The only name for God in the Old Testament that a human being gave, and the human was an Egyptian slave-girl in the desert
El Roi: The God Who Sees Me
Every other name in this series was given by God or grown by Israel. One was given by a person, once, and never used again: a pregnant Egyptian slave, run away from her mistress, sitting by a spring in the wilderness. She names God for what he has just done, and the well she sat by kept the name after she had gone.
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Lesson 7 of 12 · The name a person gave
El Roi is the God who sees: the name Hagar gave when the angel of Yahweh found her by a spring on the road to Egypt, called her by name, told her what she was carrying, and sent her back. It is the only name for God in the Old Testament that a human being coined, and the human was a woman, a slave, a foreigner, and outside the covenant line — the person the story of Abraham had least reason to notice. She names God not for what he is in himself but for what he did: he saw her. The well kept the name; the Bible kept the well; and the name says something about God that none of the greater names say as plainly, which is that his attention reaches the people nobody else is looking at.
By the spring
Hagar has fled from Sarai, who dealt harshly with her, and is on the road back to Egypt when she is found.
She called the name of Yahweh who spoke to her, “You are a God who sees,” for she said, “Have I even stayed alive after seeing him?” — Genesis 16:13 · WEB
Read the comment on Hagar, and the God who sees
She called the name of Yahweh who spoke to her, "You are a God who sees," for she said, "Have I even stayed alive after seeing him?" The Hebrew of her second sentence is difficult and the translations differ — the WEB’s is one honest reading, the King James’ "have I also here looked after him that seeth me?" is another — but the name is clear, and so is the grammar: she called it. Everywhere else in this series God announces a name or Israel arrives at one. Here a person gives one, and God accepts it by keeping it in his book.
רֳאִי rŏʼîy H7210
from רָאָה; sight, whether abstractly (vision) or concretely (a spectacle); gazingstock, look to, (that) see(-th).
Seeing, sight, appearance — from the verb to see, ra’ah. In Hagar’s name it is El Roi, God of seeing, the God who sees, or the God whom I have seen; the form allows both, and the verse plays on both. The same verb, in the next lesson, gives Abraham’s name for the mountain, Yahweh Yireh, Yahweh will see — or provide, since to see to something is to provide it. The two names are made of one word, and both are about God seeing a person in extremity.
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Who she was
The weight of the name is in the namer, and the story tells you exactly who she was.
“Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, bore him no children. She had a servant, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar.” Genesis 16:1 · WEB
Sarai had an Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar: a slave, a foreigner, named — the narrator gives her the name her mistress never uses.
“He said, “Hagar, Sarai’s servant, where did you come from? Where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from the face of my mistress Sarai.”” Genesis 16:8 · WEB
Hagar, Sarai’s servant, where did you come from? The angel is the first speaker in the story to call her by name.
“Yahweh’s angel said to her, “Behold, you are with child, and will bear a son. You shall call his name Ishmael, because Yahweh has heard your affliction.” Genesis 16:11 · WEB
You shall call his name Ishmael, because Yahweh has heard your affliction: a name for the son that means God hears, given a verse before the mother’s name for God that means he sees.
“God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. She went, filled the container with water, and gave the boy a drink.” Genesis 21:19 · WEB
God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water: the second time she is in the desert, the second time she is seen, and the verb is hers again.
Heard and seen, a son’s name and a God’s name, from the one household in Genesis that the promise was not made to. The narrator is not careless with this.
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The well that kept it
Names in Genesis are kept by places, and this one was.
Therefore the well was called Beer Lahai Roi. Behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered. — Genesis 16:14 · WEB
Read the comment on Hagar, and the God who sees
Therefore the well was called Beer Lahai Roi, the well of the Living One who sees me. Isaac later lives beside it (Genesis 25:11), and it is where he is when Rebekah arrives. The son of the promise made his home at the well named by the slave who was sent away, and the Bible records it without comment, which is how the Bible records most of the things it most wants noticed.
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The God who sees, elsewhere
Hagar’s name was not repeated, but the thing it names is everywhere.
“God saw the children of Israel, and God understood.” Exodus 2:25 · WEB
God saw the children of Israel, and God understood: the exodus begins with the verb of Hagar’s name.
“Yahweh looks from heaven. He sees all the sons of men.” Psalm 33:13 · WEB
Yahweh looks from heaven; he sees all the sons of men: the psalm’s version of what she found at the spring.
“For Yahweh’s eyes run back and forth throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him. You have done foolishly in this; for from now on you will have wars.”” 2 Chronicles 16:9 · WEB
The eyes of Yahweh run back and forth throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is perfect toward him: seeing as the prelude to acting.
“for he has looked at the humble state of his servant. For behold, from now on, all generations will call me blessed.” Luke 1:48 · WEB
He has looked at the humble state of his servant: Mary’s song, the same verb in Greek, from another young woman with a child not yet born.
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What the name asks
It asks to be believed by people in Hagar’s position — the ones the household has stopped looking at. Every greater name in this series was given to a patriarch, a prophet or a king. This one was given by a runaway, for a reason she could state in a sentence, and the Bible let it stand beside the others. A reader who has ever felt unseen has, in Genesis 16, a name to say, and the standing of the person who said it first.
Read Genesis 16:1-14 slowly and count how many times Hagar is spoken to by name, and by whom. Then write, in one sentence, what she knew about God at the well that Sarai did not know in the tent.
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