^ The qualification is not in the Talmud which the commentator quotes.
The original runs thus: A tradition of the School of Rabbi Ishmael
teaches : So great is peace, that, for its sake, even the Holy One, blessed
be He! tampered with truth; for Sarah had said (disparagingly) "My
lord being old also"; but God reported to Abraham that she had said :
"And /am old." Yovamoth, iol. 6%B.
Immediately preceding the above we read as follows : Rabbi Ilaa said,



GENESIS XV 11 I. 10-15.
14 Is anything too hard for the Lord? God said, "Is there
anything hid from Me that I should not be able to do it?"

15 T/ien Sarah debited, saying; I laughed not. Sarah denied,
and said, " I have not mocked " (or sneered), because she was
afraid to admit that she had sneered. She was not aware that
God told Abraham she had mocked ; for had she known this
she would not have denied God's word. But Sarah thought
that Abraham perceived that she mocked, because she had
laughed. Or because she did not believe the good news (that
she would have a son), therefore she denied. When Abraham
told her : " JVay, but thou didst sneer" she then understood
that God told him ; then she was silent.
