Is one allowed to marry a shifchah, a gentile maidservant? The answer is definitely not. What about a Mitzriyah? Again, the answer is absolutely not. Jews are forbidden from marrying a person from Mitzrayim, whether male or female.
Yet, in this week’s parshah, that is exactly what Avraham Avinu did. He married Hagar, who was Sarah Imenu’s Egyptian maidservant. The Gemara (Kiddushin 82a and Yoma 28b) states that Avraham Avinu kept the entire Torah. It also states (Yevamos 100b) that Avraham was specifically commanded not to marry a gentile or a maidservant. How then could he have married Hagar?
The Maharsha suggests that Sarah freed Hagar before giving her to Avraham as a wife. Hence, she was no longer a slave when she married Avraham. However, this answer is difficult to understand. The Aruch LaNer points out that the Torah is explicit that Sarah did not free Hagar when it records Avraham telling her after his marriage to Hagar, “Here is your maidservant, do with her as you please” (Bereishis 16:6). Additionally, Rashi says that Sarah worked hagar harder after her marriage to Avraham. Clearly, then, she was still her maidservant. Furthermore, even if Hagar was no longer a maidservant, she still was an Egyptian.
In light of all these questions, the Maharsha suggests that before Avraham performed his bris milah he did not in fact observe the Torah. He explains that a ger is not obligated to fulfill mitzvos until after his bris milah. Thus, Avraham, too, did not observe the mitzvos until after his bris milah.
As a side note, the Maharsha quotes a Midrash that says that Hagar was Sarah’s slave as nichsei melug. Nichsei melug are possessions a woman brings into her marriage, over which she retains a level of ownership throughout her marriage. I found this Midrash puzzling. How could Hagar have been Sarah’s slave before her marriage to Avraham when Sarah married Avraham long before they went to Egypt?
Rav Moshe Shmuel Shapiro, zt”l, elaborates on Rabbenu Bechaya’s comment in the beginning of Parshas Vayera that Avraham’s statement to Avimelech regarding Sarah – “She is my sister” – constituted a divorce because a gentile can divorce his wife with mere words. He explains that when Avraham and Sarah left, they remarried. Based on this explanation, I thought perhaps we can say the same regarding Avraham’s identical statement before he entered Mitzrayim. Perhaps his claim then as well that Sarah was his sister constituted a divorce and Avraham and Sarah remarried when they left Mitzrayim. Before she remarried Avraham, though, she acquired Hagar as a slave, rendering her nichsei melug. (Rabbenu Bechaya concludes that the divorce was not valid because it was coerced.)
Getting back to our topic, I believe one of our questions can be answered by noting that Avraham was only commanded not to marry a gentile or a maidservant in Bereishis 17:7 – after he was already married to Hagar for 13 years. Perhaps once he was thus commanded, he discontinued his relationship with Hagar until Sarah passed away. Once she passed, Avraham married Keturah, whom Rashi identifies as Hagar. At that point, though, Hagar had definitely already been freed.
We still must understand, though, how Avraham was allowed to marry an Egyptian. Tosafos, in a peirush called Paneiach Raza (Beraishis 25:1), explains that the prohibition not to marry a Mitzri became applicable only after Klal Yisrael was subjugated in Egypt, and Avraham lived before this time. The Daas Zekainim L’Baalei HaTosafos answers that according to one opinion in the Gemara (Kiddushin 73a), the prohibition not to marry a Mitzri does not apply to a ger. Since Avraham Avinu had the status of a ger, he was permitted to marry Hagar.