Jacob Part 5: Eden Springs in a Dry Land

Yitskhaq’s Conflict With Abimelech

Genesis 26:15–25 NASB95

15 Now all the wells which his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines stopped up by filling them with earth. 16 Then Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us, for you are too powerful for us.” 17 And Isaac departed from there and camped in the valley of Gerar, and settled there. 18 Then Isaac dug again the wells of water which had been dug in the days of his father Abraham, for the Philistines had stopped them up after the death of Abraham; and he gave them the same names which his father had given them. 19 But when Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found there a well of flowing water, 20 the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with the herdsmen of Isaac, saying, “The water is ours!” So he named the well Esek, because they contended with him. 21 Then they dug another well, and they quarreled over it too, so he named it Sitnah. 22 He moved away from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it; so he named it Rehoboth, for he said, “At last the Lord has made room for us, and we will be fruitful in the land.” 23 Then he went up from there to Beersheba. 24 The Lord appeared to him the same night and said, “I am the God of your father Abraham; Do not fear, for I am with you. I will bless you, and multiply your descendants, For the sake of My servant Abraham.” 25 So he built an altar there and called upon the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent there; and there Isaac’s servants dug a well.

"Now all of the wells that his father's servants had dug in the days of Avraham, his father, you know what the Philistines did?" They were envious. "They stopped them by filling them up with dust.

Abimelech said to Yitskhaq, 'Get out of here. Go away.

You are more powerful than us.' So Yitskhaq went from there and he camped in the wadi of Gerar, and he dwelled there." So he was in the city. So he leaves the city and he goes out.

Do you guys use the word "wadi"? it's a stream bed. But like in this climate, there are some regions there that only get rainfall in seasonal times of year. And so when it rains, it pours and it creates all these channels in the land. But six to eight months out of the year, they're dry. So we might say riverbed, streambeds? But usually they're deep, because it's like torrential storm waters carving out a path and then it's dry. So that's a wadi in the Bible.

My hunch is that he camps in a place that speaks of abundant water. But the fact that he can camp in it means that we're in a famine because there is no water. So it's a great symbol of the barren land, of the desolate, barren land. And there, in the midst of the barren land, God provides water.

So he goes and he camps in a dry streambed outside the city.

So Yitskhaq returned and, well, I guess I can't use my dad's wells anymore. Ooh, remember, what's happening in the climate?

Famine. So remember, naturally he's going to go like, "Okay, I can't be in the city here, can't go to my dad's wells because the Philistines stopped them up, I guess I'll just try and dig some new wells." Just dig in the ground, see what happens. "So he dug some wells of water," verse 18. "The ones that have been dug in the days of his father, Avraham, you know, the ones that the Philistines had stopped up after the death of Avraham, and he called them by their names. You know, the names that his father had called them." So we are in a time of famine. When the nations don't want us in the city, we'll go out to the dry, desolate land and trust that the water God provided for my dad God will provide again.

"So Yitskhaq's servants dug in that dry waterbed and they found there a well of mayim khayyim, water of life." Yeah.

But here's the thing. The herdsmen of the city, you know, they work for Abimelech.

"The herdsmen of Gerar, they quarreled with the herdsmen of Yitskhaq, saying, 'Nah, no, no, no, those waters, they belong to us.' And so Yitskhaq called the name of that well 'Eseq, contention, because they hit'assequ with him, they contended with him.

So they dug another well. And guess what? Yep, they fought over that one too. And so he called its name Satan," which means opposition.

"And he moved away from there and he dug another well, and they didn't quarrel over that one. And so he called the name of that one wide places, Rehoboth.

Because he said, 'Well, now Yahweh has widened a place for us so that we can be fruitful in this desert land in a time of famine.' So he went up from there to Be'er Shava'." Be'er Shava' is a compound word, it's the word "well," all these word for wells, with that word "well," and then sheva' is the Hebrew letters that spell the word "seven," but also the same Hebrew letters that spell the word "oath" or "promise."

"So he went up to the well of seven promise, seven oath, and Yahweh appeared to him that night, and said, 'I am the God of your father Avraham. Don't be afraid. I am with you. I will bless you. I will multiply your seed, your descendants for the sake of my servant Avraham.'" And so, you know, he's at the well of seven.

He just got a whole bunch of water. "So he built an altar, there by the well of blessing and seven.

And he called upon the name of Yahweh, he pitched a tent, and the servants of Yitskhaq dug a well." How you doing?

This is a great example of a narrative that seems so unnecessarily wordy.

You're just like, "Ah, how many wells do I really need to know about," you know?

What a story.

Sibling Rivalry and Blessing or Curse

So remember the previous paragraph was about the blessed one, deception, treachery, now being exiled from the city because of this hostility over who's the chosen one. The non-chosen is really angry. And now here are the two groups and they are fighting over resources and water. So God keeps showing favor on the chosen one, which keeps aggravating the jealousy of the non-chosen. And notice the repetitive nature of all, it's another well, and then another well, and then another well. It's as if the waters are rising.

The waters of conflict, yeah, are rising.

And that will have significance in what happens next. 

I think this narrative is now we're stepping into the Cain and Abel hostility, rivalry of the siblings.

In Genesis 3, the agent of deception is called the snake, or is described as a snake. In the Cain and Abel story, do you remember the one who wants Cain? "Its desire is for you, but you can master it." Remember what it was?

It was sin

Now here's a story of hostile nations.

There's three hostility narratives, and the central one, what's the name of the place?

Genesis 26:21 CSB

21 Then they dug another well and quarreled over that one also, so he named it Sitnah.

It's the word "satan."

So satan is not a name, it's a noun that describes somebody's posture to another person. So a satan is a hostile figure, one who is opposed. So this place is named Sitnah, opposition.

So is this the first time that the word "satan" is used in the Bible?

this is the first time the root occurs. 

So the noun "satan" in Hebrew is not a name of anybody. It can describe somebody who's in a hostile posture to another person. The Angel of Yahweh calls himself a satan when he stands opposed to Balaam riding on his donkey.

So it's a word used to describe opposition.

So notice that the digging of the wells in Abraham's day is then transitioned to the digging of the wells in Isaac's day. And this is another example of blessing in the middle of hostility. 

So just like you had in the previous story, you had God promised to bless treachery and deceit, God blesses and there's seed in the land. 

Now it's about blessing in the land, water in the dry and thirsty land surrounding the story of sibling rivalry or nations at odds with each other.

So yeah, what's going to happen here? How is God's blessing going to spread to the nations when the chosen one is a snake and when the non-chosen ones are envious in salvation, angry, and they resent the blessing on the chosen one? I mean, this is a recipe for disaster. Like, what are we going to do? 

That's the crisis being set up here.

Abraham and Lot

Can you think of another time where the shepherds and the herdsmen of the chosen one get into quarrels and arguing about abundance with the shepherds and herds of another person?

Lot and Abraham

So do you remember after Avram got rich off of his lying in Egypt and Pharaoh gives him all this stuff, donkeys and animals and all this. So Genesis 13 begins, Avram went up from Egypt with all that stuff that they got. I mean, dude, he was loaded now in livestock, silver, and gold, and so he went on his journeys.

Now here's the thing. Lot, well, you know, he hangs out with God's chosen one. So, like, he got rich too, And he's got flocks and herds and tents. And all of a sudden their abundance and blessing becomes unsustainable for the land. They have too much stuff. They cannot dwell together in unity. And so there was a quarrel between the herdsmen of Abraham and the herdsmen of Lot. 

It's the same exact vocabulary. The blessing leads to strife.

So Abraham said to Lot, "Oh, no, no, no, no, man, we shouldn't quarrel between me and you, between our herdsmen. We are brothers." Brothers shouldn't fight over who's chosen and who's not, right? Yes. And so what Abram does is say, "Listen, this is a big land and, you know, pick your spot." And so what Lot looks and he see is, "Ooh, this really nice city down there named Sodom, man, it's like the garden of Eden down there. I think I'll go hang out there." And it turns out to be the opposite of Eden.

And so Lot goes down there. So we're also echoing in the story of Isaac, we're echoing Cain and Abel, we're also echoing the strife of the brothers, with this herdsman of Gerar quarreling with the herdsman of Yitskhaq.

Reconciled Through Covenant

We've been taking the story of in Yitskhaq three steps, 'cause his story is divided up into three parts.

He was first the blessed deceiver, who experiences blessing even though he doesn't deserve it.

His blessing leads to tribal rivalries because God's providing living water for him in the middle of the wilderness, even though there's a satanic force at work creating rivalry and envy and angry among the brothers. 

And so here's Yitskhaq sitting in a stream bed with living water while everyone else is thirsty. 

How is this gonna resolve? God said, "I'm gonna bless the nations through you," but I don't see that happening right now.

Genesis 26:26–33 CSB

26 Now Abimelech came to him from Gerar with Ahuzzath his adviser and Phicol the commander of his army. 27 Isaac said to them, “Why have you come to me? You hated me and sent me away from you.” 28 They replied, “We have clearly seen how the Lord has been with you. We think there should be an oath between two parties—between us and you. Let us make a covenant with you: 29 You will not harm us, just as we have not harmed you but have done only what was good to you, sending you away in peace. You are now blessed by the Lord.” 30 So he prepared a banquet for them, and they ate and drank. 31 They got up early in the morning and swore an oath to each other. Isaac sent them on their way, and they left him in peace. 32 On that same day Isaac’s servants came to tell him about the well they had dug, saying to him, “We have found water!” 33 He called it Sheba. Therefore the name of the city is still Beer-sheba, today.

"So Abimelech came back to him from Gerar, he and his companion Ahuzzath, and Phicol the commander of his army."

So let's just pause, just think in terms of the narrative here. So you just got kicked out of the city and then you've just spent the last who knows how long, like quarreling with this guy's herdsmen looking for water and pasture out here. And you're the only one with water. And then this guy comes with an advisor and his army captain.

That's a little intimidating, you know, like, it doesn't seem like this is gonna go very well.

"So Yitskhaq said to them, 'Why are you guys coming out here? You guys hate me. You sent me away from you.' And they said, 'Listen, we can't deny the fact that Yahweh's with you.

So here's what we have to say. Let's make a covenant.

Let there be an oath-curse.'" There's all of these different Hebrew words for oaths and covenants and promises. 

So this is the word 'alah, it's when you say, may I be cursed if I do not do such and such for you. And may you be cursed if you don't do such and such. "

'So let there be an oath-curse between us, between you and us and you know, let's make a covenant with you, so that you don't do bad to us, 'cause listen, we haven't touched you, and we've actually done nothing to you but good.

We will send you away in peace because listen, right now you are the one who's blessed by Yahweh.' So he made them a feast and they ate and they drank."

You remember where they are?

They're at the well of seven. He lives at the well of seven. So here at the seven well, you know, by the tent that he pitched by the altar where he meets with Yahweh, they make a covenant here so that they can experience the blessing.

And there at the well of seven, the nations come together, yeah, with Yahweh's chosen one. And they have a great feast by the well, food and drink. "They got up early in the morning and they swore oaths each one to his brother.

And Yitskhaq sent them away, and they went away in shalom, peace.

Now that same day, Yitskhaq's servants came and they said, 'Man, we dug this well. And we found water.' And so he called it Shibah. And so the name of the city is Beersheba, the Well of the Oath, to this day."

We have talked about Beersheba a few times already. I am a big fan of Repetition to help us learn

https://sermons.logos.com/logos-media/1225450-18192879--

4:30 Video Beersheba Sermons by Logos, 2025.

Well, we certainly dodged ancient Near East World War I there.

Tribal Rivalry Reconciled Through Covenant

Just like after the flood, when God reconciled with violent humans through a covenant, here potentially violent humans reconcile through covenant.

Note: The seemingly random mention of “Phicol, commander of the army” ( Gen. 26:26) is a subtle recall of the “sons of elohim” and their violent warrior offspring, the Nephilim from Genesis 6:1-4. The sons of elohim can also be called “the army of the skies” (a.k.a. “the host of heaven,” see 1 Kgs. 22:19 and Job 1:6-8). Here in the Yitskhaq story, the presence of Phikol makes us think of the mutant warriors of Genesis 6:4, but only to twist our expectation. Now, the warriors come to make peace with God’s chosen one!

Just as Abimelech made peace with Abraham (about a disputed well!) through a covenant in Genesis 21:21-34, so now Abimelech makes a similar pact with Abraham’s son about disputed wells.

This story becomes a narrative image of how Yahweh wants to spread the Eden blessing out to the nations through his chosen family. It requires courageous honesty in his chosen one (Yitskhaq, who fails at first), and it requires an openness among the nations to receive God’s chosen one (Abimelech, who also fails at first). But both of these failures are reversed by the end of Genesis 26, and the nations reconcile and live in peace through the covenant at the Well of Seven!

The point: When God’s chosen one simply trusts the promise, they discover God’s life-giving blessing even in the midst of death and desert. When the nations acknowledge God’s chosen one, they find themselves included in the Eden blessing through the covenant!

Tim Mackie for BibleProject Classroom: Jacob (2021).

on one level it's a way of, at the birth of this guy's son who's a deceiver and you're thinking, oh man, how's this all gonna work out? Then you pause that story and be like, okay, I know the author says, I just made you really nervous. There's all these narrative tensions. 

Just think about this. And you get this story, and you think, okay, whatever's gonna happen, I think it's all gonna lead to the mountain with the nations coming together in peace at the well of seven, with blessing and shalom and a covenant. 

Picture of Ham and Shem making peace with each other.

 The Philistines come from Ham in Genesis 10. So this is a picture of Ham and Shem making peace with each other.

And those later narratives are ...

All of these battling nations in the Hebrew Bible all trace their genealogies back to a pretty small set of rival siblings. And so that's a great example where the Philistines can be this, they're like a Cain figure.

And sometimes they're at odds with the chosen ones and that usually doesn't end well, like Goliath loses his head.

But then you get Achish, who brings David and protects God's chosen one in Samuel and he experiences this blessing from that.

And you're like a Philistine? You know, they're synonymous with evil, you thought. But remember

when it comes to the rival siblings and chosen one. 

It's not good guys and bad guys. It's, man, how you respond in the moment will determine what seed you're a part of. Are you on the snake team or on the human team? And every generation can choose which side it's gonna participate in. 

this picture of what were rival tribes coming together in unity, but because of what God did through the chosen family of Abraham here. So in a way, this is the architecture of the whole biblical story.

And this is the story that Jesus saw himself within. 

So just for example, in Matthew chapter 10, Jesus has for, Matthew 4 all the way up through the Sermon on the Mount and then the 10 healing stories, Jesus is the main event announcing the Kingdom of God. 

In Matthew chapter 10, he pivots and he multiplies himself by 12.

Matthew 10:1–6 CSB

1 Summoning his twelve disciples, he gave them authority over unclean spirits, to drive them out and to heal every disease and sickness. 2 These are the names of the twelve apostles: First, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother; 3 Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; 4 Simon the Zealot, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed him. 5 Jesus sent out these twelve after giving them instructions: “Don’t take the road that leads to the Gentiles, and don’t enter any Samaritan town. 6 Instead, go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

And so he sends out the disciples. This is Matthew chapter 10. "Jesus summoned the 12 disciples and he gave them authority to rule over the beast, that is to rule over the Satan and his minions, to cast them out and to restore Eden to all of the broken and sick bodies."

So in other words, Jesus, he overcomes his test in the wilderness three times over. He confronts his snake in the wilderness, not in a garden, in a wilderness. 

And he overcomes it and he becomes the image of God who can rule the beast. 

And so the moment you've got a human who's like, oh man, this is an image of God. And he just goes around like spreading the life of Eden everywhere into all of these people's lives. 

And so this is what's crazy, is that he actually believes that his followers can like imitate that and actually become images of the image as it were, and rule over the beast and bring the life of Eden into places of disease and sickness. 

And so what's interesting is this is very located in the moment where Jesus is at after he instructs, after he sends out the 12, he instructs them and says,

"Listen, it's not time to go to the nations yet. Don't go to the Gentiles, don't even go to Samaria yet. Just go, it starts with the fam, it's a family business we gotta deal with here. Go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel."

So in this story, if the chosen family has itself become a snake, you need to deal with that so that you can get them on track so that they can become the vehicle and the promised vehicle of blessing to the nations. 

Paul's way of saying this is "To the Jew first and then to the Greek."

So Jesus's mission uniquely as Israel's Messiah was to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.

And you get the Canaanite woman who comes and is like, hey, can I have some crumbs? And Jesus is like, okay, cool. You know, and he heals her daughter, or you get the centurion. But for the most part, Jesus is on track. And so it, and he calls 12 of them and then he gives a thing like the Sermon on the Mount where he is like, "If your brother has anything against you and you're at the temple and you think you're in Eden worshiping, you're not in Eden because you've brought like your conflict into this place and it's gonna ruin the whole thing. 

So go reconcile with your brother, then you can come hang out at the temple."

And so Jesus has this idea that the way that this family is gonna spread blessing is through learning how to live together in unity.

And you can just follow this theme right on through the letters of Paul about the Jew and Gentile, the many becoming one, to become a mature human, to experience the life and the blessing of God.

So this is like a major, this isn't just like, oh, unity, wouldn't that be a cool thing?

It's like in these narratives, rival siblings, parents and children, brothers and sisters, wives and husbands, extended families and cousins, nephews and uncles, tribes, families, nation, at every level, the narratives are exploring this at every level. 

And it consistently paints pictures of Eden, of a restored Eden associated with people learning how to stop killing each other and how to work out their differences through covenant and to let the blessing flow from the anointed one to restore Eden.

So this is, the symbolism is very potent. But what it's talking about is like, I don't think there's ever been a generation of humans where this hasn't been like a desperate need.

And so we have our own version of it right now, but it's not like this is a new issue that people don't like each other, And that they kill each other over scarce resources. I think it's always been this way, but that doesn't prevent this God from surprising all of us with a bit of Eden in the wilderness,

and so this is powerful stuff.

Yeah, for the apostles, the primary place that we work this out is in the local gathering of Jesus' followers and learning how to endure each other. And it's also the most difficult place to discover the life of Eden. 

What this is actually about is about shaping of people who trust that this kind of thing is still possible in the world, and that the life of Eden can be experienced, that we can like participate in it in our actual like groups of people we know,

Yitskhaq and Abraham

we see how every part of his story has been mapped onto the story of his father Abraham.

This is a very clear narrative strategy that shows how the son’s life is a replay and twist on the story of the father’s life. Which makes us wonder about Yitskhaq’s sons. Will they also replay the story of their father’s failures and successes?

Abraham had conflict with Lot, Pharaoh, and Abimelech.

Yitskhaq has conflict with Abimelech that is resolved through covenant.

Yaaqov will have conflict with Esau.

Yaaqov and his descendants will also have a conflict with Pharaoh.

Rebekah’s Plan to Deceive Isaac

We just finished walking through This story, and it was the story of how the son of Avraham imitates the deception of his father, Avraham, in deceiving foreign kings, and potentially bringing curse and disaster on the nations instead of blessing. 

And so remember, in our macro design of the Yaaqov story, it's in three big parts. And we begin by hearing the little twin part story of the birth of the twins, pun not intended, but now intended. And the birth of the twins and the first deception story. Of Yaaqov deceiving his brother.

And that's gonna be matched on the other side by a really long story of Yaaqov deceiving his father and his brother. And in the middle of that was the story of the father, Yaaqov's dad. 

just for a moment, consider how this works. You would think that you would tell Yitskhaq's story, then tell the story of the birth of the twins, and just go on, but instead, it's been wrapped in this nice little three-part package, where you hear about the deception of the son, Yaaqov. And you're like, "Man, where'd that guy learn to behave like that?" And then you see the story of the dad. 

You're like, "I see, I get it." And then where did Yaaqov's dad learn how to behave like that? 

Well, you know, he's replaying what his father Avraham did. 

So it's this meditation on the children replaying and intensifying the failures of their ancestors. 

But it's like this delayed explanation where you get Yaaqov's birth and you find out what kind of person he is. And only then do you learn, like, the backstory of why he ended, why he is that way. And then you go back to the story of Yaaqov again. 

These two stories of familial deception and treachery, that's the outer frame. 

And what we're gonna do in this session, actually the next few sessions, is consider this very long part. We call it Genesis 27:34 to 28:9. But this is a really tightly bound literary unit that brings to a culmination this first part of all of these deceptions within deceptions.

Yaaqov's Deceives His Brother and Father

This large section has three parts of unequal length, but there is a clear organization of the parts based on repeated words and the plot. (The chart below is adapted from Andrew Teeter, “Genesis Class Notes” and from the principles in his essay, " Biblical Symmetry and Its Modern Detractors," a paper delivered at the 2019 International Organization for the Study of the Old Testament.)

This section begins with the very short little narrative about Esau marrying these two wives from outside the family, from the clan of the Hittites. And because you really love the genealogies in Genesis, you know that the Hittites come from Ham, son of Noah, whereas Esau comes from the line of Shem, and from Avraham. 

So there's something that seems off with that, certainly in the eyes of Esau's mom who can't stand his Hittite wives. And actually that's what becomes the topic of the conclusion of this scene, is about how Esau realizes that his parents can't stand these wives. And so he goes to another extended member of the family, Ishmael's clan, and he marries a woman from that clan. So that's the frame around this section. And inside of that frame are two tales of plans, ill-advised plans, and counterplans and deceptions. And just look at how these parts work here. First, Yitskhaq comes up with this great idea of, "Wow, I'm hungry and I can't see very well.

I know, I think I probably might be dying, so I should pass the Eden blessing onto the son whom I love, Esau." And so that's his plan. And as they talk about this plan, here's his wife outside listening, and she is not into this plan at all. So she comes up with her counterplan with her beloved son, Yaaqov. And so she has this plan to deceive her husband.

So they execute this plan. Yaaqov does what his mom says, deceives his dad. And that ends with him getting a blessing. This beautiful poem of Eden blessing that Yitskhaq thinks he's giving to Esau, but in fact he's giving to Yaaqov. Then the moment Yaaqov leaves, Esau comes in to see dad with the tasty meal, and they freak out. And what Esau gets is not the blessing, but a poem of non-blessing. It's the opposite of Yaaqov's blessing. So that's the first section.

So Esau is pretty ticked off about that. And so what he does is he begins speaking to his heart. He says to himself, "I'm gonna kill that brother of mine," and we are not told how, we're just told that Rivqah finds out about that plan too. And so she makes her own counterplan. "I know, I'll send my beloved son into exile." She's gonna part ways with her beloved son to save his life. And so she goes to her husband and says, "Hey, let's go send Yaaqov away, 'cause I can't stand these wives of Esau. And you know, he can find a nice wife from inside the family clan." And so Yaaqov is sent off by his dad to go find a wife from inside the family. And then the story ends. 

Genesis 26:34–35 CSB

34 When Esau was forty years old, he took as his wives Judith daughter of Beeri the Hethite, and Basemath daughter of Elon the Hethite. 35 They made life bitter for Isaac and Rebekah.

So we begin with this story, very short story of Esau.

"Esau was a son of 40 years when he took a wife.

Yehudit, daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemat, daughter of Elon the Hittite. And they were a bitterness of spirit for Yitskhaq and Rivqah."

Can I think of another character who was the first man to accumulate multiple wives

Lemek?

What was the Eden ideal?

A man shall leave his father and mother, be joined to his wife and the two, two, become one. So Lemek is the first polygamist, and he's not a positive character, like, at all.

When Avraham and Sarah planned for him to add another wife to his family, that is not a positive story in their abuse of Hagar. And so this is now the third time that this is mentioned. And then Yaaqov is gonna follow suit and accumulate four wives. So note, this theme of more than one wife, and the narrative continually paints it in very negative colors.

And it's always putting on front and center, the abuse that these wives have to endure in the neglect and their objectification, at the hands of all these men accumulating wives. And so it's a portrait that you have to really sit with, 'cause not everybody sees the negative critique, and they assume, "Well, these are God's chosen people, so polygamy, God's cool with it, 'cause he tolerated it," but God tolerates all kinds of things. And that doesn't mean they're the Eden ideal. 

And so I think that's a part of the portrait of what we're supposed to see here, is that Esau is following this Lemek-like pattern of accumulating wives, and it leads to bitterness and strife in the family. 

There's also one other piece to this, in that Esau takes Hittite wives. And this is not the first time that Hittites have come onto the scene. Avraham lived at peace with the Hittites. In fact, his first and only piece of the land of Canaan that he ever owned as his own, he negotiated peacefully with the Hittites. This is in the whole story in Genesis 23, he negotiates with a guy named Dusty, that is Ephron.

And so he negotiates peacefully with Dusty. And that peaceful negotiation results in a little piece of Eden right there in the middle of Canaan. 

So lest we think that this is like non-Israelites are always bad, and the Hittites themselves are a more complex character in Genesis. 

There's also for sure something funny here, because the name of one of Esau's wives is Yehudit(Judith), which is the Hebrew word for Jewish woman.

It's the feminine form of the name Judah. And there's for sure something a little ironic pun going on here, 'cause remember, God told Avraham, you will become the father of a multitude of nations that will be wrapped into the blessing. 

And so the fact that these wives are detestable to Yitskhaq and Rivqah, I don't think that necessarily means that we are supposed to adopt their point of view.

In the Old Testament there is this very consistent idea of, at least for Jewish people, to marry non-Jewish people is like, consistently considered like a very bad thing. 

There is a great danger that Moses talks about with the Canaanites is, "Hey, you're gonna like intermarry and then next thing you know, you're gonna start giving allegiance to their gods," which is exactly what happens.

So that's the danger, is about compromising allegiance to Yahweh. That's what these marriages usually represent.

But at this point in the story, maybe that's a subtext, but that's not explicitly ever on the surface in the Genesis story. 'Cause also think you can also have a Canaanite, a Canaanite sex worker, Rahab, marries into the family. And like that's odd, the narrative is all for that, because she's given herself to God. She gives her allegiance to Yahweh. So it works both ways.

It's not, you can't just chalk it up to an ancient form of racist tribalism. 

Plan and Counter plan

Genesis 27:1–18 CSB

1 When Isaac was old and his eyes were so weak that he could not see, he called his older son Esau and said to him, “My son.” And he answered, “Here I am.” 2 He said, “Look, I am old and do not know the day of my death. 3 So now take your hunting gear, your quiver and bow, and go out in the field to hunt some game for me. 4 Then make me a delicious meal that I love and bring it to me to eat, so that I can bless you before I die.” 5 Now Rebekah was listening to what Isaac said to his son Esau. So while Esau went to the field to hunt some game to bring in, 6 Rebekah said to her son Jacob, “Listen! I heard your father talking with your brother Esau. He said, 7 ‘Bring me game and make a delicious meal for me to eat so that I can bless you in the Lord’s presence before I die.’ 8 Now, my son, listen to me and do what I tell you. 9 Go to the flock and bring me two choice young goats, and I will make them into a delicious meal for your father—the kind he loves. 10 Then take it to your father to eat so that he may bless you before he dies.” 11 Jacob answered Rebekah his mother, “Look, my brother Esau is a hairy man, but I am a man with smooth skin. 12 Suppose my father touches me. Then I will be revealed to him as a deceiver and bring a curse rather than a blessing on myself.” 13 His mother said to him, “Your curse be on me, my son. Just obey me and go get them for me.” 14 So he went and got the goats and brought them to his mother, and his mother made the delicious food his father loved. 15 Then Rebekah took the best clothes of her older son Esau, which were in the house, and had her younger son Jacob wear them. 16 She put the skins of the young goats on his hands and the smooth part of his neck. 17 Then she handed the delicious food and the bread she had made to her son Jacob. 18 When he came to his father, he said, “My father.” And he answered, “Here I am. Who are you, my son?”

"Now it came about when Yitskhaq was old, that his eyes became weak." So we have an old Yitskhaq, and he can't see very well.

Already, you're supposed to be hearing echoes of the Eden story. Do you remember the whole theme of that story is who sees what's true? 'Cause the woman sees the tree is good, but she also heard, right, or should have heard what God said about that tree. And you remember what the snake says is like, "Listen, you won't die when you eat from the tree. The day you eat of it, your eyes will be opened." So see it, sight and blindness, who can really see what's real, these are Eden themes, little notes in the melody. 

"So Yitskhaq was old and his eyes were weak. So he called Esau, his son, his big one. And he said to him, 'My son,' and he said to him, 'Yep, here I am, it's me.' And he said, 'Look, I am old and I don't know the day of my death. Now please pick up your tools, your quiver, your bow, and go out to the field, hunt for me some hunted game and make for me tasty things. You know, the ones that I love. Bring it to me so that I may eat. And once you give me that food on account of that, my very soul, my being, will give you the blessing before I die.' Now, Rivqah, she was overhearing all of this when Yitskhaq spoke to Esau, his son. And so Esau went out to the field to hunt that hunted game to bring.

But Rivqah said to Yaaqov, her son, saying, 'Look, I was just listening to your dad speaking to Esau, your brother, saying "Bring me some hunted game and make for me tasty things so that I can eat. And so that I can bless you before Yahweh, before I die." So now my son, listen to my voice.'"

Listen to my voice, listen to what I command you.

Whose commands and voice should humans listen to? and when you don't listen to the right voice and the right command, who do you normally find yourself listening to?

"'Go to the flock and take for me from there, two kids of goats, good ones, take what is good, take the good ones, and I will make them into really tasty food for your dad. You know, the kind that he loves. And bring them to your father and he will eat it.  Because Goat and wild game apparently taste the same to an old man

And on account of that, he'll bless you before his death.' And Yaaqov said to Rivqah his mother, 'Ah, look, Esau, my brother, remember he's the hairy guy.

You mistook him for an animal when he was born, remember? He was a man of hair, and me? Well, I'm a smooth man.'" So good.

"'And it might just happen that my father he'll wanna like feel me, and when he feels my smoothness, he'll know that I'm a deceiver.'" Do you see the wordplay there? So smooth is literally his skin in contrast to his hairy dad. But his smoothness is how his dad will know he's a deceiver, which is, remember that's what smoothness, that's an association of the word "smooth" is trickster.

"So my dad, I'll be like a deceiver in his eyes." And here's the thing, the deceivers bring upon themselves, not blessing, but curse. Think the snake, what's the first one that God curses in the garden? Curses the deceiving snake.

"His mother said to him, 'I'll be your substitute.

May whatever curse comes upon you, may it come upon me, my son, just listen to my voice. Go and take.' So he went, and he took, and he brought to his mother. And his mother made those tasty things. You know, the one that his father loves.

And Rivqah took some of the clothes of her son, you know, the bigger one, you know, the desirable clothes, the ones that were with her in the house, and she clothed Yaaqov her son, the smaller one.

And the skin of the kids of the goats, she clothed on his hands and on that smooth nape of his neck."

So this is all the stuff she took. She took those good animals, she took the objects of desire, the clothes, and then she gave the food and the bread into the hand of Yaaqov of her son. And he went to his father.

The desirable clothes. What does that have to do with anything? Like, there's no reason to bring that up except to paint Rivqah as an Eve and to paint Yaaqov as an Adam. But then also he's going to become Eve in the very next scene as he becomes the proxy for his mom. 

So it's this interesting, it's the Adam and Eve figures have merged into one, into one here. And notice the way we're meditating on the portrait of the snake, the smooth deceiver, deception.

Deception, you think deception will get you the blessing.

But over the long haul, what it in reality will bring upon you is the curse. Even though you think, you might think it's the way to blessing.

You have a dad who's willing to give up the Eden blessing for a meal.  That's an interesting meditation on the Eden story.

Notice these themes of life and death. "Listen, I know I'm gonna die, so I may as well give you the blessing." And this raises questions of knowledge of like, did you talk about what God told Rivqah about the older and the younger? Is he operating out of ignorance here? Is he operating in violation of the divine command? These are just left in your mind.

But for sure that ambiguity is in contrast to the Eden story, where it's very clear that God told them what the command was and what voice they were supposed to listen to. 

Isaac Blesses Jacob

Bibliography

https://bibleproject.com/classroom/jacob

Freedman, David Noel, Gary A. Herion, David F. Graf, John David Pleins, and Astrid B. Beck, eds. in The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary. New York: Doubleday, 1992.

Freedman, David Noel, Allen C. Myers, and Astrid B. Beck. in Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible. Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 2000.

Mathews, K. A. Genesis 11:27–50:26. Vol. 1B of The New American Commentary. Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 2005.

Brannan, Rick, and Israel Loken. The Lexham Textual Notes on the Bible. Lexham Bible Reference Series. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2014.

Barry, John D., Douglas Mangum, Derek R. Brown, Michael S. Heiser, Miles Custis, Elliot Ritzema, Matthew M. Whitehead, Michael R. Grigoni, and David Bomar. Faithlife Study Bible. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012, 2016.

Cotter, David W. Genesis. Edited by Jerome T. Walsh, Chris Franke, and David W. Cotter. Berit Olam Studies in Hebrew Narrative and Poetry. Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 2003.