Last Sunday, we marveled at how God providentially orchestrated the match of this man, Isaac, to that woman, Rebekah, in holy matrimony. “Isaac was a son of forty years when he took Rebekah, the daughter of Bethuel the Aramean of Paddan-aram, the sister of Laban the Aramean, to himself as wife” (Genesis 25:20). And so we expect this to be the start of a beautiful and fruitful story. Isaac, sole son of Sarah, didn't even exist when God pledged to make Sarah an ancestress of nations and kings, and that Isaac would surely have “his seed after him” (Genesis 17:16-19). Isaac was a boy when God pledged to Abraham that “through Isaac shall your seed be called” (Genesis 21:12). When Isaac was spared, God swore to multiply Abraham's seed through that son (Genesis 22:16-17). When Rebekah went off to marry him, Bethuel and Laban unknowingly echoed that oath, blessing her that “your seed may become thousands of ten thousands” (Genesis 24:61). Now, “after the death of Abraham, God blessed Isaac his son” (Genesis 25:11). What could that mean, if not that his oath be upheld?
But here comes the painful phrase we'd hoped we'd left behind chapters ago in another generation: “barren was she” (Genesis 25:21). It seems so unfair. Isaac hasn't done anything to deserve it; neither has Rebekah. They had every reason to think children would grace their house swift as could be. It seems so pointless. Why, when the world's future blessing hinges on the seed of Isaac and Rebekah, would God allow this failure? They must be at a loss when their fertility becomes apparent. From them, one preacher long ago chided his congregation that “whenever you see pious people devoted to religion yet childless, don't think it is the result of sin,” but recognize that “many reasons for God's designs are beyond our ken.”1
We remember how Abraham and Sarah handled this – ducking, complaining, protesting, finally circumventing through surrogacy by 'opening' their marriage to Hagar. Isaac doesn't imitate them. Maybe, now that he's reconnected with Ishmael and heard what it was like growing up in that mess, he sees better the dire costs of monkeying with marriage. Despite his father's concubines and Rebekah's grandfather's concubine, Isaac and Rebekah live as committed monogamists by conviction.2 Instead, Isaac pours his tears into the jar of One who is greater than he. That long-ago preacher put it beautifully, that “when he saw nature impeded, he ran to the Creator of nature and pressed him by his prayer to loose the bonds of nature.”3
Before the verse is done, we read, “the LORD was supplicated toward him,” that God heard and was appeased by this impassioned plea, that God took action (Genesis 25:21). But we later find out that the birth comes when Isaac is sixty years old (Genesis 25:26), and we already heard that they married when he was forty. So that painful phrase, “barren was she,” is the spectre haunting their marriage bed, not for the first or the second year alone, but for nearly two decades. Now, that means that either Isaac twiddled his thumbs for nineteen years before trying prayer, and then God leaps into action immediately;4 or that Isaac “spent twenty years praying and beseeching God, and only then,” after those decades, “he attained his wish.”5 Until that precious day arrived, “Isaac poured out his soul before the Lord many a year, only to hear the deafening roar of silence.”6
For nineteen years, Isaac and Rebekah internalized the words of the future psalmist, that “I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest” (Psalm 22:2). It would have been easy for them, at their fifth or tenth or fifteenth anniversary, to give up – to write it off as unheard; to quit; to stumble and fall in their faith; to conclude that there's nobody home up there. “Ask, and it will be given to you” (Matthew 7:7) – this they could have disbelieved. But they didn't. Isaac prayed still as that nineteenth anniversary came and went. God had accomplished whatever he'd meant to do by the delay. So he proved he'd been hearing Isaac all along. Didn't Jesus urge his disciples “that they ought always to pray and not lose heart” (Luke 18:1)? But all too often, we too soon “lose heart and fall away if the response to prayer is not immediate.”7 Isaac shows us a better way.
But now to Rebekah, who, “by her patience, undid the knot of sterility.”8 The first trimester's already begun as the happy news dawns on her, and she excitedly tells Isaac. The second trimester gets underway. And things begin to get hard. She's been around pregnancies all her life, but this was so much worse than she'd thought to expect. Feeling pains from within, she stammers out, “If so, why is it this to me?” (Genesis 25:22). Her words don't add up to anything, as if she were kicked from within before she could get out the whole sentence.9 All she knows is, it hurts and she's worried. She's worried because, as miraculous as the pregnancy is, every mother fears the prospect of miscarrying her child.10 She's worried because, in a world where dying in childbirth is fairly common, now “she questions whether she will survive.”11 Had she known this would be so sharp and tumultuous and perilous, maybe she would've asked Isaac to wind down his prayer spree sooner!
In her worries and perplexities, Rebekah could have resorted to the moon worship in which she was raised; but two decades with Isaac have taught her better.12 “She went to inquire of the LORD,” the true God (Genesis 25:22). With the old problem of barrenness, Isaac pleaded with God in Rebekah's very presence, and obtained at length an answer in deeds; with the new problem of pregnancy, Rebekah doesn't turn to Isaac but leaves his presence, and obtained promptly an answer but in words.13 Where'd she go? Did she hike to Salem to consult Melchizedek?14 Did she stop at Beer-lahai-roi to seek out Hagar's angel?15 Did she call out over one of Abraham's old altars?16 Genesis lets us wonder. But God speaks to Rebekah in her storm.
And the very first word of that divine message is this: “Two” (Genesis 25:23). Suddenly, things click into place – it isn't only one child into whom God has poured life in her womb; Rebekah is carrying twins. And twins, starting in the second trimester, begin to interact with each other, even more than they do their own bodies or the wall of the womb.17 As for her fierce discomfort, “the children struggled within her” – or, better translated, “the sons crushed each other in her innards” (Genesis 25:22). No wonder she hurts: had she an ultrasound machine, the screen would've displayed WrestleMania! But as God's words unfold, Rebekah can take heart. He doesn't halt the MMA match in her uterus, but he assures her that she and both these children will survive.
The details of what God says demand attention, since we “live... by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4). “Two nations are in your womb,” he begins, “and two peoples from your soft guts shall be separated.” This isn't just personal, it's social and political. “And people shall be stronger than people.” Even now, it's like they're in combat for supremacy, to see who will triumphantly claim the title of firstborn.18 Then, the twist: “The greater shall serve the lesser” (Genesis 25:23). At least, that's one way to read it. Or you could hear, “the greater, the lesser shall serve,”19 or maybe even, “greatly shall the lesser one toil.”20 For that matter, what do 'greater' and 'lesser' mean here – older and younger, bigger and littler, or something else?21
In pagan cultures, oracles could be notorious for their ambiguity – divine messages so wrapped in mist that the meaning couldn't be nailed down until after the fact, like when the Lydian king Croesus fought the Persian Empire after two oracles predicted that, if he did, he'd “destroy a great empire” – only for it to turn out that the empire they meant wasn't Persia's but his own.22 In the pagan world, such ambiguity served two purposes: as a trap for the overconfident, and to cover all contingencies. But when it comes to the things of God, this “built-in uncertainty” serves other aims.23 It veils the future, to “purposely conceal rather than reveal,” because, as Moses teaches, “the secret things belong to the LORD our God” (Deuteronomy 29:29).24 It invites us to exercise discernment, and maybe even to lend our hands. By the time Rebekah sees four infant eyes, she'll probably have an opinion about what it all means; as she raises them, she'll be informed by the prophecy as she understands it; and her influence may be how the word comes to fulfillment.25
But that word already had a meaning the moment she heard it. Malachi took it as a sign that God had chosen one of the twins but not the other (Malachi 1:2-3), a message many Jews took as meaning the unchosen brother was rejected by God.26 The Apostle Paul took Malachi as a lens for reading Rebekah's pregnancy (Romans 9:13), musing that God's choice was already made and shared mysteriously with the mom at a time when her kids “were not yet born and had done nothing good or bad” (Romans 9:11). So God's choice between them couldn't hinge on their deeds, since they didn't yet have any. It couldn't be explained by their heritage, because Rebekah “conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac” (Romans 9:10). We can't even blame their age, because even though one has to be born first, their conceptions are as simultaneous as can be.
So why had God spoken? “In order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works but because of him who calls” (Romans 9:12). “These things are recalled,” adds St. Augustine, “for the purpose of smashing and overturning the pride of persons who are unthankful for the grace of God and who dare to boast of their own merits.”27 It turns out that election isn't about heritage or effort or the designs of the stars, but depends “on God who shows mercy” (Romans 9:16), on the unaccountable recklessness of Divine Love pouring himself out hither and yon, in measures known only to eternity.28 God's sovereign mercy will make the difference between these twins, separating them from their shared womb, yet without injustice to either child – who, bear in mind, are both God's gift to their father's tenacity, since, as St. Gregory said, “predestination is fulfilled through prayer.”29 And if God elected one of two from the womb, know that God “chose us in [Christ] before the foundation of the world” (Ephesians 1:6). Yes, “God chose you as the firstfruits to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth” (2 Thessalonians 2:13). So “be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities, you will never fall” (2 Peter 1:10).
Rebekah's now endured the tightening turbulence, feeling as though the border of the Gaza Strip runs between her fallopian tubes. And, at last, “her days to give birth were completed,” and – as she's already deduced – “behold, there were twins in her womb” (Genesis 25:24). So picture the scene. Her water's broken. She's in her tent, in the pangs of labor. Isaac paces outside. Within, her experienced nurse Deborah acts as midwife, with Rebekah's maids as gofers and backups. She breathes, she pushes; Deborah sees the crowning head. A boy begins to emerge, though he might not take blue ribbon at a baby parade any time soon. He's beefy and ruddy, as if baked too long; more than fuzzy, his skin feels like he's fully clothed in furs. Had a modern doctor been on the scene, he might've diagnosed the tyke with congenital hypertrichosis.30 But this is the firstborn of Isaac, and the first to open Rebekah's womb. Looking back, they'll name him Esau, maybe “the mantled one.”31
But though Rebekah pushes and pushes, Esau can't get all the way out. His leg's stuck. Soon, Deborah realizes why. The membranes separating the boys had both popped; Esau's leg had been pressed to another face, and that child's hand had gripped Esau's ankle with a potent grasping reflex. It was as though the second child were dragging his brother back; Deborah no doubt had to intervene to get Esau free. As the arm withdrew, Esau could be freed, and once his umbilical cord was severed, with nail marks on his heel to recall what happened, now the second twin could be delivered, smooth as butter.32 Esau's “brother came out, and his hand grasped the heel of Esau, so his name was called Jacob” (Genesis 25:26) – which literally cries out, 'May God protect him,' but which sounds a lot like the word 'heel,' not to mention 'to cheat.'33 His name foreshadows an ambition to get ahead by tripping others – a child “grasping, rivalrous, devious, supplanting, and most unbrotherly.”34
From womb to the light, God is showing a “historical blueprint” of things to come.35 Moses called the Edomites “the people of Esau, who live in Seir” (Deuteronomy 2:8) – 'Edom' means 'red,' due to the territory's red sandstone, and 'Seir' means 'hairy,' due to the hair-like brushwood on the hills, but Esau's birth foreshadows it. Israel itself was known as “Jacob” (Isaiah 2:6). So the crashing around in Rebekah's womb pointed to “the Edomite and Hebrew nations” living in fraternal unease.36 Little sooner had the Red Sea closed than Hebrews were singing how “now are the chiefs of Edom dismayed” (Exodus 15:15). Though Edom refused to let Israel through, Moab's hired prophet foresaw how “a star shall come out of Jacob” so that “Edom shall be dispossessed..., and one from Jacob shall exercise dominion and destroy the survivors of cities” (Numbers 24:17-19). Rebekah's hope and Balaam's oracle gained clarity in the days of David when, winning a victory, “throughout all Edom he put garrisons, and all the Edomites became David's servants” (1 Samuel 8:14). That wasn't the end of the story, not by a long shot; but more at another time.
As for the twins, the bouncing baby boys can't stay babies. “The boys grew,” we read, and as they mature, we see the very different people they're becoming. On the one hand, “Esau was a man skillful in the hunt, a man of the field” (Genesis 25:27). He's plainly “an outdoorsy sort of man,” a country boy, a blue-collar fellow, who today would sport his camo and hunting vest and keep his NRA membership card in his back pocket while “running about through the woodlands.”37 Esau is strong. Esau is brawny. Esau is a man's man. He's not at all squeamish about his hunting trips with bow and arrow, or the game he brings home to mom and pop.
Jacob isn't much like Esau. Genesis pictures him “dwelling in tents” (Genesis 25:27). Maybe you could call him “a home-lover,”38 “a man who naturally preferred to stay at home.”39 If Esau's outdoorsy, Jacob's indoorsy. If Esau's blue-collar, Jacob's white-collar. If Esau's a barbarian, Jacob's civilized.40 Early Jewish readers read into Bible that Jacob, unlike Esau, learned how to read and write.41 They took the tents as schools, saying Jacob “attended the house of study” and “dwelt in the schoolhouses” to become “perfect in every good work.”42 Genesis describes Jacob as maybe a 'blameless man,' or 'quiet man,' or 'mild man.' It's unsure what's meant, but he's like Job in being 100% committed – to what, we'll have to wait and see.43
The word 'love' has shown up in the Bible twice so far; now it gets doubled to four. “Isaac loved Esau, because his game was in his mouth, and Rebekah loved Jacob” (Genesis 25:28). Remember, when first these would-be parents met, where was Isaac? Out wandering and meditating “in the field” (Genesis 24:63). Where'd he then take Rebekah? “Into the tent” (Genesis 24:67). Isaac likes the field, and favors the son who does the same; Rebekah is placed in the tent, and favors the son who stays close to there.44 But we've noticed that Rebekah is energetic and forward, while Isaac is more retiring and passive. Isaac loves the field, but he's no hunter. What he sees in Esau is a son who melds his own love of the outdoors with the vital energy he so admires in Rebekah, and they make him proud; Esau feeds him what he can't feed himself. Rebekah sees in Jacob a son who brings into her domain the contemplative mindset she's come to appreciate in Isaac, a son who needs her and whom she can protect and keep close, whose outlook she approves.45
None of this is to say Isaac wishes Jacob weren't around, or that Rebekah turns up her nose at Esau – far from it! But the Bible lays bare how each parent forms a special attachment and alliance with exactly one of their two twin sons, each openly giving that son preferential treatment over the other.46 It's our first clear case study in this family dynamic, one Genesis will unpack over generations, and bear out the New Testament observation that “where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice” (James 3:16).
Beyond the family dynamic, Genesis calls us to respond to Jacob and Esau here as characters. It's easy for us to have a great admiration for outdoorsy, extroverted, athletic people like Esau and their perceived virtues; but we might stretch it into a disdain, be it quiet or vocal, toward indoorsy, introverted, studious people and their perceived vices: “Oh, Esau's such a go-getter, so strong and vibrant, nothing like that soft layabout Jacob and his wussy life; what a shame Jacob won't cut the apron strings, get a real job, and bring home some bacon.” Or we could go the other way around: “Oh, Jacob's so bright and well-spoken – nothing like that boorish, unkempt Esau who never got hooked on phonics; what a shame Esau plays all day and won't get buckle down to brass tacks – or take a shower.” Maybe, like Isaac, you find yourself esteeming the Esaus of the world or your house. Or, like Rebekah, maybe you've got a fondness for the Jacobs. But we haven't gotten to the moral qualities of these men; their inclinations, interests, and careers aren't that. It isn't better or worse to be a man of the field than a dweller of the tent. The brothers each “followed their natural predilection” – and that's okay.47
But these natural predilections bring us to a specific day in young adulthood when each makes a choice. Esau's been out hunting in the woods, but for all his skill, today he's got little to show for it. Maybe the animals have seasonally migrated, or maybe it's a string of bad luck, or maybe the famine that'll kick off chapter 26 has begun already.48 Either way, Esau stumbles from the field to the tents, whether that means the family camp or, more likely, Jacob's tent pitched among the shepherds with the flocks.49 Esau's worn out by a hard day's labor. He'd reckoned he'd have fresh meat by now, but he doesn't. His stomach thunders. His mouth is dry. His passions are alarmed. He feels faint. Then he sees his little brother, tending a bubbling pot over a fire pit (Genesis 25:29). Esau sniffs at the air as steam ascends to his nostrils; he starts salivating. Peering into the pot, he can't make out ingredients, just the color of the surface – a delightful red, by far his favorite color. It reminds him of the blood flowing satisfyingly from where his arrows hit their marks. Maybe that's what's in there, a nice blood broth.50 The stew smells hearty; maybe the pot's hiding what's left of his last catch.51 Esau craves it.
So he says to his brother, “Feed me now some of the red... this red... – I'm faint!” (Genesis 25:30). Esau's not as eloquent as others in the Bible; his language here is “uncouth and abrasive.”52 He stumbles and stammers as he describes the dish, not by its substance, but by its accidents his eyes apprehend. He says only the color, being “so inarticulate that he cannot name the food that Jacob is cooking.”53 And when he demands to be fed, he uses the word, not for a human eating, but for an animal chowing down. He wants to gulp down the red stuff like the predatory lion tears raw meat, a phrasing that hints at Esau's “animal-like lack of self-command.”54
Jacob could – and would, we'd expect – just see his brother's need and have mercy on him. Moses says it's a sign of a cursed age when a man would “begrudge food to his brother” (Deuteronomy 28:54). Solomon says that even if it's your worst enemy who's hungry, “give him bread to eat... and water to drink” (Proverbs 25:21). But Jacob's not really a mercy type of guy. He is, however, a young man who, ever since his infancy, has been grasping after what Esau has: the position of firstborn, to say nothing of a father's approval. Jacob may not be a physical go-getter, but he's deeply and quietly ambitious. He's been watching and waiting through these years for an opportunity, a chance he might just have something Esau wants.55 Say what else you want about Jacob, but he “can wait, postpone gratification, and think of the future.”56 And now the time has come. Earlier, we read that Esau was a skilled hunter, but today he looks inept; we read Jacob as a simple man without guile, but today he shows himself shrewd as a serpent.57 Ironically, now Jacob's the skilled hunter, who craftily uses food as bait to lure and catch his prey – his brother.58 Maybe later, when journalists interview Jacob's neighbors, they'll all say, “I never would've expected this; he always seemed so quiet.”
So what is it Esau has and Jacob wants? What we read as 'birthright' is, more literally, the status of firstborn. In their world, to be firstborn in any family was a very honored position, one of respect and prestige; it meant you symbolized your father's strength, “preeminent in dignity and preeminent in power” (Genesis 49:3). It came with rights and responsibilities. At the father's death, the firstborn by default got a double share of inheritance; since Isaac's got just two boys, the difference between birthright and no birthright is a full third of the family estate. Also, the firstborn would naturally assume leadership of the clan and exercise authority over his brethren – so Esau's birthright suggests his future supremacy over Jacob. Not just that, but the firstborn often acted in a priestly capacity in the domestic circle, which is why the firstborn of the people were consecrated and would've been priests if the Levites hadn't been substituted for them (Numbers 3:12-13).59 Jacob wants all that.
Thus, when Esau demands whatever's red in that pot, approaching the matter like an animal growling at a dish, Jacob turns to the civilized domains of law and commerce: “Sell me, as of this day, your birthright” (Genesis 25:31).60 It sounds absurd. To trade away, at minimum, a third of the family fortune for a single bowl of soup? Get real! But listen to Esau. “Esau said, 'Behold, I'm on the way to death; of what use is a birthright to me?'” (Genesis 25:32). There are two ways to take what he's saying. One is that he's so weak of hunger right now that he thinks his life is in danger if he doesn't eat immediately.61 The other is that Esau lives such a dangerous life as an archery hunter in the woods that he's got no confidence he'll outlive his dad anyway.62
Now, if Esau means the second, then we already see a problem: he doesn't believe in the promise, doesn't get what God said to Rebekah. If he means the first, then a bowl of stew wouldn't be enough to save him; plus, his later behavior puts the lie to any claim to be starving. Esau might be exhausted, might be very hungry, but he's in no mortal danger here.63 Esau has just inherited his mom's dramatic flair (cf. Genesis 25:22). But he's faint enough, hungry enough, that the mysterious redness in the bowl has a mesmerizing power over him, reaching through his eyes and stomach to his soul, drawing him magnetically in. He's willing to deal.
Jacob has a suspicion, though, that Esau will have regrets once the moment's passed and he's forgotten the taste of his mouth and the fullness of his belly, which comes and goes. The benefit of hindsight will make the whole transaction seem like a bad joke. So if Jacob wants to leverage this to a lasting advantage, all sales must be final. That's why he demands Esau swear an oath as part of the transaction. And Esau raises no objection. “He swore to him and sold his birthright to Jacob” (Genesis 25:33).
Then “Jacob gave Esau bread and a stew of lentils” – that's what was in the pot: not blood, not meat, but some porridge of red lentils and grains, a common dish rich in proteins and carbohydrates.64 As for Esau, we now get a rapid-fire series of five verbs to close out the chapter, recreating for us a “chilling, sullen atmosphere”:65 “And he ate and he drank and he rose and he went and he despised – (Esau did) – the birthright” (Genesis 25:34). Esau sold off the most precious thing he had, greedily wolfed down some food and drink, then worldlessly lumbered away without a moment's reflection. He just did not care.
And here's where our natural sympathy for Esau has to break down, and our skepticism of Jacob's own conduct might even begin to lessen. After all, Jacob might've reasoned, if Esau can be tempted that easily to give up his standing as firstborn, then how could he fulfill the role's responsibilities? “It is incumbent upon every priest... that he should not be... satisfied by the eating of bread” and stew.66 In this light, Jacob didn't so much buy the birthright – Genesis says Esau sold, not that Jacob bought – as Jacob “redeemed from an unjust possessor something that was owed to him” instead, by the prophetic decree of the Almighty.67 In fact, some early Christians read Jacob's ambitious maneuvering as actually an act of faith, a display of how strongly he trusted in the truth of the prophecy spoken before he was born.68 By faith, Jacob claimed the birthright.
There's not as much, in the end, to be said for Esau. The New Testament barely mentions him, but when it does, it's as an example here of who not to be. “See to it that there be among you... no fornicator or profane person like Esau, who for a single meal sold his birthright” (Hebrews 12:16). What has Esau done wrong? First, in not caring about what he was given from birth, Esau displayed his “ingratitude,” being “unappreciative of the precedence given him by nature itself.”69 Second, Esau shows that his view of the world was distorted by lack of self-control and forethought. Esau comes across here as utterly “controlled by his bodily desires,” like any animal can be but as it's gloriously human to not be.70 Esau shows us a sad glimpse into “unrestrained greed,”71 and was held up as a warning that “those who do not govern their own selves are worthless in judgment”72 – that you can't make good decisions or even form good opinions if you don't make any effort to be well-ordered within, to control your lower self by your higher.
Third, in his great impatience, “Esau put lower things before higher,”73 “counting the fullness of his stomach to be more important than his own dignity, for which he cared nothing..., accounting momentary enjoyment as more excellent” than “the glory that was laid up for him.”74 Esau “sells his eternal inheritance for a bit of food,”75 opting for “momentary pleasures... even at the expense of future material or spiritual privilege.”76 His body weighs more to him than his soul. The present has a reality to him that the future can't. Esau illustrates “the ultimate inversion of proper values.”77 He gets life woefully backwards, “for the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Romans 14:17).
And fourth, as some ancient Jewish readers saw, Esau's assumption that his allegedly impending death would render irrelevant his birthright – the birthright that came with such great promises – was effectively a rejection of eternity. In this act, Esau implicitly “denied the life of the world to come.”78 It's little wonder that, mired in disbelief, his answer to Jacob boils down to, “Eat and drink, for tomorrow we die” (Isaiah 22:13).79 Esau is just fundamentally disinterested in what comes after his span on earth, whether that means his legacy on earth or his own fate beyond earth.80 It never occurs to him that it'll be through the chosen brother that will pass a line leading to the ultimate Seed of Abraham: the Messiah; and so, by surrendering so cheaply the birthright of this chosen family, Esau has renounced the prospect that he could have the matchless spiritual honor of serving the world by becoming a forefather of Jesus Christ. Instead, he'll be father the likes of Doeg, Haman, and Herod.
Esau isn't disinherited, as Ishmael was, but he's lost something incredibly precious and missed out in a way few others ever could. But now the author of Hebrews pokes us in the ribs and says through gritted teeth, “And how about you?” If, as we heard last week, Rebekah might stand allegorically for the Church, then there's a reading, among others, where Jacob and Esau show us two types of Christians: those who set their hearts on eternity, and those who don't. For “in the Church..., both good and bad people are found, two people struggling as in the womb of the spiritual Rebecca,” wrestling “in the womb of the Church until judgment day.”81 It would be such a relief if Christians all lived up to their parentage, if we all exemplified discipleship. But we don't. There are people in the Church who make their own the mind of Christ, and those who cling to their own.
So Esau stands here, lentils dotting his beard, as a warning to “the carnal ones among the people of God” now as then,82 to Christians who, despite being in Christ, “are still of the flesh” (1 Corinthians 3:3), Christians who fail to “abstain from the passions of the flesh” (1 Peter 2:11). These are “those in the Church who are slaves to temporary pleasures and satisfactions,” who “are materialistic in life, materialistic in faith, materialistic in hope, materialistic in love.”83 Of such, it might be said, to borrow the Apostle's words, that “their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things” (Philippians 3:19).
Esau “bought permanent regret at the price of a moment's pleasure.”84 What better statement is there to sum up what it means, as a Christian, to turn back to sin? Ours is a precious birthright, this grace of God that makes us alive; but do we sell it for a meal here, a thrill there, an easier hour now and again? “Are we, like Esau, so taken with this world's offerings that we 'despise' God's promises in Jesus?”85 May we not be immoral, not be profane, not be so shortsighted and contemptuous of grace! “Let us learn the lesson never to neglect the gifts of God, nor forfeit important things for worthless trifles.”86 For “the grace of God has appeared..., training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior” (Titus 2:11-13).
1 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 49.6, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 87:45.
2 O. Palmer Robertson, The Genesis of Sex: Sexual Relationships in the First Book of the Bible (Presbyterian & Reformed Publishing, 2002), 14; James McKeown, Genesis (Eerdmans, 2008), 127.
3 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 49.5, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 87:44.
4 Leon R. Kass, The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis (Free Press, 2003), 378.
5 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 49.12, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 87:48.
6 Chad Bird, Limping with God: Jacob and the Old Testament Guide to Messy Discipleship (1517 Publishing, 2022), 7.
7 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 49.4, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 87:44.
8 Ambrose of Milan, Isaac, or the Soul 4.18, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 65:23.
9 Chad Bird, Limping with God: Jacob and the Old Testament Guide to Messy Discipleship (1517 Publishing, 2022), 10.
10 Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis (Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 179.
11 Bill T. Arnold, Genesis (Cambridge University Press, 2009), 232.
12 Shaul Bar, Daily Life of the Patriarchs: The Way It Was (Peter Lang, 2015), 62.
13 Zvi Grumet, Genesis: From Creation to Covenant (Maggid Books, 2017), 269, 283.
14 Ephrem the Syrian, Commentary on Genesis 11.2.2, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 91:151; Targum Neofiti Genesis 25:22, in Aramaic Bible 1A:129; Cave of Treasures 31.6, in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures 1:563.
15 Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis (Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 169; Shaul Bar, Daily Life of the Patriarchs: The Way It Was (Peter Lang, 2015), 62.
16 Augustine of Hippo, Questions on the Heptateuch 1.72, in The Works of St. Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century I/14:42; Theodoret of Cyrus, Questions on Genesis 77, in Library of Early Christianity 1:159.
17 Umberto Castiello et al., “Wired to Be Social: The Ontogeny of Human Interaction,” PloS ONE 5/10 (October 2010): e13199.
18 Elie Assis, Identity in Conflict: The Struggle between Esau and Jacob, Edom and Israel (Eisenbrauns, 2016), 23.
19 David W. Cotter, Genesis (Liturgical Press, 2003), 188-189; John E. Anderson, Jacob and the Divine Trickster: A Theology of Deception and YHWH's Fidelity to the Ancestral Promise in the Jacob Cycle (Eisenbrauns, 2011), 63-65.
20 Zvi Grumet, Genesis: From Creation to Covenant (Maggid Books, 2017), 284.
21 John E. Anderson, Jacob and the Divine Trickster: A Theology of Deception and YHWH's Fidelity to the Ancestral Promise in the Jacob Cycle (Eisenbrauns, 2011), 62-63.
22 Herodotus, Histories 1.53, 75, 90-91, in Pamela Mensch, tr., Herodotus: The Histories (Hackett Publishing, 2014), 22, 32, 39-40.
23 Chad Bird, Limping with God: Jacob and the Old Testament Guide to Messy Discipleship (1517 Publishing, 2022), 11.
24 John E. Anderson, Jacob and the Divine Trickster: A Theology of Deception and YHWH's Fidelity to the Ancestral Promise in the Jacob Cycle (Eisenbrauns, 2011), 56.
25 Zvi Grumet, Genesis: From Creation to Covenant (Maggid Books, 2017), 285-286.
26 4 Ezra 3:16, in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha 1:528.
27 Augustine of Hippo, Miscellany of Questions in Response to Simplician 1.2.3, in The Works of St. Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century I/12:187.
28 R. R. Reno, Genesis (Brazos Press, 2010), 221-222.
29 Gregory the Great, Dialogues 1.8, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 39:33.
30 Charles M. Phillips, “The Hypertrichosis of Esau,” JAMA Dermatology 152/5 (2016): 592.
31 Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis (Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 180; Brian Neil Peterson, Genesis: A Pentecostal Commentary (Brill, 2022), 224.
32 John Makujina, “'Behold, There Were Twins in Her Womb' (Gen. 25:24-26; 38:27-30): Medical Science and the Twin Births in Genesis,” Tyndale Bulletin 68/1 (2017): 45-49.
33 Iain W. Provan, Seriously Dangerous Religion: What the Old Testament Really Says and Why It Matters (Baylor University Press, 2014), 184.
34 Leon R. Kass, The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis (Free Press, 2003), 407.
35 Elie Assis, Identity in Conflict: The Struggle between Esau and Jacob, Edom and Israel (Eisenbrauns, 2016), 22.
36 Ephrem the Syrian, Commentary on Genesis 23.1, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 91:171.
37 David W. Cotter, Genesis (Liturgical Press, 2003), 187; Peter Damian, Letter 39.6, in Fathers of the Church: Medieval Continuation 2:103.
38 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 50.5, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 87:52.
39 Cyril of Alexandria, Glaphyra on the Pentateuch 3.4.3, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 137:172.
40 Bill T. Arnold, Genesis (Cambridge University Press, 2009), 232; Ronald Hendel, “Politics and Poetics in the Ancestral Narratives,” in Mark G. Brett and Jakob Wöhrle, eds., The Politics of the Ancestors: Exegetical and Historical Perspectives on Genesis 12-36 (Mohr Siebeck, 2018), 25.
41 Jubilees 19:14, in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha 2:92.
42 Targum Onqelos Genesis 25:27, in Aramaic Bible 6:94; Targum Neofiti Genesis 25:27, in Aramaic Bible 1A:129-130.
43 Philip H. Kern, Jacob's Story as Christian Scripture (Cascade Books, 2021), 3.
44 Israel Jacob Yuval, Two Nations in Your Womb: Perceptions of Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages (University of California Press, 2006), 6-7.
45 Leon R. Kass, The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis (Free Press, 2003), 383; Zvi Grumet, Genesis: From Creation to Covenant (Maggid Books, 2017), 270-271.
46 Bill T. Arnold, Genesis (Cambridge University Press, 2009), 233.
47 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 50.6, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 87:52.
48 Jubilees 24:2, in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha 2:102.
49 Cynthia Shafer-Elliott, Food in Ancient Judah: Domestic Cooking in the Time of the Hebrew Bible (Equinox, 2013), 152.
50 Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis (Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 181.
51 John Goldingay, Genesis (Baker Academic, 2020), 411.
52 Bill T. Arnold, Genesis (Cambridge University Press, 2009), 233.
53 Ronald Hendel, “Politics and Poetics in the Ancestral Narratives,” in Mark G. Brett and Jakob Wöhrle, eds., The Politics of the Ancestors: Exegetical and Historical Perspectives on Genesis 12-36 (Mohr Siebeck, 2018), 26.
54 Leon R. Kass, The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis (Free Press, 2003), 409; cf. Brian Neil Peterson, Genesis: A Pentecostal Commentary (Brill, 2022), 225.
55 Zvi Grumet, Genesis: From Creation to Covenant (Maggid Books, 2017), 293.
56 David W. Cotter, Genesis (Liturgical Press, 2003), 191.
57 Leon R. Kass, The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis (Free Press, 2003), 382-383.
58 John E. Anderson, Jacob and the Divine Trickster: A Theology of Deception and YHWH's Fidelity to the Ancestral Promise in the Jacob Cycle (Eisenbrauns, 2011), 72.
59 Philip H. Kern, Jacob's Story as Christian Scripture (Cascade Books, 2021), 5.
60 Ronald Hendel, “Politics and Poetics in the Ancestral Narratives,” in Mark G. Brett and Jakob Wöhrle, eds., The Politics of the Ancestors: Exegetical and Historical Perspectives on Genesis 12-36 (Mohr Siebeck, 2018), 26-27.
61 Matthew R. Schlimm, From Fratricide to Forgiveness: The Language and Ethics of Anger in Genesis (Eisenbrauns, 2011), 165-166.
62 Zvi Grumet, Genesis: From Creation to Covenant (Maggid Books, 2017), 291.
63 Philip H. Kern, Jacob's Story as Christian Scripture (Cascade Books, 2021), 4.
64 Cynthia Shafer-Elliott, Food in Ancient Judah: Domestic Cooking in the Time of the Hebrew Bible (Equinox, 2013), 154.
65 Nahum M. Sarna, Genesis (Jewish Publication Society, 1989), 182.
66 Testament of Isaac 4:41, in Old Testament Pseudepigrapha 1:908.
67 Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Hebrews §692, in The Works of St. Thomas Aquinas 41:298.
68 Ephrem the Syrian, Commentary on Genesis 23.2, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 91:171.
69 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 50.6, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 87:53.
70 R. R. Reno, Genesis (Brazos Press, 2010), 222.
71 Augustine of Hippo, The City of God 16.37, in The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century I/7:227.
72 Ambrose of Milan, Jacob and the Happy Life 1.2 §6, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 65:123.
73 Cyprian of Carthage, On the Good of Patience 19, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 36:281.
74 Cyril of Alexandria, Glaphyra on the Pentateuch 3.4.3, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 137:172.
75 Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Hebrews §692, in The Works of St. Thomas Aquinas 41:298.
76 Shira Weiss, Ethical Ambiguity in the Hebrew Bible: Philosophical Analysis of Scriptural Narrative (Cambridge University Press, 2018), 111.
77 James W. Thompson, Hebrews (Baker Academic, 2008), 266.
78 Targum Neofiti Genesis 25:34, in Aramaic Bible 1A:130.
79 Leon R. Kass, The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis (Free Press, 2003), 411.
80 Elie Assis, Identity in Conflict: The Struggle between Esau and Jacob, Edom and Israel (Eisenbrauns, 2016), 23.
81 Caesarius of Arles, Sermon 86.2, 4, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 47:25, 28.
82 Augustine of Hippo, Questions on the Heptateuch 1.73, in The Works of St. Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century I/14:43.
83 Augustine of Hippo, Sermon 4.12, in The Works of St. Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century III/1:191-192.
84 Desiderius Erasmus, Paraphrase on Hebrews 12:16, in Collected Works of Erasmus 44:255.
85 Philip H. Kern, Jacob's Story as Christian Scripture (Cascade Books, 2021), 6.
86 John Chrysostom, Homilies on Genesis 50.7, in Fathers of the Church: A New Translation 87:53.
No comments:
Post a Comment