I have heard what you asked me to do for Ishmael, and so I will also bless him with many descendants. He will be the father of twelve princes, and I will make his family a great nation.
of a crime that no nation has ever committed before. Just ask anyone, anywhere, from the eastern deserts to the islands in the west. You will find that no nation has ever abandoned its gods even though they were false. I am the true and glorious God, but you have rejected me to worship idols.
Here is what the LORD says about the Kedar tribe and the desert villages that were conquered by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia: Listen, you people of Kedar and the other tribes of the eastern desert. I have told Nebuchadnezzar to attack and destroy you.
But I will ask you to do one thing: give me all the earrings you took from the enemy.” The enemy soldiers had been Ishmaelites, and they wore gold earrings.