Isaac: A House Divided

 

In our last episode, Isaac: Like Father, Like Son (from Genesis 26), we were given a brief glimpse into the adult life of Isaac.  Whereas the last half of Chapter 25 dealt with his genealogy and the birth of his sons, Esau and Jacob, Chapter 26 revealed that he was like his father, Abraham, in a number of ways, one being that he was…

…a man who was willing to sacrifice his wife’s safety in order to ensure his own.

However, we also learned that unlike his father—who was an Altar Builder—Isaac was…

A Farmer/Sower of Seed;
A Well-Digger; and,
A Man of Peace.

In this episode from Genesis 27, we will see how the dysfunctional dynamics of Isaac’s family lead to further conflict, and ultimately propel Jacob away from his home and on to his destiny.

 

Episode #3 of Biopic #2
Cast:  Narrator     Isaac     Rebekah     Esau     Jacob

 

 

Narrator:  Now it came to pass, when Isaac was old and his eyes were so dim that he could not see, that he called Esau his older son and said to him…

Isaac:  My son.

Esau:  Here I am.

Isaac:  Behold now, I am old. I do not know the day of my death.  Now therefore, please take your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt game for me.  And make me savory food, such as I love, and bring it to me that I may eat, that my soul may bless you before I die.

 

 

Narrator:  Now Rebekah was listening when Isaac spoke to Esau his son. And Esau went to the field to hunt game and to bring it.  So Rebekah spoke to Jacob her son, saying…

Rebekah:  Indeed I heard your father speak to Esau your brother, saying, ‘Bring me game and make savory food for me, that I may eat it and bless you in the presence of the LORD before my death.’  Now therefore, my son, obey my voice according to what I command you.  Go now to the flock and bring me from there two choice kids of the goats, and I will make savory food from them for your father, such as he loves.  Then you shall take it to your father, that he may eat it, and that he may bless you before his death.

Jacob:  Look, Esau my brother is a hairy man, and I am a smooth-skinned man.  Perhaps my father will feel me, and I shall seem to be a deceiver to him; and I shall bring a curse on myself and not a blessing.

Rebekah:  Let your curse be on me, my son; only obey my voice, and go, get them for me. 

Narrator:  And he went and got them and brought them to his mother, and his mother made savory food, such as his father loved.  Then Rebekah took the choice clothes of her elder son Esau, which were with her in the house, and put them on Jacob her younger son.  And she put the skins of the kids of the goats on his hands and on the smooth part of his neck.  Then she gave the savory food and the bread, which she had prepared, into the hand of her son Jacob.  So he went to his father and said…

Jacob:  My father.

Isaac:  Here I am. Who are you, my son?

Jacob:  I am Esau your firstborn; I have done just as you told me; please arise, sit and eat of my game, that your soul may bless me.

Isaac:  How is it that you have found it so quickly, my son?

Jacob:  Because the LORD your God brought it to me.

Isaac:  Please come near, that I may feel you, my son, whether you are really my son Esau or not.

Narrator:  So Jacob went near to Isaac his father, and he felt him and said…

Isaac:  The voice is Jacob’s voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau.

 

 

Narrator:  And he did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like his brother Esau’s hands; so he blessed him.  Then he said…

Isaac:  Are you really my son Esau?

Jacob:  I am.

Isaac:  Bring it near to me, and I will eat of my son’s game, so that my soul may bless you.

Narrator:  So he brought it near to him, and he ate; and he brought him wine, and he drank.  Then his father Isaac said to him…

Isaac:  Come near now and kiss me, my son.

Narrator:  And he came near and kissed him; and he smelled the smell of his clothing, and blessed him and said…​

​​Isaac:  Surely, the smell of my son is like the smell of a field which the LORD has blessed.  ​​Therefore may God give you of the dew of heaven, of the fatness of the earth, and plenty of grain and wine.  ​​Let peoples serve you, and nations bow down to you.  ​​Be master over your brethren, and let your mother’s sons bow down to you.  ​​Cursed be everyone who curses you, and blessed be those who bless you!

Narrator:  Now it happened, as soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, and Jacob had scarcely gone out from the presence of Isaac his father, that Esau his brother came in from his hunting.  He also had made savory food, and brought it to his father, and said to his father…

Esau:  Let my father arise and eat of his son’s game, that your soul may bless me.

Isaac:  Who are you?

Esau:  I am your son, your firstborn, Esau.

Narrator:  Then Isaac trembled exceedingly, and said…

Isaac:  Who? Where is the one who hunted game and brought it to me? I ate all of it before you came, and I have blessed him—and indeed he shall be blessed.

 

 

Narrator:  When Esau heard the words of his father, he cried with an exceedingly great and bitter cry, and said to his father…

Esau:  Bless me—me also, O my father!

Isaac:  Your brother came with deceit and has taken away your blessing.

Esau:  Is he not rightly named Jacob? For he has supplanted me these two times. He took away my birthright, and now look, he has taken away my blessing!  Have you not reserved a blessing for me?

Isaac:  Indeed I have made him your master, and all his brethren I have given to him as servants; with grain and wine I have sustained him. What shall I do now for you, my son?

Esau:  Have you only one blessing, my father? Bless me—me also, O my father!

Narrator:  And Esau lifted up his voice and wept.  Then Isaac his father answered and said to him…​

​​Isaac:  Behold, your dwelling shall be of the fatness of the earth, and of the dew of heaven from above.   ​​By your sword you shall live, and you shall serve your brother; and it shall come to pass, when you become restless, that you shall break his yoke from your neck.

Narrator:  So Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father blessed him, and Esau said in his heart…

Esau:  The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then I will kill my brother Jacob.

Narrator:  And the words of Esau her older son were told to Rebekah. So she sent and called Jacob her younger son, and said to him…

Rebekah:  Surely your brother Esau comforts himself concerning you by intending to kill you.  Now therefore, my son, obey my voice: arise, flee to my brother Laban in Haran.  And stay with him a few days, until your brother’s fury turns away, until your brother’s anger turns away from you, and he forgets what you have done to him; then I will send and bring you from there. Why should I be bereaved also of you both in one day?

 

 

Narrator:  And Rebekah said to Isaac…

Rebekah:  I am weary of my life because of the daughters of Heth; if Jacob takes a wife of the daughters of Heth, like these who are the daughters of the land, what good will my life be to me?

Narrator:  Then Isaac called Jacob and blessed him, and charged him, and said to him…

Isaac:  You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Padan Aram, to the house of Bethuel your mother’s father; and take yourself a wife from there of the daughters of Laban your mother’s brother.​

May God Almighty bless you, and make you fruitful and multiply you, that you may be an assembly of peoples; and give you the blessing of Abraham, to you and your descendants with you, that you may inherit the land in which you are a stranger, which God gave to Abraham.​

Narrator:  So Isaac sent Jacob away, and he went to Padan Aram, to Laban the son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, the mother of Jacob and Esau.

Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Padan Aram to take himself a wife from there, and that as he blessed him he gave him a charge, saying, ‘You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan,’ and that Jacob had obeyed his father and his mother and had gone to Padan Aram.  Also Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan did not please his father Isaac.  So Esau went to Ishmael and took Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, the sister of Nebajoth, to be his wife in addition to the wives he had.

And with that, the curtains close on this very dramatic episode.

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Our Review

 

For our review, let’s consider these all-important points in this episode—

Although we are not told exactly when this episode took place, it would seem that given the sense of immediacy under which Isaac was operating, his desire to bless Esau may have been prompted by the then recent event in which Jacob purchased of Esau’s birthright. He may have decided to bless Esau in order to prevent Jacob from getting his hands on that, too.  Timewise based upon other passages in scripture…

— Isaac would have been about 137 years old and, although he thought he could die at any time, he lived to the ripe old age of 180;
— Jacob and Esau would have been about 77 years old.

Although Isaac had served as a type of Christ back in Chapters 21, 22, and 24, he certainly was NOT doing that in this chapter. Instead of typifying the Spiritual Man, he seems more like the Carnal Man, one wholly given over to satisfying the desires of the flesh.  There are at least twenty references to those fleshly desires and in his encounter with Jacob, we can see how he is repeatedly duped as a result of his reliance upon his senses…

— His sense of sight failed—he was blind;
— His sense of smell failed—he thought the smell of Jacob’s garments meant that he was Esau;
— His sense of taste failed—he thought the goat was actually venison;
— His sense of touch failed—he thought Jacob’s hairy “arms” were Esau’s; and,
— His sense of hearing failed—for although he heard correctly, he didn’t trust what he heard.

Rebekah was listening—one explanation for this is that women were not allowed to be in the presence of men when they were conducting business; but it could also have been that Isaac was planning to bless Esau without Rebekah’s knowledge. Either way, when she overheard what Isaac was about to do, she sprang into action with a plan of her own.  Since her sons were then about 77 years old, that’s how long she had been waiting for the prophecy she had been given concerning Jacob to come to pass, and she was not about to let anything or anyone prevent that from happening.

I shall seem to be a deceiver—of course, we know that Jacob was a deceiver, however, the original word for this actually meant mocker, as if to suggest that if this plan was discovered, Jacob would appear to be mocking his father’s blindness.

Curse/let your curse be on me—Jacob feared that if the plan failed, he would be cursed by his father instead of being blessed; therefore, Rebekah assumed all responsibility for the outcome of their actions.

Made savory food/took the choice clothes/put the skins—all of this would have taken time, yet it would have been done under pressure because they had no idea when Esau would return.

When he appears before his father, Jacob demonstrates what an accomplished liar he is for he lies to his father five times when he says…

— I am Esau;
— I am your firstborn;
— I have done just as you told me;
— Eat of my game; and
— The Lord your God brought it to me.

The Blessing—In his blessing, Isaac bestowed upon Jacob…

— Unlimited prosperity and power;
— The fatness of the earth;
— Sovereignty over the nations;
— Lordship over his brethren; and,
— Divine protection.

Trembled exceedingly—at soon as Jacob left, Esau entered, only to find out that his blessing had been stolen. When Isaac realizes what has happened, his reaction is described by Hebrew scholars in the original language as Isaac trembled most excessively with a great trembling.

He cried with an exceedingly great and bitter cry—remember that when Esau sold his birthright to Jacob, there was no such lamentation. That could be because the birthright was all about being the spiritual head and leader/priest of the family.  Here, it seems that Esau was grief-stricken because the blessings of material wealth and power have been stolen from him.

Bless me also—in response, Isaac pronounces a sort of anti-blessing upon Esau.

I will kill my brother—Esau comforts himself by planning the death of his brother—which, if he is not executed for it, will leave him as the sole heir of his father’s vast wealth.

Flee to my brother Laban in Haran/because of the daughters of Heth—when Rebekah learns of Esau’s plan, she appeals to Isaac to send Jacob away to find a wife so that he won’t marry a Canaanite woman like Esau

Arise, go to Padan Aram—in sending Jacob away, Isaac confers upon him the blessings of the Abrahamic Covenant.

Esau saw—when Esau saw that Jacob was sent away, he may have reasoned that his marriages to two Canaanite women may have been the reason his father didn’t bless him—prompting him to seek a wife among the descendants of Ishmael. Esau just didn’t get it because…

But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. 1 Corinthians 2:14

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In Summary

 

What Life Lessons can we take away from this episode?

Probably the chief lesson to be learned from this episode can best be summed up in a quote attributed to the late Ravi Zacharias…

Sin will take you farther than you want to go, it will keep you longer than you want to stay, and it will cost you more than you want to pay.

This will certainly prove to be true, not only for Jacob but also for his mother, Rebekah. She may have thought that she had everything under control, that the hostilities between her sons would blow over quickly and her favorite would be able to come back to her soon. But there is no record of Jacob ever having seen his mother again meaning that she never got to meet his wives or see any of her grandchildren!

What Contributions does this episode make to God’s One Big Story of Redemption?

This episode serves to mark out another division between our characters, much like we have seen before in the story of Cain and Abel and Ishmael and Isaac—where the elder/rejected one is passed over for the younger/accepted one. In the case of Esau and Jacob, although they eventually come to peaceful terms, the seeds of hostility that were sown in this episode will continue germinate throughout the history of their descendants—with Edom, the nation that descends from Esau, proving to be one of Israel’s most hateful and enduring enemies.

How is God revealed in this particular episode?

In this episode, God remains strangely silent. At no point does He interrupt or intervene in the events taking place in this part of our story. It seems that He has given each of our characters over to their own choices and is patiently waiting while those choices move the story forward.

 

 

Some Questions to Ponder

— Although Jacob was a schemer and liar, why do you think God never scolded, rebuked, or criticized him for his choices/behavior?

— In what ways did Isaac fail in his role as head of the family?  What impact do you think that this had on his family and on our story?

— Why do you think Isaac favored Esau and Rebekah favored Jacob?

In our next episode, we will leave the very brief story of Isaac behind and travel with Jacob to the land of his come-uppance! So be sure to join us again then.

 

 

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