BRAGADAYJAH 42

Our story so far has made only brief references to Sarai, Abram’s wife, although we know she was always in the picture somewhere. Now the emphasis shifts to her and the fact that she was childless. She too, would have been even more bothered and concerned about their plight than Abram was. After all, a woman’s primary role in the family was to bear children; and a woman who could not do that was no woman at all. So yes, she would have been very concerned; but like most women, she came up with a plan to do something about. Sarai’s reasoning was that it was necessary that the family should have at least one heir. Surely God had told her husband that his seed would be as plenteous as the sand of the seashore; but He did not say anything about motherhood. Accordingly, Sarai reasoned, why not give one of my younger maids to my husband so that he may satisfy the deepest and dearest wish of his heart, namely to have an heir? And so it was that Sarai decided to solve the insoluble; after all she was an old woman now, and her husband was not far behind in age. Perhaps even now there was a seed or two left in him; so she had an idea that might just work. Here is how Sarai put it to her husband. “Behold now, the Lord has restrained me from bearing; I pray thee, go in to my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her.” What Sarai proposed was well within the custom and practice of the time. Note the words, “I may obtain children by her.” That was the law of servitude that continued down through the Roman Empire. Offspring of the slave girl was mere fructus, [fruit], and belonged to the master or mistress as the case may be. Would Abram accept? We shall see. More