donkey

donkey

Genesis 16: 11, 12

The angel of the Lord also said to her:

“you are now with child

and you will have a son.

You shall name him Ishmael,

for the Lord has heard of your misery.

He will be a wild donkey of a man;

his hand will be against everyone

and everyone’s hand against him,

and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”

Oh, Hagar! First you are ripped from your Egyptian family and bound to a rich vagrant. Then after serving faithfully and well you discovered that your exaltation to become the Master’s concubine for the purpose of mothering an heir has become a nightmare. Your haughty attitude came from the quick insemination from the elderly Abram, while his long suffering wife remained barren. Sarai’s understandable angst turned against you and here you are: fleeing, angry and scared. 

Did the angel of the Lord give you a vision of the hordes of people who would point to you and Abram as the fountainhead of their people? Did you connect the promise in verse 10 “I will so increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count.” to the term hostility? 

What was going through your soul at that moment? What did you see, hear, feel or believe?

What we do know is that the attitude and thinking you entered this encounter with endured in your son and his descendants. And yes, they are numerous on the earth. They have always been more numerous than the descendants of Isaac, Abram’s son by Sarai (later Sarah). For those sons are known crudely as Arabs, and most follow the religion of Mohammed today. To this day the common dialogue is the same as that uttered in this fateful description of the child, Ishmael.

• Oppressed, miserable, at a disadvantage because of the people of Isaac.
• Wild and donkey-like: obstinate and strong, self willed and clannish.
• His hand will be against everyone: not just Abraham, Isaac and their line… everyone.
• Everyone’s hand against him: this is a conflict that must be resisted, and will be resisted.
• He will live in hostility toward all his brothers: this child and his offspring will never value shalom.

Never.

Mohammed simply codified the angel’s pronouncement and added regulations to make it work. Then by conquest and dominion sought to establish what was believed to be a birthright. 

Ishmael, firstborn, rejected because he was not a purebred child of the promise, sired a people with the same attitude as he grew up with. In the ancient world birth order meant something important: double portion of the estate, control of the family business at the right time, authority that was second only to the master of the house and the blessing of the patriarch. Ishmael, the unchosen one, was excluded from all of this. Ejected from the family because of his arrogant, haughty and threatening behavior he worked his life and built his line on his own with a huge chip on his shoulder. A chip so huge the splinters remain on a billion shoulders to this day.

So what are we to make of this? Especially today, with the decedents of Ishmael convulsing the peoples once again?

1. Do not be dismayed, as the Lord God has protected his people so he will do so now.Though some may die at the hands of Ishmael's seed, the Remnant will remain.
2. Be aware of the language of victimhood, and the passive resignation to battle that stems from it. It is fuel for the hostility and anger.
3. Do not be amazed at the brutality or universal nature of the hostility. No one on earth is spared this constant barrage of mistrust, aggression or attack.
4. Salvation is open to all, as evidenced by the many of Ishmael’s line who have come to understand, trust and follow Jesus as Messiah of the world. Acceptance and shalom only come through Him.