Genesis 16:9-11

"And the angel of Jehovah said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself unto her hands. And the angel of Jehovah said unto her, I will greatly multiply thy seed, and it shall not be numbered for multitude. And the angel of Jehovah said unto her, Behold thou art with child, and shall bear a son; and thou shalt call his name Ishmael, because Jehovah hath heard thy affliction."

"And the angel of Jehovah ..." The threefold repetition of this in Genesis 16:9; Genesis 16:10, and Genesis 16:11, is used by critics as an excuse to cast out the last two of these verses as "an interpolation."[13] This is not at all reasonable, for the smoothness of the narrative would be restored completely merely by supplying the words, "Again, the angel of Jehovah said unto her ..." Such a device is used by translators constantly, and there is no good reason why they should not have done so here. Three definite and very important prophecies concerning Hagar were given, and it was imperative that all three be understood as having been given by the angel of Jehovah. That is clearly the reason for the repetition. The message of the angel of Jehovah was:

1. "Return and submit ..." This is never easy to do; and in Hagar's case it might have been unusually difficult; but she returned and submitted.

2. "I will multiply thy seed ..." This was fulfilled on a scale that no one in that age could have believed, not even Hagar.

3. "Thou shalt bear a son, and thou shalt call his name Ishmael ..." This recalls the prophecy of Gabriel to Mary. Only God can name in advance the sex of a child before it is conceived and bestow the name in the manner noted here. We have no patience whatever with the type of critic who finds a "contradiction," no less, in the fact that here Hagar named the child, and that in Genesis 16:15 Abram named him. As a matter of fact, neither Hagar nor Abram named Ishmael, for he was named by God Himself. And there is no problem whatever with the fact that both Hagar and Abram consented to receive the God-given name. (For more, see comments at Genesis 16:12, below).