Rebekah, the wife of Isaac, was pregnant with twins. Thy struggled together in the womb. They looked differently and had different natures. Esau was hairy and was hunter. One might see that he considered himself “king of the beasts”.
Unlike him, Jacob was a tent-dweller. Perhaps rather than hunting wild beasts, Jacob grew domesticated animals. One was a hunter and the other a farmer of animals. When Isaac was on his deathbed, nearly blind, he desired that Esau serve him venison from the fields. Jacob beat him to it, acting as if he was Esau and served to Isaac savory goat.
Not only was Esau a hunter but a “cunning” one at that. In the Hebrew, he was “yada sayid”, or precisely “seeing the chase” indubitably as his! Perhaps his nature was arrogant. God had said to barren Rebekah that two sons would be born to her… that, “Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger” (Gen 25:23).
The manner of Esau was more like the beasts and Jacob’s the husbandman. Keep in mind that Holy Scripture refers to The LORD GOD as the “Husbandman” [i] and that God’s heirs up to that time had been the same: Adam, Abel, Noah, and even Abraham who was a migrant grower of animals. Even their appearances were different. Esau was hairy and Isaac plain.
Esau was Isaac’s heir by the law of primogeniture, as the firstborn, but Jacob would be heir because he was predestinated to be God’s chosen one. As a hunter, Esau’s nature was to kill. As the husbandman, the nature of Jacob would be to serve and preserve. Remember that Adam’s job was to “dress and keep the Garden”? [ii] His nature was to be the Husbandman in Paradise and that was what God chose Jacob to be.
But ask yourself? Just who was the cunning one? Three times it took for Jacob to relieve Esau of his birthright. Jacob first grabbed Esau’s heel in the womb. That was an attempt at being first to be born and heir by primogeniture. Esau came out first. He was legitimate heir by the law of the land. His appearance was red all over as if wearing a hairy coat. [iii]
After they began to grow, Jacob was a proud server of soup. He served red lentil soup to his brother, Esau, who then sold his birthright to Jacob because at that time Esau despised his birthright. [iv] Surely, he wanted to remain a hunter and not a husbandman like his father and brother.
All that was to identify the manner and nature of the miraculously born twins in that Rebekah was barren; not having the reproductive organs to produce. That did not stop God from serving two seeds in her womb and preserving them because serving and preserving are the nature of The Husbandman!
Esau had become “faint” from his hunting trip: to wit: “And Esau said to Jacob, ‘Feed me, I pray thee, with that same red pottage; for I am faint:’ therefore was his name called Edom” (Gen 25:30).
The name Esau means “doer, maker, or worker” (Abarim Publications). Hang onto that thought.
The name Edom means “to produce or be red” (Ibid). A related name to Edom is “Adam” — “red, from the soil, beginning” (ibid).
Jacob means, “He Who Closely Follows or Supplanter” and his new name, Israel, means, “he retains God or God Is upright” (ibid).
“Supplanting” is to supersede another. Jacob tried that in the womb and failed, but it worked when Edom traded to Israel his birthright. Of course, that right had to be blessed by Isaac, and to obtain that blessing, Rebekah and Jacob cunningly tricked Isaac for the blessing, or prosperity, to supplant his brother.
Jacob said that if he did such a thing, “I shall seem (be seen) to Isaac as a deceiver; and I shall bring a curse upon me, and not a blessing” (Gen 27:12). Isaac was blind, so seem is better translated that “seen”.
Be it said that even Jacob saw himself as a deceiver, even a cheater. The chicanery was for one thing: for Jacob to be the heir to Isaac and to God. The question, unanswered of course, is why did not God just bear Jacob first? The only thing that could possibly be is symbolism — the twins represent the transition from works (Esau) to righteousness with God (Israel). It is learned from the story of Cain and Abel that the works of Cain’s hand and his nature would not be enough. But Abel was the husbandman.
The story of Esau and Jacob is a repetition of the story of Cain and Abel. Even Esau was much like Cain and Jacob the very nature of Abel. Could that be because of parentage? Just who was Cain’s father? Cain was of the Wicked One. [v] Abel is called, “righteous Abel”. [vi]
In previous commentaries, I made the claim that Cain was fathered by Lucifer, and Abel by The LORD GOD. [1] Was that the same for Esau and Jacob, but this time Isaac fathered Esau and God Jacob, or did Lucifer again sneak in his seed unto the womb of Rebekah? Those things are not to know, but it is imperative to understand that Esau was of the nature of the Beast, and Jacob the nature of God.
The nation and person of Israel represents the Son of the Father: “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt” (Hos 11:1). Here, the seed of Israel, then the nation of Israelites, were called out of Egypt. God called the nation of Israelites, at the birth of the nation, His Son! With that said, those of the seed of Israel (Jacob) are meant to be sons of God. Note that Edomites were not God’s “Son”.
As the hunter in the field, Esau represents the Prince of the Power of the Air (Satan) and the field in which he hunted, the world. On the other hand, Israel (Jacob) was a plain (skinned) man who remained in his tent, [vii]
The word, “tent” in scripture implies so much. The “Tent” of God is the celestial sphere and also the Garden of Eden. The Tent of God later was the Tent of Meeting, or the Tabernacle wherein He lived during the exodus.
It is implied that Jacob, soon to be Israel, stood upright in God’s tent, although he crawled like his brother when in the womb of Rebekah, another of God’s “Tents.” Implied is that Esau was “the wanderer” like Cain whose name means just that, and Jacob like Abel who remained faithful under both the Canopy under the trees of God, and by then, upright Adam.
Sacred literature represents the twin birth as a supplanting of works by grace. It was a change of times. God would change the clock, so the speak — how time would be spent; not by hard work and fainting from fatigue, but merely standing upright with God in the Tent of God.
The futility of the works of Esau meant little because even though he worked hard for his father, the son that stayed near his father got the blessing. The same holds true to this day! Hard work counts for little, but who is the last man standing when the time comes.
With Dismus (the thief on the cross with Jesus), Christ asked him not what he had done in life, but knew where he stood at the moment. Dismus stood upright with Jesus. God held him upright. Dismus did nothing to save himself but looked at Jesus who promised salvation to Paradise that day.
Since the time that Jesus died, ergonomically speaking, all that anyone must do is stand upright and look at what Jesus is doing on their behalf.
Pilate’s washing of his hands symbolizes that water was not efficacious. He saw Jesus, but then tried to cleanse himself of the sin that he was doing! Any type of water is obedience. Pilate seemed to go with Jesus, and perhaps later he did, but it would be by faith, and not by water. Jacob stood upright with God with the Holy Spirit of God on him because he was to be God’s son.
Like Joshua long after, when he entered the Promise Land, he passed through the water on dry land and stood still, to ostensibly by wetted by Jesus. He was “born again” when he stood still, and perhaps was washed with the Holy Spirit. That was his “baptism of the Holy Ghost” of Jesus, whose name “Joshua” bears.
Of course, Jacob failed in the womb. Amniotic fluid would not suffice. He was “baptized” without water when Isaac transferred his purpose on to Jacob. Isaac was of God and Sarah. Jacob would have the same relationship as his spiritual father — of God and the woman Rebekah.
(picture credit: Pexels; "Silhouette of a man standing under a tree:)
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