Ishmael was born at Mamre, when Abraham was 86, 11 years after Abraham's arrival in what would become the land of Israel (Genesis 16:3). He grew up to be a man of the desert wilderness, with a wild and hostile attitude toward people, exactly as God described him to his mother before he was born:

"Behold, you are with child, and shall bear a son; you shall call his name Ishmael; because The Lord has given heed to your affliction. He shall be a wild ass of a man, his hand against every man and every man's hand against him; and he shall dwell over against all his kinsmen." (Genesis 16:11-12 RSV).

When a feast was held to celebrate the weaning of Isaac, who was born 13 years later, Ishmael caused trouble by insulting and mocking his little brother (Genesis 21:8-9). After Sarah, who by then had come to dislike both Hagar and Ishmael, saw what he was doing, she said to Abraham "Cast out this slave woman with her son; for the son of this slave woman shall not be heir with my son Isaac." (Genesis 21:10 RSV)

Abraham at first resisted Sarah's demand - despite Ishmael's difficult personality, Abraham loved him and did not want to see him go. God however settled the matter:

"But God said to Abraham, "Be not displeased because of the lad and because of your slave woman; whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for through Isaac shall your descendants be named. And I will make a nation of the son of the slave woman also, because he is your offspring." (Genesis 21:12-13 RSV)

Hagar and Ishmael were sent away, but they were not abandoned. God appeared and spoke to Hagar, assuring her that He would watch over them and see them prosper (Genesis 21:17-19). "And God was with the lad, and he grew up; he lived in the wilderness, and became an expert with the bow. He lived in the wilderness of Paran; and his mother took a wife for him from the land of Egypt" (Genesis 21:20-21 RSV).

Isaac and Ishmael apparently did not meet again until Abraham died: "Isaac and Ishmael his sons buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron the son of Zohar the Hittite, east of Mamre, the field which Abraham purchased from the Hittites. There Abraham was buried, with Sarah his wife" (Genesis 25:9-10 RSV). The place today is known as the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, where the conflict for control of it still rages between the descendants of Isaac and Ishmael.

Ishmael lived 137 years (Genesis 25:17). He had 12 sons, who became the founders of Ishmaelite tribes that spread from Egypt to what is today Iraq. Many of the modern-day Arab peoples correctly recognize that they are the descendants of Ishmael, while the Jews, and the rest of the Israelites, are descendants of Isaac - but all are descended from Abraham.

Fact Finder: Did the apostle Paul use the history of Isaac and Ishmael to illustrate the two covenants?
Galatians 4:21-31

Plus much, much more on the same CD! Bible Maps Over 70 detailed full-color Bible study maps. Christian Music Enjoy the magnificent sound of over 1,900 hymns (midi computer format) Biblical Clipart Over 200 beautiful Biblical graphics (.jpg and .gif) Classic Works of Biblical History The Works of Philo, Complete and Unabridged (.txt format) The Works of Josephus, Complete and Unabridged (.txt format) Edward Gibbon's The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (.txt format) Hebrew and Greek Alphabets The Hebrew alphabet of the Old Testament, and the Greek alphabet of the New Testament, with equivalent sounds in English.

How To Receive Your Daily Bible Study CD
(Please read carefully to understand how and why the CDs are available)

This ministry web site, with thousands of Bible studies (including a new study added every day, 365 days a year) is always freely available for everyone. As such, this Daily Bible Study has become a very expensive time and financial commitment for the author and the publisher. Every study, that takes you only minutes to read, takes many hours of work to write, format and technically make available and maintain on the web server. Without help, it would be impossible for this Daily Bible Study web site to continue. That is the simple reality of the situation.

We are not "selling" CDs. The CD is our humble thank you gift to the faithful who realize the importance of making Bible-based Christian teaching available to "all the world" as Christ commanded His servants to do. The map is an actual Daily Bible Study server statistics "snap shot" of visitors to Daily Bible Study at 7 am local time recently. The green bars represent the percentage of visitors to the web site (where on the planet requested pages were being sent to) at that moment in the entire time zone directly above the green bar. The graphic constantly changes through the day like a rolling wave across the world's time zones.

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God bless you!