Dedicated to the memory of my Safta, Sara bat Chana, who named my father Yitzchak and gave me the name Shmuel.

Sara had waited years for a child.

Believing that Avraham’s future must continue, she gave Hagar to him as a wife. Hagar conceived, and Sara became diminished in Hagar’s eyes. Years passed until even the possibility of motherhood seemed to have passed with them.

Then the Torah tells us:

וַה׳ פָּקַד אֶת־שָׂרָה כַּאֲשֶׁר אָמָר And Hashem remembered Sara as He had said. (Bereishit 21:1)

Generations later, Chana faced a long wait of her own. The Midrash draws the two stories closer still.

Chana had been Elkana’s first wife. After ten childless years, Elkana married Penina, echoing........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)