54 myths · Page 2 of 2
Behind the tent flap Sarah laughed at a promised child, then denied it. The visitor answered with four words that still hold the air.
Abraham had bargained heaven down from fifty righteous. Inside the city, Lot's wife drew a line through her own house so the guests stood only on his half.
The king of Shalem came out to the battlefield with bread and wine and blessed the victor first, God second. The office left him before the meal ended.
Guests ate meat and eggs for nothing. When the plates were empty their host asked for the only payment he took, a sentence naming a God they did not know.
The morning they seated Lot on Sodom's high court, his four colleagues were named Chief of Lies, Chief Scoundrel, and worse. By dark, a mob had his door.
Abraham ran with curds, milk, and a calf for three travelers, and every kindness returned as wells, manna, quail, and walking clouds.
A servant reached him between courses with the news. The father heard it, straightened his sleeves, and went back out to pour wine for a full courtyard.
Old Barzillai fed fleeing David and earned five mentions like five Torah books, while Rabban Gamliel poured wine for Rabbi Yehoshua with his own hands.
Abandoned for bearing only daughters, a wife unloads a cart of coals, finds treasure beneath, and years later feeds the husband who left her.
Abraham sprinted for strangers and water, and the midrash says that running still binds the King among Israel more tightly than any idol's empty debt.
A beggar asked Rava for fowl and old wine, Heaven delivered both, and other sages learned fear, shame, and a calm mind before death.
Three travelers sat under Abraham's tree and ate like men. Heaven withheld the word angel so his hospitality would stay honest.
God says please and names Moriah. Abraham asks who will officiate, walks ahead as El Shaddai's partner, and nearly offers the son he was only asked to lift.
Fleeing Sodom under orders not to look behind, Lot's wife turned once toward the fire and stiffened into a pillar of salt the oxen still lick by day.
After the plain burned, Abraham did not freeze in grief. He moved to Gerar and opened the same tent that Sodom had refused to learn.
Rabbi Hanina lifted a tired official onto his shoulders and washed the man's feet at home. Heaven later showed that the guest had been an angel.
Three unborn guests ate with Abraham. Later blessings cast Israel's seed like angels, while God alone lights dark and clothes the bare.
Abraham ran toward three strangers he took for idolaters. Later Gamliel left the patriarchs seat and poured wine for the sages himself.
Jethro brought offerings and the elders sat to eat. Moses stayed on his feet serving, and the sages raised the bar to heaven.
A host opens the door with perfect will and finds more than a traveler. Companions kiss hands. Elijah descends with souls, angels, and a crown.
Laban's men had ridden hard to catch him. Jacob stacked the border stones, killed animals for a meal, and sat the whole posse down to eat with him.
Near death under desert thorns, Ishmael cried to Abraham's God. Years later Abraham left a coded message at the tent door, and the son understood.
Under the tree Abraham served three guests whose food vanished course by course, then Ammon locked the desert against travelers who already had manna.
Rabbi Yanai invited fine clothes to his table, tested the guest, and said a dog had eaten his bread. The man seized him by the inheritance of Jacob.
