Sarah Dies; A Wife for Isick; Birth of Hesaw and Jackup

SARAH DIES AND ABRAHAM BUYS A BURIAL GROUND

Giving birth in her eighties took its toll on Sarah, not to mention not getting a good night’s sleep for a couple of years. She finally succumbed and passed out while jogging one day. This occurred in the land of the Hittites, and Abraham didn’t want to have to drag the body back to their home town, so he asked around to see if anyone was willing to sell him a plot of land on which he could bury his wife, and perhaps set up a small Jewish cemetery that he might turn into a profitable venture.

A Hittite by the name of Ephron owned some property with a cave on it, which he intended to turn into a tourist attraction/theme restaurant. When he heard that Abraham was looking to buy a patch of land, Ephron offered the land to him. They went back and forth, with Abraham insisting on paying for the land, and Ephron insisting he wouldn’t accept payment, but in the end Abraham prevailed, and so came to own this patch of land that included not only a cave, but also a waterslide park and a miniature golf course still under construction.

A WIFE FOR ISICK

Abraham was getting old and called his servant to him.
“I’m an old altacocka now, and I could buy the farm any time now. I want you to go back to the land of my father, and find a nice Jewish girl for my son Isick. These shicksas around here don’t appreciate a man without a foreskin. Put your hands between my thighs and promise that you will do this for me.”
(I’m not making this stuff up here. If you don’t believe me, check it out in some other Bible. This was the way vows were made.)

The servant did as he was told, putting his hands between Abraham’s thighs.
Abraham’s eyes rolled backward in his head, and his breathing quickened.
“Mmm, does that ever feel good!” he said. “Can you move your hands just a little higher?
Oh yes, that’s the spot. Stay there, will you?” (Abraham was clearly missing Sarah.)
The servant did as he was told, though being a family man, he felt a bit strange about the whole thing.

The next morning, after Abraham had released the servant’s hands from between his thighs, the servant set out on camel to try to find a suitable wife for Isick. He traveled to the town where Abraham’s brother, Nowhere, lived, and inquired as to where women hung out when in the market for a husband.
An old matchmaker told him, “Oh yes, that would be the well in the center of town. All the virgins, divorcees, and widowers go down to the well with the pretense of getting water, but they’re really hoping to hook up. We have no dating service or singles dances in this town, so the well is the best place to be seen.”

The servant went down to the well, and after watering his camel, sat in a corner where he could inconspicuously watch the foot traffic. After a while, he spied an attractive young woman wearing a Star of David around her neck. He sidled up to her as she began to fill her water jar.

“Come here often?” he tossed out as an icebreaker.
“I do,” she replied. “I haven’t seen you around before. Are you new in town?”
The servant was pleased. Things were moving along nicely here. Time to ask her name.
“No, I’m actually from out of town. My name’s Floppo. And you would be…?”
“Rebecca,” she replied, batting her eyelashes coquettishly.
“Not Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, I presume,” retorted the servant, being perhaps a bit too cute at this point in the conversation.
“Oh, no,” came her reply. “I’m Rebecca, daughter of Bethuel, the son of Abraham’s brother Nowhere and his wife Milkher.
(It seems everyone was related in these parts, leading one to think that incest must have been the order of the day.)
“Can I have a drink of water from your jugs?” asked the servant.
“My jugs have milk in them, silly,” she replied, “but there’s water in those jars over there.
Of course you can have a drink of water,” replied Rebecca, “but whether you may or not is an entirely different matter.”
This grammatical repartee was totally wasted on the servant, who was not an educated man. She could tell from the blank look on his face that he didn’t know what she was talking about, so she moved on.

“Here, take a swig. I’ll go fetch some water for your camel.”
This was the sign that the servant was looking for, as Abraham had instructed him. The right one for Isick would spontaneously offer to satisfy the camel. Abraham thought that any woman who could satisfy a camel would suffice for his Isick. The servant could also tell that Rebecca was a virgin, though it was not at all clear how he could tell this without doing a pelvic exam.

The servant put a ring in Rebecca’s nose which bothered Rebecca to say the least, as she wasn’t pierced anywhere, and didn’t have even a delicate tattoo on her ankle or shoulder.
The servant asked if he could go home with her, and thinking that he might propose to her, Rebecca led him to her home, or more likely he led her by the nose ring.
At her home, after proper introductions were made, the servant told Rebecca’s parents the story of what he was doing at the well, and made sure to let them know how well off Abraham was, and how well endowed his son Isick was.

The servant made it clear that Rebecca would have to travel back with him to dwell in Cannon with Isick. Rebecca wanted to stay a few days with her family before bidding them farewell, but her mother and father pushed her out the door, saying, “Go, Rebecca.
Go. We’ll fix you a little snack, and pack a couple of dresses, and you’ll be set to go. There’s some chopped liver left over from supper last night. Would you like a little chopped liver sandwich on some nice pumpernickel? How about you, servant? A little chopped liver for you, tatskelah?”

It was clear to the servant that as far as the parents were concerned, it was high time that Rebecca left home and stopped mooching off them.
When they reached the town in which Abraham’s family dwelled, Rebecca saw a young man approaching them.
“Who’s the hunk?” she inquired of the servant.
“That’s master Isick,” the servant answered.
It was lust at first sight, and though Isick had never met a girl with a nose ring, that night there were sounds of pleasure arising from Isick’s tent. The noise kept Abraham awake half the night, but he was pleased that his son finally had a partner, with whom he could continue the blood line. From the sounds emanating from the tent, it was clear Isick wasn’t wasting any time in this matter.


THE BIRTH OF HESAW AND JACKUP

Rebecca, the wife of Isick, was not having much luck getting pregnant, despite Isick being a horny bugger, and so Isick asked God for help. God paid a visit to Rebecca, and lo and behold, it was soon obvious to all that Rebecca was with child, though it was not so obvious whether the child was fathered by her husband or by divine intervention. Judging by the sounds coming from her tent that night, it was clear that it was divine for Rebecca, whoever it was.

Rebecca was pregnant with twins, and she could feel them fighting each other even in her womb. It was as if they were warring against each other. She asked God why it felt this way and he answered, “You are carrying two enemies, who will become bitter rivals and hate each others’ guts.”
“Wonderful,” Rebecca replied. “Just what I needed! I knew it was a mistake talking to that Floppo guy at the well.”

Rebecca gave birth to twin sons. (What? Did you expect a girl child?) One had so much hair on his body it looked like he was wearing a mohair sweater. He was named Hesaw, which means “baby wearing a mohair sweater.” The second son was born holding tight to Hesaw’s heel, and so he was named Jackup, which means “he who hangs onto the heel of another.”