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Hagar (Hebrew הָגָר "Stranger", Standard Hebrew Hagar, Tiberian Hebrew Hāḡār; Arabic هاجر; Hagar), according to the Abrahamic faiths, was an Egyptian handmaiden of Sarah, wife of Abraham. Her story is reported in the Book of Genesis in Judeo-Christian tradition. In Islam, her story is mentioned in the Quran. She is regarded as the mother of Abraham's son, Ishmael, who is regarded as the the patriarch of the Northern Arabs.

Contents 1 Origins 2 Hagar in the Hebrew Bible 3 Hagar in Islamic traditions 3.1 In Hajj 4 The Race of Hagar 5 Hagar in popular culture 6 Hagar in contemporary Israel 7 References 8 See also

Hagar was the handmaiden of Abraham. Upon conversion to Abraham's Jewish faith, the Pharoah gave Hagar to Sarah who gave her to Abraham. Thus, the word "Hagar" (called Hajar in Arabic) comes from Ha ajruka (Arabic for "here is your recompense").^[1]

The story of Hagar is found in the Bible in the book of Genesis, chapters 16 and 21. The narrative states that Hagar was an Egyptian servant belonging to Sarah, who, being barren, gave Hagar to her husband Abraham as a concubine, so that he might still have children. She gave birth to a son, whom she named Ishmael.

Fourteen years after this, following Sarah's repentance to God for her sins, God allowed Sarah to give birth to Isaac. According to Judaic teachings, God commanded Abraham to obey his wife's wishes and expel Hagar and Ishmael into the desert alone. It is believed that Sarah was motivated by Ishmael's sexually frivilous ways ("making merry" Gen. 21:9) at a party, which has been translated as a reference to idolatry, sexual immorality or even murder; some rabbinic sources claim that Sarah worried that Ishmael would negatively influence Isaac, or that he would demand Isaac's inheritance on the grounds of being the firstborn.

Abraham is reluctant to send his son away, but God promised to make a geart nation out of Ishmael, because he was Abraham's seed. Rising early in the morning, therefore, Abraham took bread and a container of water and sent his former consort, Hagar and his son, Ishmael away.

Hagar intended to return to Egypt, but lost her way, and wandered in the desert of Beersheba. The water in her container failing, she placed Ishmael under one of the trees in the wilderness to cry as she went in search of water a small distance away from him. God ended up rescuing them by showing Hagar a well. Hagar eventually settled in the Desert of Paran.

According to Islamic tradition, Hagar was the maiden of Sarah, the wife of the founder of the Abrahamic religions, Ibrahim (Arabic word for Abraham), and the daughter of the Egyptian king, who gifted her to Abraham as a wife, thinking Sarah was his sister.^[2] Ishmael's birth to Hagar caused strife between her and Sarah, who was still barren. Abraham brings Hagar and their son to Mecca, where angel Gabriel shows him the Ka'aba.^[3] The objective of this journey was to "resettle" rather than "expel" Hagar.^[1]

The journey begins in Syria, when Ishmael is still a suckling. Angel Gabriel personally guides them on the journey, and part of the journey happens on a winged steed Al-Buraq. Finally, upon reaching the site of the Kaaba, Abraham left Hagar and son Ishmael under a tree and provided them with water.^[3] Hagar, learning that God had ordered Abraham to leave her in the desert, respected his decision.^[2] Muslims believe that God ordered Abraham to leave Hagar in order to test his obedience to God's commands.^[4]

However, soon Hagar ran out of water, and baby Ishmael began to die. Hagar, according to Islamic tradition, panicked and climbed two nearby mountains repeatedly in search for water. After her seventh climb, Ishmael scratched the ground, and water gushed forth from a spring.^[3]

Like many other significant figures in the Quran, Hagar is never mentioned by name in the text. The reader never hears her talking to Abraham. However, the reader lives Hagar's predicament indirectly through the eyes of Abraham. ^[1]

Hagar's repeated attempts to find water for her son, by running between the hills Safa and Marwa has become a Muslim rite (known as the sa`i, Arabic: سَعِي). During the two Muslim pilgrimages (the Hajj and Umra), pilgrims are required to walk between the two hills seven times in memory of Hagar's quest for water. The rite symbolizes the celebration of motherhood in Islam, as well as leadership of the women.^[2]

To complete the rite, Muslims drink from the well of Zamzam. According to Islamic tradition the well was God's answer to Hagar's quest for water. Often Muslims will bring back the water, regarding it as sacred, in memory of Hagar. ^[5]

The true race of Hagar is not known for certain as most Ancient Jewish text's do not mention Hagar's race. In ancient Middle-Eastern cultures prisoners of war's were usually kept as slaves. Hagar's ancestory was from a Royal Egyptian lineage. Shem who was the father of the Semites, (a group of people that later went to establish itself in the Middle-East), was the 7th king of the First Egyptian Dynasty from which whom the Hebrews and Arabs descended. This can means that Hagar was a Semite, rather than a Hamite.

The common perception among Northern Arabs is that Hagar was of semitic lineage.

Medieval Arab genealogists divided Arabs into three groups:

• "ancient Arabs", tribes that had vanished or been destroyed, such as 'Ad and Thamud, often mentioned in the Qur'an as examples of God's power to destroy wicked peoples.

• "Pure Arabs" of South Arabia, descending from Qahtan. The Qahtanites (Qahtanis) are said to have migrated the land of Yemen following the destruction of the Ma'rib Dam (sadd Ma'rib).

• The "Arabized Arabs" (musta`ribah) of center and North Arabia, descending from Ishmael son of Abraham.

• The Scottish artist James Eckford Lauder (1811-1869) painted a large canvas of Hagar.

• A character named Hagar is prominently featured in Toni Morrison's novel Song of Solomon, which features numerous Biblical themes and allusions.

• William Shakespeare - Merchant of Venice - Act II Scene 4 line 40

Shylock: What says that fool of Hagar’s offspring, ha?

• The comic strip Viking Hägar the Horrible uses the name, but with an umlaut over the first letter "a". This might be an unintended coincidence. Hägar is not a Viking name. In Scandinavian translations, he is called Hårek or Hagbard.

• The novel The Stone Angel by Margaret Laurence has a protagonist named Hagar whose life story loosely imitates that of the biblical Hagar.

• Hagar is mentioned briefly in Sir Salman Rushdie's controversial novel The Satanic Verses, where Mecca is replaced with 'Jahilia', a desert village built on sand and served by Hagar's spring.

The story of Hagar's expulsion to the desert has acquired some political connotations in modern Israel, being taken up as a symbol of the massive expulsion and exodus of Palestinians during the 1948 Israeli War of Independence, being depicted as such by some Israeli writers and artists.

It was also the subject of a famous debate on the floor of the Knesset between two women parliamentarians - Shulamit Aloni, founder of Meretz (Civil Rights Movement) and Geulah Cohen of Tehiya (National Awakening Party) - who argued about the right interpretation which the Bible in general and Hagar's story in particular should be given in curriculum of Israeli schools.

Since the 1970's the custom has arisen of giving the name "Hagar" to newborn female babies. The giving of this name is often taken as a controversial political act, marking the parents as being left-leaning and supporters of reconciliation with the Palestinians and Arab World, and is frowned upon by many, including nationalists and the religious.

The Israeli Women in Black movement has unofficially renamed Jerusalem's Paris Square, where the movement has been holding anti-occupation vigils every Friday since 1988, as "Hagar Square". The name commorates the late Hagar Rublev, a prominent Israeli feminist and peace activist, who was among the founders of these Friday vigils.

1. ^ ^{a b c} Fatani, Afnan H. (2006), "Hajar", in Leaman, Oliver, The Qur'an: an encyclopedia, Great Britain: Routeledge, pp. 234-236
2. ^ ^{a b c} 'Aishah 'Abd al-Rahman, Anthony Calderbank (1999). "Islam and the New Woman/ ﺍﻹﺳﻼﻡ ﻭﺍﻟﻤﺮﺃﺓ ﺍﻟﺠﺪﻳﺪﺓ". Alif: Journal of Comparative Poetics (19): 200. 
3. ^ ^{a b c} Firestone, Reuven (1992). "Abraham's Journey to Mecca in Islamic Exegesis: A Form-Critical Study of a Tradition". Studia Islamica (76): 15-18. 
4. ^ Schussman, Aviva (1998). "The Legitimacy and Nature of Mawid al-Nabī: (Analysis of a Fatwā)". Islamic Law and Society 5 (2): 218. 
5. ^ Delaney, Carol (August, 1990). "The "hajj": Sacred and Secular". American Ethnologist 17 (3): 515. 

• Hagarism: The Making of the Islamic World, a book discussing the origins of Islam.