Jacob

The stories of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are our stories – the stories of our spiritual ancestors. I’m sure you have family stories about your siblings, parents, and possibly your great-grandparents, as well as other members of your extended family. We love these stories, and we tell them again and again, even though we know how they turn out. Why? Because stories reveal who we are; they are how we get to know each other. This is particularly true in the case of relatives who have died. As we tell their stories, they continue to speak to us.

Likewise, as we tell the stories about the patriarchs – Abraham, our father, Isaac and Jacob – we get to know our spiritual ancestors. There is however one important difference between telling the stories of our biological families and hearing the biblical stories. Family stories tell us about our ancestors; the biblical stories tell us about God. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is our God. This is what links the Old Testament and the New Testament. God’s cosmic plan of salvation is one great story, from the opening chapters of Genesis, which describe the beginning of all things, to the book of Revelation, which reveals the end of time, as we know it. And our lives – our little stories – are part of this one great story – the story of our redemption and release.

Today, we come to the third generation of the patriarchs – Jacob and Esau. This is the story of how Esau sold his birthright to Jacob for a pot of lentil stew.

Jacob and Esau were twins, born to Rebekah and Isaac in their old age. The Lord had promised Isaac and Rebekah that they would have children and that their descendants would become a great nation. But Isaac and Rebekah had a problem: Rebekah couldn’t get pregnant. And Isaac was getting old. He was 40 when he married Rebekah – 60 when the twins were born. So they waited 20 years. That is a long time to wait. Isaac’s mother and father, Sarah and Abraham, had to wait even longer. Sarah was ninety when Isaac was born. Through these experiences, this family had learned how to trust the Lord. He kept making promises – “I will make you a great nation…I will give you this land…In you, all the nations of the earth will be blessed” – and they kept having to wait. In this way, they learned that the Lord always comes through with his promises.

So, Isaac prayed and pleaded with the Lord that Rebekah would get pregnant. The Lord answered his prayer. In fact, Isaac got more than he asked for. At some point – probably late in the pregnancy – they realized that Rebekah was carrying twins.

It was a difficult pregnancy. The twins wrestled with each other while they were still in the womb – they “clashed together within her,”[1] as Genesis puts it. It was a preview of the struggle that the boys would have with each other after they were born, Perplexed and in anguish, Sarah went to the Lord and prayed: “Why is this happening to me? Why me?” And this is the answer she got. The Lord said:

A strange answer! To appreciate just how strange, you have to know something about the Hebrew traditions concerning the firstborn son. In ancient Israel, the first born had special privileges. He was the man, as we would say.

Nowadays, parents bend over backwards to be fair to all of their children. Whether or not they are successful is another question. If you ask most children, they would say that the other siblings get preferential treatment: She gets away with murder….You never let me do that when I was his age….He gets all the attention. Or the most painful of all: You love him more than you love me. These are powerful feelings, and they can shape you for a lifetime. Don’t you know adults who are still angry at their parents because one of the siblings got preferential treatment?

But in ancient Israel, primogeniture – the right of the firstborn – was a fact of life. And just in case anyone forget who was the man, there was a very concrete reminder – the inheritance. The firstborn received a greater share of the inheritance than the others. And we all know what can happen to families when there are disputes over the inheritance.

There was always a possibility that favoring of the firstborn would lead to conflicts and jealousies in families. But in the case of twins, the distinction between the elder and the younger must have seemed particularly arbitrary. They were conceived at the same time. The age difference was a matter of minutes – but what a difference a few minutes can make.

The day came for Rebekah to deliver. Two new lives were about to come into the world. When the first one came out, he had a ruddy complexion, and he was hairy all over – like he was wearing a hair shirt. So they called him Esau, and his nickname was Edom, which means “ruddy” in Hebrew.[2] When the other one came out, he was grasping his brother’s ankle. The wrestling match that had begun in utero continued as they came out of the womb. Because the second one was grasping his brother’s heel, they named him “Jacob,” which means “heel.”[3] It was an appropriate name. From the moment he was born, Jacob was grasping for things that did not belong to him. He was opportunist. So it was clear from the very beginning: this was going to be a stormy relationship.

Esau and Jacob grew up, and before long it was obvious that they were very different, even though they were twins. Esau was an outdoorsman – he loved to hunt, and he was good at it. Jacob was a homebody. And as so often happens, Jacob and Rebekah gravitated toward the child who was more like them temperamentally. Isaac loved Esau more, because he brought back game from his hunting trips. Rebekah loved Jacob more. Genesis does not tell us why she did, but I have a theory: she could see herself in him. Rebekah was a real manipulator – like Jacob. Her true stripes were revealed later when she tricked her husband, Isaac, into blessing Jacob instead of Esau. She was able to pull it off, because the old man was blind. But that’s another story.

One day, Jacob was in the tent, cooking – true to form. He was preparing lentil stew, which was dark red – ruddy, like Esau’s complexion. Esau came in from a hunting trip, and he was famished. He said: I’m starving – let me gulp down some of that red…that red stuff. Esau was pretty rough, and he was not the sharpest tool in the shed. He didn’t even know the word for “stew.” Esau lived by following his appetites, his cravings. He did not know the meaning of “delayed gratification” – short term denial for a long term good.

Jacob knew his brother’s weak point –as brothers do – and decided to seize the moment. “Sell your birthright – right now – to me.” Every word was carefully chosen. Esau thinks it over for a minute and says – partly to himself, partly to Jacob: “Here I am – about to die of starvation – what good to me is my birthright?” Jacob has him right where he wants him. But he has to get the signature on the dotted line. He says: Do you swear? – You’ve got to swear to me you’ll do it. So Esau swore. Jacob gave him some bread and lentil stew. Esau ate it, drank something, and left – just like that. He gave it all up for a bowl of lentil stew.

And that is how Esau sold his birthright to Jacob. It wasn’t until years later, when their father Isaac was about to die that he actually received the blessing of the firstborn. But it was here, when Esau sold his birthright, that the tables turned. Now, Jacob was the man. It was through Jacob that the Lord fulfilled the promise of the covenant.

Is this fair? Well, no, if the universe runs according to primogeniture. No, if we play by the standard rules. But the Lord does not play by our rules. He turns things upside down. The kingdom of God is an upside down kingdom. He uses connivers, like Jacob and Rebekah. He works out his purposes through messy family relationships. Through man’s confusion comes the providence of God.

If you had to choose between Esau and Jacob, which would you choose? Neither one is worthy of the blessing. Esau gives away his inheritance for a pot of lentil stew. How stupid is that? Jacob gets through life by grasping what does not belong to him. Later, he hoodwinks his father-in-law, Laban of all the best livestock. He even tries to grasp hold of God – he wrestles all night long with the angel of the Lord – and almost wins.

Neither one was worthy to carry on the family line. But worthiness is not what matters. What matters is the will of God. Before they did anything right or wrong, the Lord chose Jacob.

Here, we are face to face with the mystery of divine election: God chooses. The doctrine of election offends us – or should, if we really understand it. It is not fair. But the fact that God chooses is also good news. Karl Barth said that the doctrine of election is “the sum of the gospel.”[4] Why? Because it shows that our relationship with God based on divine grace, from beginning to end, and not on anything we do. This is good news, liberating news: Before we were born, before we did anything right or wrong, God chose us. If that is true, then nothing – nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus.

[1] Alter’s translation here and throughout, unless otherwise noted.

[2] “There is an odd displacement of etymology in the naming sentence, perhaps because the writer was not sure what ‘Esau’ actually meant. ‘Ruddy,’ ‘adom refers to another name for Esau, Edom (as in verse 30), and the ‘hairy’ component of the mantle simile, se ‘ar, refers to Edom’s territory, Seir.” Alter, 130.

[3] Ya aqob, “Jacob,” is similar to ‘aqeb, heel. “The grabbing of the heel by the younger twin becomes a kind of emblem of their future relationship…and invokes the struggle against primogeniture.” Ibid.

[4] “The doctrine of election is the sum of the Gospel because of all the words that can be said or heard it is the best: that God elects man; that God is for man, too, the One who loves in freedom.” CD II/2, p.3.