]

So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his ass and took two of
his servants with him, and his son Isaac. When he had split the wood for
the burnt-offering, he set out for the place of which God had told him.
On the third day, when Abraham looked up and saw the place in the
distance, he said to his servants, "Stay here with the ass, while I and
the lad go over there. When we have worshipped, we will come back to
you."

Then Abraham took the wood for the bu