And they said to him, Where is Sarah your wife? And he said, She is in the tent.

And he said, I will certainly come back to you in the spring, and Sarah your wife will have a son. And his words came to the ears of Sarah who was at the back of the tent-door.

And Sarah, laughing to herself, said, Now that I am used up am I still to have pleasure, my husband himself being old?

And the Lord said, Why was Sarah laughing and saying, Is it possible for me, being old, to give birth to a child?

Is there any wonder which the Lord is not able to do? At the time I said, in the spring, I will come back to you, and Sarah will have a child.

And the Lord said, Am I to keep back from Abraham the knowledge of what I do;

For I have made him mine so that he may give orders to his children and those of his line after him, to keep the ways of the Lord, to do what is good and right: so that the Lord may do to Abraham as he has said.

I will go down now, and see if their acts are as bad as they seem from the outcry which has come to me; and if they are not, I will see.

And the men, turning from that place, went on to Sodom: but Abraham was still waiting before the Lord.

If by chance there are fifty upright men in the town, will you give the place to destruction and not have mercy on it because of the fifty upright men?

Let such a thing be far from you, to put the upright to death with the sinner: will not the judge of all the earth do right?

And Abraham answering said, Truly, I who am only dust, have undertaken to put my thoughts before the Lord:

If by chance there are five less than fifty upright men, will you give up all the town to destruction because of these five? And he said, I will not give it to destruction if there are forty-five.

And again he said to him, By chance there may be forty there. And he said, I will not do it if there are forty.

And he said, Let not the Lord be angry with me if I say, What if there are thirty there? And he said, I will not do it if there are thirty.

And he said, See now, I have undertaken to put my thoughts before the Lord: what if there are twenty there? And he said, I will have mercy because of the twenty.

And the Lord went on his way when his talk with Abraham was ended, and Abraham went back to his place.

And at nightfall the two angels came to Sodom; and Lot was seated at the way into the town: and when he saw them he got up and came before them, falling down on his face to the earth.

But before they had gone to bed, the men of the town, all the men of Sodom, came round the house, young and old, from every part of the town;

And crying out to Lot, they said, Where are the men who came to your house this night? Send them out to us, so that we may take our pleasure with them.

And Lot went out to them in the doorway, shutting the door after him.

And he said, My brothers, do not this evil.

See now, I have two unmarried daughters; I will send them out to you so that you may do to them whatever seems good to you: only do nothing to these men, for this is why they have come under the shade of my roof.

And they said, Give way there. This one man, they said, came here from a strange country, and will he now be our judge? now we will do worse to you than to them; and pushing violently against Lot, they came near to get the door broken in.

But the men put out their hands and took Lot into the house to them, shutting the door again.

Then the men said to Lot, Are there any others of your family here? sons-in-law or sons or daughters, take them all out of this place;

For we are about to send destruction on this place, because a great outcry against them has come to the ears of the Lord; and the Lord has sent us to put an end to the town.

And Lot went out and said to his sons-in-law, who were married to his daughters, Come, let us go out of this place, for the Lord is about to send destruction on the town. But his sons-in-law did not take him seriously.

And when morning came, the angels did all in their power to make Lot go, saying, Get up quickly and take your wife and your two daughters who are here, and go, for fear that you come to destruction in the punishment of the town.

And when they had put them out, he said, Go for your life, without looking back or waiting in the lowland; go quickly to the mountain or you will come to destruction.

And Lot said to them, Not so, O my Lord;

See now, your servant has had grace in your eyes and great is your mercy in keeping my life from destruction, but I am not able to get as far as the mountain before evil overtakes me and death;

Go there quickly, for I am not able to do anything till you have come there. For this reason, the town was named Zoar.

The sun was up when Lot came to Zoar.

And Abraham got up early in the morning and went to the place where he had been talking with the Lord:

So it came about that when God sent destruction on the towns of the lowland, he kept his word to Abraham, and sent Lot safely away when he put an end to the towns where he was living.

Then Lot went up out of Zoar to the mountain, and was living there with his two daughters, for fear kept him from living in Zoar: and he and his daughters made their living-place in a hole in the rock.

And the older daughter said to her sister, Our father is old, and there is no man to be a husband to us in the natural way:

And on the day after, the older daughter said to the younger, Last night I was with my father; let us make him take much wine this night again, and do you go to him, so that we may have offspring by our father.

And so the two daughters of Lot were with child by their father.

And the older daughter had a son, and she gave him the name Moab: he is the father of the Moabites to this day.

And the younger had a son and gave him the name Ben-ammi: from him come the children of Ammon to this day.

And Abraham went on his way from there to the land of the South, and was living between Kadesh and Shur, in Gerar.

But God came to Abimelech in a dream in the night, and said to him, Truly you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken; for she is a man's wife.

Now Abimelech had not come near her; and he said, Lord, will you put to death an upright nation?

Did he not say to me himself, She is my sister? and she herself said, He is my brother: with an upright heart and clean hands have I done this.

And God said to him in the dream, I see that you have done this with an upright heart, and I have kept you from sinning against me: for this reason I did not let you come near her.

So now, give the man back his wife, for he is a prophet, and let him say a prayer for you, so your life may be safe: but if you do not give her back, be certain that death will come to you and all your house.

Then Abimelech sent for Abraham, and said, What have you done to us? what wrong have I done you that you have put on me and on my kingdom so great a sin? You have done to me things which are not to be done.

And Abimelech said to Abraham, Why did you do this thing?

And Abraham said, Because it seemed to me that there was no fear of God in this place, and that they might put me to death because of my wife.

And when God sent me wandering from my father's house, I said to her, Let this be the sign of your love for me; wherever we go, say of me, He is my brother.

Then Abimelech gave to Abraham sheep and oxen and men-servants and women-servants, and gave him back his wife Sarah.

And Abimelech said, See, all my land is before you; take whatever place seems good to you.

And he said to Sarah, See, I have given to your brother a thousand bits of silver so that your wrong may be put right; now your honour is clear in the eyes of all.

Then Abraham made prayer to God, and God made Abimelech well again, and his wife and his women-servants, so that they had children.

And the Lord came to Sarah as he had said and did to her as he had undertaken.

And Abraham gave to his son, to whom Sarah had given birth, the name Isaac.

And when his son Isaac was eight days old, Abraham made him undergo circumcision, as God had said to him.

And she said, Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would have a child at her breast? for see, I have given him a son now when he is old.

And when the child was old enough to be taken from the breast, Abraham made a great feast.

So she said to Abraham, Send away that woman and her son: for the son of that woman is not to have a part in the heritage with my son Isaac.

And this was a great grief to Abraham because of his son.

But God said, Let it not be a grief to you because of the boy and Hagar his mother; give ear to whatever Sarah says to you, because it is from Isaac that your seed will take its name.

And she went some distance away, about an arrow flight, and seating herself on the earth, she gave way to bitter weeping, saying, Let me not see the death of my child.

And the boy's cry came to the ears of God; and the angel of God said to Hagar from heaven, Hagar, why are you weeping? have no fear, for the child's cry has come to the ears of God.

Now at that time, Abimelech and Phicol, the captain of his army, said to Abraham, I see that God is with you in all you do.

Now, then, give me your oath, in the name of God, that you will not be false to me or to my sons after me, but that as I have been good to you, so you will be to me and to this land where you have been living.

But Abraham made a protest to Abimelech because of a water-hole which Abimelech's servants had taken by force.

But Abimelech said, I have no idea who has done this thing; you never gave me word of it, and I had no knowledge of it till this day.

And Abraham took sheep and oxen and gave them to Abimelech, and the two of them made an agreement together.

So he gave that place the name Beer-sheba, because there the two of them had given their oaths.

So they made an agreement at Beer-sheba, and Abimelech and Phicol, the captain of his army, went back to the land of the Philistines.

And Abraham, after planting a holy tree in Beer-sheba, gave worship to the name of the Lord, the Eternal God.

Now after these things, God put Abraham to the test, and said to him, Abraham; and he said, Here am I.

And he said to him, Take your son, your dearly loved only son Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah and give him as a burned offering on one of the mountains of which I will give you knowledge.

And Abraham got up early in the morning, and made ready his ass, and took with him two of his young men and Isaac, his son, and after the wood for the burned offering had been cut, he went on his way to the place of which God had given him word.

And on the third day, Abraham, lifting up his eyes, saw the place a long way off.

Then he said to his young men, Keep here with the ass; and I and the boy will go on and give worship and come back again to you.

And Abraham put the wood for the burned offering on his son's back, and he himself took the fire and the knife in his hand, and the two of them went on together.

Then Isaac said to Abraham, My father; and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, We have wood and fire here, but where is the lamb for the burned offering?

And they came to the place of which God had given him knowledge; and there Abraham made the altar and put the wood in place on it, and having made tight the bands round Isaac his son, he put him on the wood on the altar.

And stretching out his hand, Abraham took the knife to put his son to death.

And he said, Let not your hand be stretched out against the boy to do anything to him; for now I am certain that the fear of God is in your heart, because you have not kept back your son, your only son, from me.

And Abraham gave that place the name Yahweh-yireh: as it is said to this day, In the mountain the Lord is seen.

And the voice of the angel of the Lord came to Abraham a second time from heaven,

And your seed will be a blessing to all the nations of the earth, because you have done what I gave you orders to do.

Then Abraham went back to his young men and they went together to Beer-sheba, the place where Abraham was living.

After these things, Abraham had news that Milcah, the wife of his brother Nahor, had given birth to children;

And his servant Reumah gave birth to Tebah and Gaham and Tahash and Maacah.

And Abraham came from his dead and said to the children of Heth,

I am living among you as one from a strange country: give me some land here as my property, so that I may put my dead to rest

And in answer the children of Heth said to Abraham,

My lord, truly you are a great chief among us; take the best of our resting-places for your dead; not one of us will keep back from you a place where you may put your dead to rest.

And Abraham got up and gave honour to the children of Heth, the people of that land.

And he said to them, If you will let me put my dead to rest here, make a request for me to Ephron, the son of Zohar,

That he will give me the hollow in the rock named Machpelah, which is his property at the end of his field; let him give it to me for its full price as a resting-place for my dead among you.

No, my lord, I will give you the field with the hollow in the rock; before all the children of my people will I give it to you for a resting-place for your dead.

And Abraham said to Ephron, in the hearing of the people of the land, If only you will give ear to me, I will give you the price of the field; take it, and let me put my dead to rest there.

So Ephron said to Abraham