Sarah Laughing - Genesis 18: 1-15

There is a bit of confusion in the first verse of chapter 18 because it says that after Abraham had circumcised all the male members of his household like the Lord commanded him, “the Lord appeared unto him in the plains of Mamre: and he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day… and, lo, three men stood by him.” The IM says, “we are not justified in teaching that our Heavenly Father, with other heavenly persons, came down, dusty and weary, and ate with Abraham. This is not taught in the 18th chapter of Genesis. The first verse of that chapter should read as follows: ‘And the Lord appeared unto him in the plains of Mamre.’ That is a complete thought. The second part of this paragraph has nothing to do with the Lord’s appearing to Abraham.” It’s like that thing that says, “Let’s eat Grandma!” or “Let’s eat, Grandma!” Punctuation saves lives. I think this is another example of that. In fact, the IM says at the end of this explanation, “In the Joseph Smith Translation, Genesis 18:23 states definitely that ‘the angels… were holy men, and were sent forth after the order of God.” When the three men show up, Abraham runs to greet them “and bowed himself toward the ground, and said, My Lord,” and asks them to stay to eat and rest with him. This could lend to the confusion about who is visiting Abraham at this moment, but the JST substitutes “my Lord” and “my brethren,” which clarifies. I guess this all begs the question why it matters who exactly was visiting Abraham at this moment. Some of the reasons why I think it might be important to note that Jesus is not personally visiting Abraham at this moment might be because Abraham has Sarah make food “and they did eat.” Now with Jesus having not been born into his mortal body yet so I don’t think that he would be able to physically eat anything. These guys not being God also makes a difference when it comes to their conversation with Sarah. They ask where Sarah is and when Abraham tells them that she’s in the tent behind them, they tell him that “Sarah thy wife shall have a son.” Sarah hears this and is really old “therefore Sarah laughed within herself.” It seems like these guys get offended and kind of get into a back and forth with her basically saying, “why did you laugh at my saying?” And when she was nervous and said “I laughed not,” he said, “Nay; but thou didst laugh.” This interaction always bugged me because I just don’t think that Jesus would have acted his way and I don’t think that he would have gotten into a pissing match with her about whether or not she accepted his words right away. If Jesus is the champion of women, which he is, then he would have understood her pain and heartache from wanting a child for so long and maybe even the anger and bitterness that she felt. I’ve always felt, “leave her alone, these men have no idea what she’s gone through,” it just seems like a very human response from this man and like many that I’ve had before, but maybe that’s just my own irritations projecting out right now. The IM actually makes a good point saying, “Sarah’s astonished laughter at the news that she was to conceive and bear a son should not be interpreted as proving her lack of faith. Often in the scriptures the servants of the Lord are astonished beyond belief at the miraculous goodness of the Lord… It was the incredible nature of the news that caused Sarah’s response. And after approximately seventy years of childlessness, who could condemn her temporary inability to believe the joyous promise?” The IM also gives many examples of men in the scriptures who did not believe/understand the magnitude of God’s promises to them, such as when “Moses could not believe that he was capable of being God’s spokesman with the pharaoh and asked that he receive help.” There’s a big thing about Sodom and Gomorrah coming up next and it’s pretty in depth so I think I’m going to but this short right here for today and start up on S&G tomorrow.