Sarai

One of the Yahwist passages from Genesis identifies Haran as the father of Iscah and Milcah.^[1][2] Some rabbinic texts within the Midrashic tradition have identified the aforementioned Iscah as Sarah.^[3] According to the Babylonian Talmud, Rabbi Isaac Nappaha, who was one of the Palestinian rabbis, said that Iscah and Sarah were the same person: "And why was she called Iscah? Because she saw through the Holy Spirit"

According to Genesis 20:12, in conversation with the Philistine king Abimelech of Gerar, Abraham reveals Sarah to be both his wife and his half-sister, stating that the two share a father but not a mother.^[3] This would make Sarah the daughter of Terah and the half-sister of not only Abraham but Haran and Nahor. She would also have been the aunt of Lot, Milcah, Iscah, and Bethuel, by both blood and marriage. By her union with Abraham, she had one child, Isaac.

Sarah first appears in the Book of Genesis, while the Midrash and Aggadah provide some additional commentary on her life and role within Judaism and its ancestral form, Yahwism. She is born Sarai (Hebrew: שָׂרַי) in Ur Kaśdim, or Ur of the Chaldees, believed to have been in present-day Iraq, 1,958 years following Creation, according to the Hebrew calendar. She was the daughter of Haran^[24] and the granddaughter of Terah, an idolater who worshiped the Moon god Nanna^[25] and high-ranking servant of Nimrod, the king of Shinar, or Mesopotamia, but not of his wife, Amathlai. Her name is a feminine form of sar (Hebrew: שַׂר), meaning "chieftain" or "prince." Through Terah, she would have been a 10th-generation descendant of Noah, still alive, living in the Mountains of Ararat, and over nine centuries old at the time of her birth. No details are given as to her life or her religious beliefs before Abraham's return to Ur Kaśdim to thwart Nimrod's efforts to proclaim himself a god. It is known she wed Abraham, then Abram, sometime between the ages of forty and five and following her husband's public humiliation of Nimrod, she, along with her father Terah, her orphaned nephew Lot, her manservant Eliezer, and some three hundred others left Ur Kaśdim for Canaan, the present-day Levant, to save Abraham from a plot by Nimrod to destroy him, commanded to do so by Yahweh.

En route to Canaan, the group stopped in Harran, in present-day Turkey, settling there for some twenty years, until Yahweh urged them to move on and so, they left Terah behind, to live out his days, and traveled through Shechem and Bethel, both cities in the present-day West Bank, and, when a famine strikes the region, to Mizraim, present-day Egypt. While in Mizraim, Sarah's beauty attracts the attention of Pharaoh and Abraham, fearing the Egyptians would kill him if they knew Sarah were married to him, introduces himself as her brother and so, Pharaoh bestows upon Abraham great wealth, in the form of livestock and slaves, including Hagar, so that he may take Sarah as his concubine, to live in his palace with him. For Pharaoh's unintentional transgression against Abraham, he and members of his household, save for Sarah, are stricken with plague. Pharaoh then realizes that Abraham is Sarah's husband, not only her brother. Despite Abraham's willful deceit of Pharaoh, Pharaoh does not punish Abraham nor does he require the return of the wealth Abram was given in exchange for Sarah. However, he orders them to leave Mizraim. After leaving Mizraim, Lot splits from their group amicably. He eventually settles in Sodom, over disputes related to the livestock.

They returned to Canaan, and a decade passed and still, she and Abraham had no children. Thus, Sarah offered Hagar, her slavewoman, as a concubine to her husband so that he may have a child. Hagar became pregnant with Ishmael. During Hagar's pregnancy, Sarah and Hagar's relationship deteriorated rapidly, with Sarah striking her and Hagar fleeing into the desert to avoid her, returning only at the urging of angels. Yahweh then told Abraham that Sarah would give to him a son. Sarah, then ninety years old, laughed at this idea. But, as prophesied, she became pregnant with Isaac and she nursed him herself. She would ultimately demand that Abraham send Hagar and Ishmael away and so, Abraham banished them and sent them into the desert.

Sometime after the birth of Ishmael but before the birth of Isaac, Sarah and Abraham travel to Gerar, as described in Genesis 20, where events took place which mirrored those of Mizraim, in which a king, this time Abimelech, took an interest in Sarah for her beauty and, as he had done in Mizraim, Abraham presented himself as her brother instead of her husband and so, believing her unmarried Abimelech took her into her house as Pharaoh had though, this time, Yahweh intervened before he touched Sarah, through dreams and plague. Abimelech confronted Abraham, angry that his lie had caused him to provoke the wrath of a god, but, also like Pharaoh, he bestows great wealth upon Abraham. The two men part amicably, with Abraham saying he will pray for the king, who is childless and without an heir.

It is said that Sarah died at the age of one hundred and twenty seven years, caused in part by the events of the Binding of Isaac. She is buried in Kiryat Arba, in Hebron, in the Cave

Lord plagues Pharaoh because of Sarai

(Gen 12:17)  And the LORD plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai Abram's wife.

(Gen 12:18)  And Pharaoh called Abram, and said, What is this that thou hast done unto me? why didst thou not tell me that she was thy wife?

(Gen 12:19)  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.

(Gen 12:20)  And Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him: and they sent him away, and his wife, and all that he had.

Altercation to Sarai's name

Gen 17:15  And God said unto Abraham, As for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall her name be. 

Sarah laughs at having Isaac

(Gen 18:11)  Now Abraham and Sarah were old and well stricken in age; and it ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women.

(Gen 18:12)  Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?

(Gen 18:13)  And the LORD said unto Abraham, Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a child, which am old?

(Gen 18:14)  Is any thing too hard for the LORD? At the time appointed I will return unto thee, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son.

(Gen 18:15)  Then Sarah denied, saying, I laughed not; for she was afraid. And he said, Nay; but thou didst laugh.

Sarah gives birth to Isaac

(Gen 21:1)  And the LORD visited Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did unto Sarah as he had spoken.

(Gen 21:2)  For Sarah conceived, and bare Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time of which God had spoken to him.

(Gen 21:3)  And Abraham called the name of his son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bare to him, Isaac.

(Gen 21:4)  And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac being eight days old, as God had commanded him.

(Gen 21:5)  And Abraham was an hundred years old, when his son Isaac was born unto him.

(Gen 21:6)  And Sarah said, God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me.

(Gen 21:7)  And she said, Who would have said unto Abraham, that Sarah should have given children suck? for I have born him a son in his old age.

Sarah takes jealousy to Ishmael and Hagar

Gen 21:9  And Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, which she had born unto Abraham, mocking. 

Gen 21:10  Wherefore she said unto Abraham, Cast out this bondwoman and her son: for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac. 

Gen 21:12  And God said unto Abraham, Let it not be grievous in thy sight because of the lad, and because of thy bondwoman; in all that Sarah hath said unto thee, hearken unto her voice; for in Isaac shall thy seed be called. 

Sarah's death

Gen 23:1  And Sarah was an hundred and seven and twenty years old: these were the years of the life of Sarah. 

Gen 23:2  And Sarah died in Kirjatharba; the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan: and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her. 

Gen 23:19  And after this, Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah before Mamre: the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan.