What Really Happened to Hagar in the Wilderness
By William Hanna Thomson
WE bade farewell to the emir and Dahook and our kind Druse escort, and started for another and a long day's ride with a mounted guide furnished by the emir. Just as we started, a young girl ran ahead of us driving a donkey, laden, as we found out, with her trousseau. She was the daughter of our guide, and he was taking advantage of this opportunity to escort her to the tent of her bridegroom, whom, by the way, she had never yet seen. I mention this incident to explain the sending of Hagar away with her son from Abraham's encampment, because as that narrative reads in our version, Gen. 21:14, it would appear as a heartless procedure on Abraham's part. Every Arab, however, understands at once that Abraham for the purpose of quiet did not send her with an escort, but instead she was going to some one of Abraham's many encampments, which thereafter should be hers. The subsequent history showed that Abraham's son Ishmael received a large portion of his father's property, and therefore was enabled soon to take a high position among the roving Arab tribes, which were the sons of Joktan (Gen. 10:25-30), and who preceded Abraham. The Arabs to this day, accordingly, divide themselves into the original Arabs, descendants of Joktan, and what they call the "naturalized" Arabs, who are descendants of Ishmael. What happened to Hagar was that she evidently lost her way while going to what was to be her own encampment.— Dr. Wm. Hanna Thomson in October "Designer."