Citation

Mills M. New Blackfriars 2008; 89(1021): 280-299.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2008, John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1111/j.1741-2005.2008.00221.x

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This paper explores the profiles of the women characters Sarah and Hagar as models of human identity. The two characters can only be explored through reading the over-arching narrative of the story of Abraham. Their profiles and narrated personalities have to be extracted from that narrative, but there is a two-sided nature of this necessity. If Sarah and Hagar cannot be separated from the biblical narrator's engagement with father Abraham, neither can Abraham function as father of the nations except through his interaction with these two women. The reader is thus led towards an understanding of how the stories of Genesis 12–24 deal with the issue of parenthood.