Genesis 16:10

I will multiply thy seed, &c.— The angel here speaks authoritatively, and not as bearing a message from another: I will multiply. In the next chapter, Genesis 17:20 the same promise is renewed: "And these passages," says the Bishop of Bristol, "evince, that the prophecy doth not so properly belong to Ishmael, as to his posterity, which is here foretold to be very numerous. Ishmael married an AEgyptian woman; and, in a few years, his family was so increased, that, in the 37th chapter of Genesis, we read of Ishmaelites trading into AEgypt. Afterwards his seed was multiplied exceedingly in the Hagarenes, and in the Nabathaeans, who had their name from his son Nabaioth; and in the Ituraeans, who were so called from his son Ietur or Itur; and in the Arabs, especially the Scenites and the Saracens, who overran a great part of the world: and his descendants the Arabs are a very numerous people at this day." See notes on Genesis 17:20 and Jeremiah 49:31.