Genesis 21 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.

Yahweh paid attention to Sarah just as he had said he would, and Yahweh did for Sarah exactly what he had promised.

Sarah became pregnant and gave Abraham a son in his old age, at the exact time Elohim had told him it would happen.

Abraham named the son who was born to him — the one Sarah had given him — Isaac.

Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, exactly as Elohim had commanded him.

Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.

Sarah said, "Elohim has made me laugh — and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me!"

She added, "Who would have ever told Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet here I am — I've given him a son in his old age!"

The child grew and was weaned, and Abraham threw a huge celebration on the day Isaac was weaned.

But Sarah noticed that the son Hagar the Egyptian had given Abraham was mocking.

So she told Abraham, "Get rid of this slave woman and her son! This slave woman's son is not going to share the inheritance with my son Isaac."

This deeply troubled Abraham, because it was about his son.

But Elohim told Abraham, "Don't be troubled over the boy or your slave woman. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it's through Isaac that your offspring will be traced."

"But I'll also make the slave woman's son into a nation, because he too is your offspring."

Abraham got up early the next morning, took some bread and a skin of water, and gave them to Hagar. He put them on her shoulder along with the boy, and sent her away. She left and wandered in the wilderness of Beer-sheba.

When the water in the skin ran out, she left the boy under one of the bushes.

Then she went and sat down by herself a good distance away — about a bowshot — because she said, "I can't watch the boy die." And sitting there at a distance, she broke down and cried.

Elohim heard the boy's voice, and the messenger of Elohim called to Hagar from the sky: "What's wrong, Hagar? Don't be afraid — Elohim has heard the boy's voice right where he is."

"Get up, pick up the boy, and hold him tight — because I'm going to make him into a great nation."

Then Elohim opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. She went over, filled the skin with water, and gave the boy a drink.

Elohim was with the boy as he grew up. He settled in the wilderness and became an expert archer.

He lived in the wilderness of Paran, and his mother found him a wife from Egypt.

Around that time, Abimelech and Phicol, the commander of his army, said to Abraham, "Elohim is with you in everything you do."

"So swear to me right here before Elohim that you won't deal falsely with me, my children, or my descendants. Show me and the land where you've been living the same loyalty I've shown you."

Abraham said, "I swear it."

But Abraham confronted Abimelech about a well that Abimelech's servants had seized.

Abimelech said, "I don't know who did this. You never told me about it, and I'm only hearing about it today."

So Abraham took sheep and cattle and gave them to Abimelech, and the two of them made a treaty.

Abraham set seven female lambs apart from the flock by themselves.

Abimelech asked Abraham, "What are these seven female lambs you've set apart?"

He replied, "Accept these seven female lambs from me as proof that I dug this well."

That's why that place is called Beer-sheba — because the two of them swore an oath there.

After they made the treaty at Beer-sheba, Abimelech and Phicol, the commander of his army, headed back to the land of the Philistines.

Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beer-sheba and called on the name of Yahweh, El Olam — the Everlasting God.

And Abraham lived in the land of the Philistines for a long time.