<b>And Abraham took another wife (Gen. 25:1).</b> What is written previously concerning this matter? <i>And Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent</i> (Gen. 24:67). You learn from this that if a man’s wife should die, leaving him sons, he should not remarry until his sons are betrothed. Only then should he remarry. Abraham did so. After Sarah’s death, he first betrothed Isaac and then took a wife for himself. Where do we learn this? It is written: <i>Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent</i>, and after: <i>Abraham took another wife</i>. Isaac said to himself: “I have taken a wife, but my father is without a wife.” What did Isaac do? He went and bought him (Abraham) a wife. Rabbi said: Hagar and Keturah were one and the same person. Why then was she called Keturah? Because she had been bound up (<i>keshurah</i>) like a water bag.<sup class="footnote-marker">8</sup><i class="footnote">Indicating that she was a virgin.</i>

Our sages, however, maintained that she was actually a different wife. Rabbi insisted: Hagar and Keturah were one and the same person, since it is written about Isaac: <i>And Isaac came from the way of Beer-lahai-roi</i> (Gen. 24:62); that is, from the well of which it is written: <i>And she called the name of the Lord that spoke to her, Thou art a God of seeing</i> (ibid. 16:13). From this you learn that she must have been Hagar.<sup class="footnote-marker">9</sup><i class="footnote">A well opened for Hagar after she and Ishmael were sent away (Gen. 21:19). God saw her plight.</i>

Another comment on why she was called Keturah: Her deeds were as pleasant as the fragrance of incense (<i>ketar</i>). <i>And she bore him Zimran, and Jokshan, and Medan</i>, etc. (ibid. 25:2). Therefore Scripture says: <i>Though thy beginning was small, yet thy end shall greatly increase</i> (Job 8:7). The Holy One, blessed be He, proclaimed: The righteous beget good and wicked sons in this world, but in the world-to-come all of them <i>shall be righteous and shall inherit the land forever</i> (Isa. 60:2). And it says also: <i>The smallest shall become a thousand, and the least a mighty nation; I, the Lord, will hasten it in its time</i> (ibid., v. 22). And so may it be.