What does Genesis 12:15 mean?
Abram's great fear immediately comes to be—in part, because of his own attempts to avoid it. Abram's plan was for his family tell a half-truth, intended as a whole lie: that Sarai (his wife and half-sister) was merely his sister. His hope may have been that, as Sarai's brother, he would have the right to refuse any marriage proposals. At the same time, Abram felt that a beautiful woman's "brother" would have been less a target for jealous violence than her "husband" (Genesis 12:12).After Abram, Sarai, and their large company enter Egypt, the princes of Egypt's Pharaoh report on her great beauty. Pharaoh takes Sarai for his wife—most likely one of many. Apparently, the Pharaoh didn't need permission to take a man's sister for his wife. Ironically, as later verses will show, even the pagan Pharaoh balked at stealing a married woman (Genesis 12:18–19)!
The passage doesn't reveal whether Pharaoh actually slept with Sarai as his wife or was prevented from doing so by the affliction reported in the following verses. Given that Egypt's ruler probably had many wives already, and God's intentions for Sarai, the most likely situation is that he never had the opportunity to touch her.
