THE THEME OF IMMIGRATION, IN THE FIRST TESTAMENT,
AS ILLUSTRATED IN THE LIVES OF
SARAH, HAGAR, NAOMI and RUTH
SARAH (Genesis 12:1-9)
Sarah is challenged by God to remove herself from her land and her home,
all the places of security,
and accompany her husband to a non-specific place.
“Go from your country and your kindred and your [father’s] house to the land I will show you.” (Genesis 12:1)
Sarah walks with God.
Leaves her predictable environment because
she trusts her husband’s word and God acting in his life.
She is the tremendous support of her husband.
This act changed the course of their lives together.
Sarah sets on a path that she could scarcely have imagined.
Abraham, in my opinion, was able to respond to God’s call because he had the support of his family to search for a better life.
We understand Sarah and Abraham’s life as a couple on a pilgrimage.
Those of us who have walked the path of uncertainty
walk with Sarah.
[for they went as the Lord directed.] (Genesis 12:4)
There were stumbling blocks in this plan though:
The land that God promised them had people already living in it.
There was a clash of culture.
I imagine Sarah asking herself,
Will this change OUR traditions and eventually change US?
We are immigrants and can see OUR STORY in SARAH’S STORY.
*[For once we are considering HER story, not HIS STORY – history.]
How has God called us here, to the United States?
What are our fears here?
We haven’t taken “all the possessions we have,” (Genesis 12:5a) like Sarah and Abraham did.
We are not fortunate enough to have taken “all the persons” that are in our lives. (Genesis 12:5b)
Many of us haven’t even taken our husbands or wives,
or family members.
We are here alone;
families back in our own country.
Our journeys here were long, tough and dangerous.
Like Sarah, in order to get to OUR CANAAN,
we had to pass through many lands
BUT we are here,
with “pitched tents”
and with the same promise God gave to Sarah and her husband:
“To your offspring I will give this land” (Genesis 12:7a)
because one day, our offspring will be citizens
and
“you will be a blessing (Genesis 12:2) to your children and the families you left behind.
AND AS MEN we need NOT to underestimate the role women have in our lives.
In this story we see how Abraham was supported by his wife Sarah
and how instrumental she was in enabling,
not just encouraging,
Abraham’s acting on God’s call.
Additionally, Sarah later saves his life when they were forced to flee to Egypt
when avoiding famine,
subjecting herself to become one of the Pharaoh’s wives. (Genesis 12:19)
So as immigrant people on our pilgrimage to God,
we need to keep Sarah before our eyes AS INSPIRATION and ENCOURAGEMENT.
Later on in Genesis (chapter 16) we meet HAGAR
an Egyptian and Sarah’s slave who [as Phyllis Trible suggests,] “becomes the other woman.”
Sarah who had not given birth yet,
offers Hagar to her husband
but…
when Hagar becomes pregnant, Sarah treats her so badly that she runs away.
Not that I mean to suggest Sarah and Abraham’s house was perfect,
for Hagar is Sarah’s “slave girl,” (Genesis 16:3)
but…
the alternative for a better situation prompts Hagar to leave,
even though she is pregnant,
[ to possibly return to her homeland of Egypt. ]
Why did WE leave our homeland to come here?
How many times have we heard people say to us
as we are on our journey:
“where have you come from and where are you going?” (Genesis 16:8)
either referring to our journey to this land
or even questioning us about something as personal as
our pilgrimage to God.
Like Hagar, we may have left a “not so perfect” home situation.
Hagar responds to God though,
with the same trust as her oppressor Sarah did,
when Sarah accompanied her husband to Canaan,
but…
in this part of Genesis, we also see God caring DIRECTLY for Hagar
and God becoming Hagar’s ADVOCATE
for God promises Hagar that God “will so greatly multiply [her] offspring that they
can not be counted.” (Genesis 16:10)
This is the SAME promise that God gave to Abraham saying:
“Look towards the heavens and count the stars… so shall your descendants be.” (Genesis 15:5)
Although Hagar escaped from Sarah’s oppression,
she also is challenged by God to return to Sarah,
not perhaps to her homeland,
where she may have longed to return and raise her child.
How many times, especially in adversity, do we want to return home
to be with our own,
speak our own language freely and without fear of being labeled “a foreigner”
or even worse, an “alien?”
Hagar’s difficulties, though, do not end with her return to Sarah and her husband.
In chapter 22 of Genesis,
after the birth of her son Ishmael and Sarah and Abraham’s son Isaac,
Sarah once again sends Hagar away.
First Hagar lives out of her homeland Egypt-
NOW she is exiled from what HAS BECOME HOME.
The DIFFERENCE NOW is that Hagar is NOT choosing to leave,
as she did before.
In the desert, though, GOD IS STILL HER ADVOCATE,
concerned with the well being of her son.
God reminds Hagar that her son, Ishmael,
“will be made a great nation.” (Genesis 16:18)
God provides them with water,
Ishmael survives and he grows up.
The story ends with Hagar “get[ting] Ishmael an Egyptian wife,” (Genesis 16:21)
a woman from her own country.
Hagar never gave up her love for the homeland.
As immigrants we see how Hagar’s experiences mirror ours:
being labeled “illegal aliens,” but still paying taxes with LIMITED legal opportunities
when maltreated,
being single parents fending for the survival of our children,
possibly being pregnant and young- alone and with no support from the father of our
child,
being workers whose identities are measured only in the amount of hours we work
for FAR LESS than minimum wage.
Hagar, then becomes a courageous woman who typifies the immigrant trait of PERSEVERANCE,
struggling to provide the best for our children and families back home,
in a foreign land.
A few books further into the Hebrew Scriptures we are introduced to RUTH and NAOMI.
Upon resettling in Moab, Naomi’s husband dies and she must raise her two sons in this foreign land, alone.
Naomi’s sons grow and eventually marry- Ruth and Orpah. [OR-PAH]
As the story develops, Naomi’s two sons die.
Naomi and her two daughters-in law live together for survival and mutual support.
Naomi then hears that the famine that once forced her and the family from Bethlehem
out and into Moab, is ended.
She leaves with Ruth and Orpah, [OR-PAH]
but
in the middle of the journey,
changes her mind about taking along both Ruth and Orpah, [OR-PAH]
because they are both young and can remarry.
Naomi wants to send them back to Moab.
[OR-PAH] Orpah returns
but Ruth insists on traveling on with Naomi,
pledging her fidelity [ by saying:
“Wherever you go, I will go,
wherever you lodge, I will lodge;
your people shall be my people,
and your God my God.
Wherever you die, I will die-
and there I will be buried beside you.” (Ruth 1:16-17a) ]
Ruth follows Naomi into a foreign land.
There in Bethlehem, Naomi’s relative Boaz provides them with a job,
gathering grain.
Through their repeated contact with each other, Ruth marries Boaz.
Like Sarah, Naomi followed her husband into a foreign land.
While there,
through the death of her husband and eventually her two sons,
Naomi finds herself a widow and without the support of sons.
She survives because of yet another IMMIGRANT TRAIT
that of mutual support.
Although Naomi’s daughters-in-law are not immigrants to Moab,
they support her
and RUTH becomes an immigrant to Bethlehem,
at first, feeling alienation
but…
relying on her STRENGTH and finding ENCOURAGEMENT in
Naomi’s ability to experience and work through her grief
in losing first her husband and then her two sons.
Their mutual support is SOLIDIFIED by their friendship.
The interesting TWIST of this account is seen at the end
where we learn that Ruth’s son OBED is the grandfather of King David.
This foreigner,
this immigrant, who cared for Naomi,
a Hebrew woman,
through her commitment as a faithful friend
play yet ANOTHER pivotal role in our salvation history.
Who would have thought that such a great King would have come from an immigrant family?
Through their companionship Naomi and Ruth teach us immigrants
about the responsibility to care for one another in this foreign land,
[using Renita Weems’ words] “to respect each other’s choices and to allow for each
other’s differences.” (p. 34)
From these great women,
SARAH, HAGAR, NAOMI and RUTH,
we as immigrants and pilgrims,
along with Abraham, in making a new home in this land,
hear God saying to us, as God did to Sarah and Abraham: [in Genesis 13:14-17]
“See now, this land before you,
rich with food and grain.
No longer must you wander
for this will be your home.”
REFRENCES:
Trible, Phyllis (1984) Texts of Terror: Literary-Feminist Readings of Biblical Narratives.
Philadelphia, Penn: Fortress Press.
Weems, Renita J. (1998) Just A Sister Way: A Womanist Vision of Woman’s Relationships in
the Bible.
Philadelphia, Penn: Innisfree Press, Inc.
