Genesis 21:8-21
“God was with the boy, and he grew up.” – Genesis 21:20
Abraham and Sarah do not look good in this story. This story (and its “Part 1” back in Genesis 16) lay bare the power that this couple has over the people they enslave. Abraham, the father of nations, is willing to discard Hagar once she is no longer useful (and willing to blame Sarah for it). The patriarch of all Peoples of the Book acts no different from any other slaveholder or lord: Benevolent as long as it serves him, cruel and death-dealing when the situation changes.
Hagar’s story has long been a source for Black feminist and womanist theological criticism of white theologies that would seek redemption in the substitutionary suffering of racialized women, most famously in Dr. Delores Williams’ Sisters in the Wilderness.
For Williams, there is nothing redemptive about unchosen suffering. Jesus does not die as a surrogate for us. Rather, “The cross is a reminder of how humans have tried throughout history to destroy visions of righting relationships that involve transformation of tradition and transformation of social relations and arrangements sanctioned by the status quo.”
Picking up on these themes, Patrick Reyes writes in his memoir that, “I am not seeking a judge to save us from oppressive rulers. I am not seeking a prophet in the wilderness calling for unflinching faith in the face of adversity. I am not seeking a king to rule a new, more faithful kingdom. I am seeking a Jesus who accompanies me on a journey to survive.”
But this is not, really, a story about Abraham (or Sarah). God is with the boy, Ishmael. God is with Hagar. The God of Hagar and Ishmael accompanies them on a journey to survive. God does not ask them to turn their suffering into a learning opportunity for Abraham and Sarah. “God was with the boy, and he grew up; he lived in the wilderness, and became an expert with the bow.”
Sometimes liberation and reconciliation do not operate on the same timeline. The Black radical tradition in and beyond the United States teaches all of us that self-determination for the oppressed can be found in the wilderness, away from the centers of power. And in these maroon communities (which might dismissively be called “bubbles”), God and God’s people are journeying together towards freedom.
Rev. Jay Bergen is a pastor at Germantown Mennonite Church in Philadelphia, and a volunteer organizer with the Coalition to Abolish Death By Incarceration (CADBI), a campaign fighting to end life sentences and heal communities across Pennsylvania.