Abraham and Sarah were sorely troubled, and prayed to God to protect them. Then the angel of the Lord was sent to watch over Sarah, and the angel comforted her with these words, “Fear not; God has heard thy petitions!”
Pharaoh asked Sarah who that man was who accompanied her, and when she answered “My brother,” Pharaoh bade him to be brought before him, and he gave him rich gifts.
And Pharaoh asked Abraham, “Who is this woman?” He answered “She is my sister.” This say the Mussulmans, is the third lie that Abraham told; but it was not a lie, but a justifiable falsehood.
Pharaoh was filled with love for Sarah, and he offered her as his present for her hand, all his possessions of gold and silver and slaves, and the land of Goshen. And when he pressed his suit upon her with great vehemence, she cried to God and told him she was already married; then he was smitten with paralysis, and great plagues afflicted all his servants. But Pharaoh sent for Abraham, and returned him Sarah, his wife, and dismissed him with costly presents, and he gave to Sarah also his daughter, Hagar, to be her servant.
“Truly, my daughter, it is better,” said Pharaoh, “to be servant in a house which God has taken under His protection, than to command elsewhere.”
After a three months’ sojourn in Egypt, Abraham returned to Canaan.
According to Tabari, Hagar loved Sarah greatly. On their way back to Canaan the provisions failed, and Abraham went out one day to get food, with a sack on his back; but the day was hot, so that he laid down and went to sleep. He did not awake till evening, and then he returned, but was ashamed to appear with the sack empty before his wife, so he filled it with sand. On reaching the tent he put the sack under his head and went to sleep again. Very early in the morning Sarah said to Hagar, “What has Abraham in his sack? open it and look.” So Hagar untied it, put in her hand and drew out flour. She and Sarah baked cakes of the flour, and woke Abraham and bade him eat. Then, full of wonder, he asked where they had obtained meal. They told him, and he understood that God had wrought a miracle.[305]
Now Abraham’s flocks and herds, and those of Lot, pastured together. Abraham’s cattle were muzzled that they should not feed in the lands of the neighbouring people; but Lot’s cattle were not muzzled. And when Abraham’s shepherds complained of this to those of Lot, the latter answered, “Your master is old, and has no children; soon he will die, and then all will belong to our master Lot.”
But Abraham spake to Lot and said, “Thy ways and my ways do not agree: we must part; do thou go to the left, and I will go to the right.” So they separated; and Lot departed from Abraham, and from the way of righteousness, and from the living God; but Abraham camped in Mamre.