Question about Ishmael?

I was reading out of Genesis today and something really confused me. Genesis records Ishmael being born when Abraham is 86 and then Isaac is born when Abraham was 100, doing the math when Ishmael and Hagar are driven away by Abraham Ishmael was 24 but then immediately after this it sounds or reads as if Ishmael is a small child. Saying Hagar took the boy and put him under a bush.

My question being what is the deal with this? What time kept differently then and Ishmael was actually younger than 24? Is this a numerical mistake by the translators? Is Genesis mearly Spiritual or Metaphoric in application or are the historic records something that can be pretty well set in stone as historic fact? Thanks for all your help on this one. :)

Reading out of different versions I can see Ishmael being older, the AMPlified version calls him a Youth and a Lad which in comparision to many of the early bible characters a person at the age 24 could easily be considered a youth. :) But I would still like some thoughts on this

WOAH! LOL Wow dont' I feel sheepish now. I thought it was weird they would call him a boy if he was 23 or 24.

apologies I work the graveyard shift and sometimes my brain doesn't want to work properly, good example simple math LOL

Well I guess it didn't take scooby doo to solve this mystery.

Oh I don't feel bad about it, I work with a guy who is pretty big into the bible that is eastern orthodox and he told me I need the Church Father's Commentaries thoughts on it. So perhaps not so much a bible scholar but a scholar of the early church father's writings. He obviously isn't a mathmatician either LOL

QUOTE:
"You just need a calculator with a new battery, thats all!"

Or, maybe one of Krispy's boys!? :-)

@Matt: too bad not all Bible questions are answered as easily as this one...