I know, I know, you're all anxious to learn more about Amorites (Amurrites), but let's wade through the chapter first. It's kinda like saving the desert until after the meal. You'll thank me later.

   "16:1 Now Sarai Abram's wife bare him no children: and she had a handmaid, an Eqyptian, whose name was Hagar.
   "16:2 And Sarai said unto Adam, Behold now, the Lord hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai."

    I'll bet that was a tough sell!

   "16:3 And Sarai Abram's wife took Hagar, her maid, the Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife."

    The Catholic edition, The New American Bible, prefers that we believe, "...his wife Sairai took her maid, Hagar the Egyptian, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his concubine." (emphasis, mine)

   "16:4 And he went in unto Hagar and she conceived: and when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes."

    You may have noticed that I get confused a lot, but the above verse confuses me even further - didn't we just read in Genesis, Chapter 17, that Abe, when told by a god-vision that his descendants would be more numerous than stars in the universe, "...believed in the Lord; and he counted it to him for righteousness"? So why is he taking matters into his own hands? Well, not into his own hands exactly, but definitely into something other than Sarai?
     How in the world did the Mormons ever manage to pull it off? In my experience, two hetrosexual women under the same roof, never works out. Not an indictment ladies, just relating personal observations here.  Ooops - looks like it didn't for Abe either --  

"16:5 And Sarai said unto Abram, my wrong be upon thee: I have given my maid unto thy bosom; and when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes: The Lord judge between me and thee."

    The New American Bible translates that last sentence just a bit differently, in that Sarai said, "The Lord decide between you and me!" The confrontational inference of that statement, as well as the added exclamation point, leads one to believe that Sarai was P.O.'d at Abe over Hagar's impudence. It also implies that Sarai was hardly the docile little tent-wife one would expect, considering the times.

    "16:6 But Abraham said unto Sarai, thy maid is in thy hand; do to her as it pleaseth thee. And when Sarai dealt hardly with her, she (Hagar) fled from her (Sarai's) face.
    "16:7 And the angel of the lord found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur."

    The New American Bible has a slightly different take on that verse. Rather than, "...the angel of the lord found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness...," TNAB quotes the scripture as saying, "The Lord's messenger found her by a spring in the wilderness...."
    The New American Bible takes it a step further, and infers that the "messenger" was no angel at all, but rather a manifestation of god in Human form. Which begs the question as to why god would have to take Human form, when Genesis 1:27 tells us, "...God created man in his own image, in his own image created he him...." According to that, it was his form that we Humans took! In fact, he was skipping about Earth, chatting up members of the Adam's family throughout the first few chapters of Genesis! All of those little inconsistencies certainly do add up, don't they?

    "16:8 And he said, Hagar, Sarai's maid, whence camest thou? and whither wilt thou go? And she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarai.
   "16:9 And the angel of the Lord said unto her, Return to thy mistress and submit thyself unto her hands.
    "16:10 And the angel of the Lord said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude.
   "16:11 And the angel of the Lord said unto her, Behold, thou art with a child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael; because the Lord hath heard thy affliction."

    Let me just pop in here for a second, to remind everyone to remember the fact that the name, "Ishmael," is actually, Ishma-el, for reasons that will become clearer as we progress. Popping back out now --

  "16:12 And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethern."

    I'm thinkin', not with those kinds of personality problems! That kid's gonna be in Juvie somewhere before he's 12! Really gives Hagar a lot to look forward to, doesn't it?

   "16:13 And she called the name of the Lord that spake unto her, Thou seest me: for she said, have I here looked after him that seeth me?"

    Now that verse might take a bit of explaining. Coming from a culture that had many gods and godlings, Hagar felt she was in the presence of a god, but not knowing which one, simply referred to him by a word or phrase that meant, "Thou seest me," or, "You see me."
    The New American Bible offers a slightly different translation of the verse: "To the Lord who spoke to her she gave a name, saying, 'You are the God of Vision'; she meant, 'Have I really remained alive after my vision?'" TNAB informs us that the statement regarding remaining alive was based on an ancient belief that anyone seeing god, died.

    "16:14 Wherefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered.
    "16:15 And Hagar bare Abram a son: and Abram called his son's name, which Hagar bare, Ishmael.
   "16:16 And Abram was fourscore and six years old when Hagar bare Ishmael to Abram."

    Not exactly a strong finish, was it? Hagar bore Abram's son when Abram was 86 years old - the end. After all of the drama, the finale was a bit anticlimactic.
    OK, time for the Amorites (Amurrites), but first, it's important to understand the basic background of Mesopotamia before the arrival of the Amurrites.
    I used this map in Chapter 6, (Part 4), to illustrate the extent of the actual great flood, rather than the impossible biblical one, so I'm going to trot it out again, simply because it's the only one I've found that has most of the cities of ancient Mesopotamia on it, and those are necessary for a complete understanding of the dynamics of the area in those times.


    The first recorded settlements in Mesopotamia were in the southern portion c.8,000 BCE, or, according to the Bible, some 3,500 years before the universe was created (I guess the settlers hadn't read the book), in the cities of Nippur and Susa, in the area that would become Sumeria. Nippur is shown on the map, Susa, is not. By 6,000 BCE, Eridu, Lagash, and several other cities had been established.
    Around 5,000 BCE, there was a heavy Semitic migration into the area from the desert areas to the west. Those tribes settled in the northern areas yet unclaimed by the Southern settled cities of Sumer. Many of the Semites entered Sumeria simply as visitors, stayed, and merged into Sumerian culture. Others, more barbaric and less trustful, settled the Northern areas of Mesopotamia and established their own city-states.
    By 4,500 BCE, those of the North had begun to encroach on the Sumerians and were defeated by En-Shag-Kushanna, king of Sumer. Ironically, En-Shag-Kushanna is a Semitic name, obviously a descendant of one of the Semites who had peacefully merged with the Sumerians, and who had risen to power and fought for a Sumeria that had become his home. For the next 500 years, Sumer was ruled by a continual succession of kings, until about 4,000, when an internal uprising threw the entire area into disorder.
    It's important that you note all of the little cities, clustered in proximity of the two rivers, the Tigris and the Euphrates, in a valley only a few hundred miles long.
    Now that you have this image firmly in mind, try to imagine an area in your own state or country, that might have a similar cluster of relatively small cities, all within a few hundred mile-long area. Get it? (Got it!) Good!
    (Those of you who regularly use the metric system are on your own - I know that Soda comes in plastic, 2-liter bottles, and that's all of the metrics I need to know. Frankly, I've always thought that the Metric System, based originally on the 10-finger, 10-toe concept, was blatantly discriminatory to those of us with twelve of each!)
    Now imagine those cities in your own area to each be surrounded with defensive walls, with armed sentries parading along the ramparts, vigilant to spot the enemy's army at the greatest possible distance.  Imagine each of those towns in seemingly perpetual warfare with each other. Imagine a few of those cities banding together in a loose alliance for mutual protection against possible attacks from other cities, an alliance that inevitably falls apart, and the previously-aligned cities battling among themselves like starving dogs over a tossed bone, then yet another city or alliance of cities, attacking those in their moment of weakness and battling them to capitulation. Imagine mothers, afraid to bear sons, knowing what their likely fate must be. This was the world in which the ancient Mesopotamians lived for a couple of thousand years.
    The moments of peace came, ironically, from war. Only when a solitary Conqueror arose who pummeled all of the individual City-States into submission and united the country, was there any semblance of peace and prosperity. Even then, the area was surrounded by nomadic tribes who envied that prosperity and wanted a share of it without an invitation, and even when peace temporarily reigned among the City-States, conflict with the outlying tribes, though sporadic, was ongoing.
    Then there was the matter of religion. As previously mentioned in Chapter 1, Gods 'r' Us (Part 6), the area was divided between the Sumerians in the south, whose civilization had lasted 4000 years, and the relatively newly-arrived Semitic Akkadians, who held the north half of the country. Ultimately, the Sumerians star waned, and they were eventually absorbed into the Semitic culture. The political and social language then, of all of Mesopotamia, became Semitic, while the religious language - that used for religious ceremonies - remained Sumerian.
    Needless to say, but I'll say it anyway, there was a considerable interchange of gods. Additionally, each City-State not only worshiped as many gods as possible, as the people hedged their bets, but each City-State had its own patron god from out of the pantheon. and though the patron god may originally have had very specific attributes, if the god of another City-State had additional powers, the people of the first City-State often borrowed those for their own patron. It would be the equivalent of having Batman as my patron, then, upon learning that you had Superman as yours, ascribing to Batman as well, the ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound, rather than shinnying up them on a rope. The Mesopotamians had gods running out of their...ears.
    In fact, allow me to acquaint you with a few of those - I do not at all attest that this list is all-inclusive, I've no doubt there are still more that I've failed to list, but they'll have to do, Feel free to quickly scan through these, as there will be no pop quiz later, I just wanted you to have some idea as to the magnitude of the big business that religion was to the Early Mesopotamians. Early Mesopotamians like Abram/Abraham.