Back when Abraham was an energetic young man of 75 (yeah, really), he had yet to earn the extra syllable in his name and was simply known as Abram. He lived in Canaan with his wife, Sarai, until one day famine struck and they were forced to pack up and move to Egypt. As the couple entered the land of the Pyramids, Abram turned to Sarai and said:
"Behold now, I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon: Therefore it shall come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall say, "This is his wife: and they will kill me, but they will save thee alive. Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister: that it may be well with me for thy sake; and my soul shall live because of thee." - Genesis 12:11-13
Concerned that those crazy, heathen Egyptians would find Sarai so damn fine that they'd actually kill Abram to get a piece of her, Abram asks his wife to pose as his sister. Because that can't go wrong at all. Upon arriving in Egypt, the Egyptians take about 2 seconds to grab the Hebrew hottie and bring her to Pharaoh to be his ... pet sexy Hebrew chick. Good call there, Abram. Clearly telling everyone that your smokin' wife is really your sister works splendidly.
Pharaoh heaps gifts on Abram, who apparently accepts them without saying anything. Wait a minute! I see what you did there, Abram. You're tired of your old lady, always nagging you to patch up the tent and repair the camel (it's been making funny sounds for weeks!), so you pass her off onto some guy who will give you mountains of stuff for her! Then you can spend every day of the week at the driving range and nobody can criticize you! You sly devil, you! Unfortunately for Abram, though, God (feeling omnipresent that day, apparently) notices what's going on:
"And the LORD plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai Abram's wife. And Pharaoh called Abram, and said, What is this that thou hast done unto me? why did thou not tell me that she was thy wife? Why saidst thou, She is my sister? so I might have taken her to me to wife: now therefore behold thy wife, take her, and go thy way." - Genesis 12:17-19
Somehow, from a few of his family members dropping dead from plague, Pharaoh clues in to the fact that Sarai is Abram's wife, not sister. He ships her back to her husband, asking him why the hell he would do such a thing in the first place. Meanwhile, Abram's dreams of becoming a new bachelor are thoroughly squashed. So really, it's a bit of a strange story, but it's not a bad story. It's kind of funny, actually, with Abram's lie about Sarai being his sister getting him into all sorts of trouble. In fact, it almost teaches us a good lesson: one little white lie can grow into an unmanageable mess quicker than you might think. But Genesis is so proud of the fact that it almost told a good, entertaining story with a decent moral that it repeats it two more times. The second time this story shows up, it's with our lucky couple ... Abram and Sarai? Someone's either a little slow on the uptake here or he really does want to get rid of his old lady.
By this point, Abram has earned his "ham" and Sarai has had her name changed to Sarah. Again, he does it because he's afraid people will kill him to have the hot piece of 65-year-old ass that is his wife. (No, really, this man is obviously desperate to escape this evil harpy woman's clutches.)
"And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister: and Abimelech king of Gerar sent, and took Sarah." - Genesis 20:2
This time, God's up on Abraham's wife-ditching ways. He's been watching, and clearly it's time to sit Abraham down and have a good, long talk about how lying is wrong and trying to dump your wife on other men is even more wrong.
Nah! He just threatens the dude who took her with death. And you thought for a second that there was a point to this!
"But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and said to him, Behold, thou art but a dead man, for the woman which thou has taken; for she is a man's wife." - Genesis 20:3
So Abimelech and God have a good chat about how Abimelech won't be smote as long as he returns Sarah to her actual husband. He does so, and then asks Abraham the same question Pharaoh and the rest of us have all been wondering: why the hell would he do such a thing, especially knowing that he'd be bringing the wrath of God down on whoever unknowingly married another man's wife? Well, Abraham?
"And Abraham said, Because I thought, Surely the fear of God is not in this place, and they will slay me for my wife's sake. And yet, she is indeed my sister; she is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife." - Genesis 20:11-12.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, back up! So he wasn't lying because Sarah actually is his half-sister? That's more than a little twisted, Bible. I mean, I know a lot of old stories involve siblings getting married, but this is the guy that three major religions - two of them accounting for half the world's spiritual beliefs (Christianity and Islam) - are based on. And he married his sister. I'm beginning to see why religion inspires so much insanity.
Anyway, Abimelech gives Sarah back to poor, desperate Abraham and they go on their way. By the time this happens a third time, we all have wonder if someone shouldn't just invent divorce so these guys don't have to keep pawning their wives off on random kings. This time, the couple are Isaac, Abraham's son, and Rebekah. The king is ... Abimelech. Oh, really God? You're gonna do this to this poor guy again?
So by this point you know the drill. There's a famine, so Isaac and Rebekah move to a place with food (Gerar, in this case). He's afraid that the Godless heathens of Gerar will kill him to get Rebekah, so he calls her his sister. This time, however, there's a twist: Abimelech isn't falling for it again. He spots Rebekah from his window and just knows that this is a woman who's obviously posing as her husband's sister. He calls to Isaac and asks him:
"What is this thou hast done unto us? one of the people might lightly have lain with thy wife, and thou shouldest have brought guiltiness upon us." - Genesis 26:10
Instead of waiting for a response (possibly because he's afraid of getting one as creepy as the reason Abraham gave), he lays down a law that says anyone who so much as touches Rebekah will be put to death, because he'll be damned if God's gonna threaten him with death and destruction again for something he has absolutely no control over. Normally, I would assume that these are all simply different versions of the same story, with various retellings changing the details of who was involved and where it happened, but there are no contradictions in the Bible, so I guess we're just going to have to accept that God loves watching people misinterpret relationships and get caught up in their own poorly spun webs of lies. In other words, God's a romantic comedy fan after all. Who knew?
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