Was Abraham’s Fear Well Founded?

When about to enter Egypt on account of a famine in the land of Canaan, Abraham said to his wife: “I know well how beautiful a woman you are. When the Egyptians see you, they will say, ‘She is his wife’; then they will kill me, but let you live. Please say, therefore, that you are my sister.”​—Gen. 12:11-13, New American Bible.

There is positive evidence that Abraham’s fear was valid. An ancient papyrus tells of a Pharaoh who commissioned armed men to seize an attractive woman and kill her husband. Abraham, therefore, acted in harmony with what he felt would be the safest course in having his wife identify herself as his sister. She was, in fact, his half sister.​—Gen. 20:12.