GENESIS

JACOB

Isaac Destroys His Family

Genesis 27:1-46

INTRODUCTION

I believe that this passage has been as misunderstood as any other chapter in the Bible. Most of us come away from it blaming either Rebekah or Jacob for what happens in this chapter, when the truth is that the fault lies squarely at the feet of Isaac. Isaac is a good man. At times he is a most spiritual man as seen in the previous episodes in his life; however, here in this episode Isaac fails miserably. He allows his preference for one son, Esau, to destroy his family. If men don't think that they have a tremendous influence on their families, they need to take a serious look at this passage. It is a sad ending to an otherwise stellar life.

Some tend to excuse Isaac because of his natural love for Esau. Having been a minister for the past 31 years, I can tell you that "the natural love" of a parent for a child can be one of the worst things that can happen to a family. Dads AND moms go braindead many times for their children. I've seen the best of friendships destroyed because of problems with other people's children. Competitive dads and moms are some of the scariest people on planet earth. It's sad in the lives non-Christians; there's absolutely no room for it at all in the lives of Christians.

ISAAC SUMMONS ESAU (27:1-4)

At this point Isaac is an old man. Moreover, he has lost his sight. Although he will not die for over 20 years, he knows that he does not have much time left. Before he dies or grows senile, he wants the blessing God had given to Abraham and to him, Abraham's seed, to be transmitted to Esau.

On the surface all this sounds harmless; however, the comment that Isaac was sightless is important on more than just the physical level. He was blind spiritually as well. There are 2 problems with what Isaac is doing. First, God never told Isaac to transmit His blessing to anybody. It was God's blessing to transmit, not Isaac. In fact, not even the great Abraham had transmitted the blessing to Isaac; God Himself had transmitted it to Isaac. If anybody was going to transmit the blessing, it should have been God, not Isaac.

There's an even greater problem here though. God had actually ALREADY transmitted the blessing, not to Esau as Isaac wanted, but to Jacob. Even before the 2 twin boys were born, God had told Rebekah that the older son would serve the younger, a clear indication of God's ultimate favor upon Jacob the younger and not upon Esau the elder. There is absolutely no doubt in anybody's mind that she had not told Isaac about what God had said. Calling in Esau to blessing him was Isaac's attempt to circumvent God's will and make sure that the blessing God gave to him would go to Esau and not to Jacob.

What is even worse is that Isaac KNEW that Esau was not qualified to receive the blessing of Abraham. What is amazing is not that Esau chose Canaanite women to be his wives but that Isaac continued to think of Esau as the appropriate recipient of the great promises God had made first to Abraham and then to him. Not only had Esau tossed away his birthright for a bowl of porridge, by marrying Canaanite women he had actually married outside the faith. Isaac is truly spiritually blind.

So why did Isaac favor Esau? Because he loved the fact that Esau was a man of the wild, a hunter. He loved the wild game that Esau would kill and prepare for the old man's supper. Isaac is being led by his belly in his relationship with his sons. Isaac tells Esau to go kill him some wild game, prepare it for him for a meal, and then come and receive his blessing. Esau goes out to carry out his father's wishes.

REBEKAH'S DECEPTION (27:5-17)

Isaac was not the only parent in the household who had a favorite son. Rebekah, the mom, has her favorite, Jacob, the younger son. Whereas Esau was a man of the field, Jacob did chores and engaged in occupations which focused on the domestic life, such as, tent-making, carpentry, etc.

More may have been in play here though. She and not Isaac was the one God directly addressed whenever He said that the blessing would fall upon Jacob and not upon Esau. That incident may have formed a special relationship between her and Jacob from that point on. Although this direct communication does not justify what she does next, it does at least help explain her determination to make sure that Isaac blessed Jacob instead of Esau.

Rebekah overhears Isaac's plan to bless Esau. She rushes to Jacob and instructs him to dress up like Esau and take to Isaac a meal she will prepare for him so that Isaac will bless Jacob instead of Esau. (There may be a touch of jealousy in her relationship with Esau because apparently Isaac preferred Esau's cooking to Rebekah's.)

Throughout this story we see Rebekah assuming something which was not necessarily true. She assumed that Isaac had the power to transmit the blessing. In this she was wrong. If God had chosen Jacob, then there was nothing Isaac could do to stop God; the same was true if He had chosen Esau. When it is all said and done, Rebekah didn't have to do anything in order to secure the blessing for Jacob. The fact that she didn't trust the Lord causes great mischief in her family.

To his credit Jacob resists at first. Although he doesn't resist for the highest motive ("My father will curse me instead"), at least he does initially resist. He reminds his mother that whereas Esau was a hairy man, he was a smooth man. Rebekah though assures him that any curse will fall upon her instead of him. Rebekah will rue the day she made this assurance. To his shame Jacob agrees to such an arrangement, that is, if any curse does fall, he will let it fall on his mom.

Just in case blind Isaac uses his touch to determine the identity of the son, Rebekah straps onto Jacob the skins of a kid on the smooth part of his neck and on his hands. She dresses him in Esau's clothes which give off Esau's scent and sends him into Isaac's tent to carry out the deception.

JACOB BEFORE ISAAC (27:18-29)

Jacob enters Isaac's tent carrying the meal which Rebekah had prepared for Isaac. When Isaac asks who it is, Jacob replies that it is Esau who had returned with the food Isaac requested so that Isaac could now bless him, Esau. Isaac is astonished that Esau is back so soon. Jacob, lying through his teeth, claims that GOD gave him swift success so that Isaac could quickly dispense the blessing. All that was happening, according to Jacob, was in accordance with God's will.

Isaac is suspicious; he may be blind, but he's not deaf. The voice may claim to be that of Esau; however, it sure sounds a lot like Jacob. Isaac has the voice to come closer so that he can touch his skin. He knows that Jacob is smooth skinned, while Esau is hairy. After touching Jacob, Isaac says that although the voice is that of Jacob, the skin is that of Esau. Isaac gives Jacob a preliminary blessing.

Again Isaac is not sure; so he asks Jacob if he is Esau. A second time Jacob lies to his father: "I am [Esau]." Isaac then instructs the voice to come closer to him so that he can kiss its face. When Jacob does get closer, Isaac smells the garments he is wearing. Without any doubt the clothes belong to Esau; they have the scent of the fields. Thus assured Isaac now blesses Jacob.

There are 2 major elements to this blessing Isaac bestows upon Jacob: the land and his dominion. God had promised Abraham to give him the land and also to make of him kings and nations. The first part of Isaac's blessing relates to the Abrahamic promise of the land, while the second part of Isaac's blessing referring to dominion relates to the Abrahamic promise of nations and kings.

The element of the land:

"See the smell of my son
Is like the smell of a field which the Lord has blessed;
Now may God give you of the dew of heaven,
And of the fatness of the earth,
And an abundance of grain and new wine;

So far, so good. But Isaac goes further and in doing so overreaches what even the Abrahamic blessing promised. The Element of Dominion Over His Brothers:

"May peoples serve you;
And nations bow down to you;
AND MAY YOUR MOTHER'S SONS BOW DOWN TO YOU.
Cursed be those who curse you,
And blessed be those who bless you."

The last 2 stanzas show us that he thinks he is transmitting to Esau the promise God gave directly to Abraham.

The words AND MAY YOUR MOTHER'S SONS BOW DOWN TO YOU are the disturbing element in this blessing. Why would Isaac even utter these words especially since they contradict the very words God had given to Rebekah? In his spiritual blindness caused by arrogance, he is trying to subvert what God has said. There is something sinister in this part of the "blessing." God had never made this promise to Isaac over Ishmael. He is definitely showing his preference for Esau by overreaching in this part of the blessing. In trying to SUPER-bless Esau, he actually dooms Esau.

Now that Jacob has secured the blessing, he departs Isaac's tent--and just in time. The Hebrew reads as if Esau appears at the camp at almost the same moment that Jacob left Isaac's tent. If Jacob had stayed a little bit longer in Isaac's tent, then Esau most likely would have discovered his and Rebekah's ruse. The threat that Esau utters later against Jacob might have actually become a reality right then and there if he had actually caught Jacob in the act.

ESAU AND ISAAC DISCOVER THE DECEPTION (27:30-41)

After preparing a savory meal of wild game for his dad, Esau enters Isaac's tent, encourages him to eat the meal so that he can then bless Esau. At first Isaac asks who it is who is speaking to him. After Esau identifies himself, Isaac begins to tremble violently, almost out of control. He knows that his scheme has unraveled, that Jacob has gotten the better of him. It's probably true that he knew that God's will had been done in SPITE of what he had tried to do. Isaac informs Esau that he has blessed Jacob instead of him. What's even more Isaac states: "Yes, and he shall be blessed" (27:33). (The fact that Isaac resigns himself so readily shows that he really believed that he had tried to subvert the Lord's will and had failed.)

Now vengeance is paid back to Isaac for what he had tried to do to Jacob. Whenever Esau asks Isaac for a blessing, Isaac gives Esau all that is left, basically a curse:

"Behold, away from the fertility of the earth shall be your dwelling,
And away from the dew of heaven from above.
And by your sword you shall live,
AND YOUR BROTHER YOU SHALL SERVE;
But it shall come about when you become restless,
That you shall break his yoke from your neck."

Isaac cannot undo the doom he put upon Esau whenever he over-blessed Jacob; however, he decides the make the doom temporary (would he have done the same for Jacob?). Esau WILL serve Jacob; Edom, the nation which descended from Esau, would throughout her history serve the nation of Israel which descended from Jacob; however, one day Edom would break off forever Israel's yoke. Esau was cursed but not permanently.

Some may feel that I was too harsh when I claimed that Isaac had over-reached in the blessing to "Esau," actually Jacob, by saying that Esau's brother was to serve him and bow down to him. Well, just ask yourself the question: suppose Isaac had actually blessed the real Esau, would he have told Jacob that he one day would eventually break Esau's yoke and serve him no longer? I sincerely doubt it. There is something mean in the way Isaac was trying to treat Jacob when he tried to bless Esau.

Esau was a wild man, not to be trifled with. Only out of love for his father will Esau delay wreaking vengeance upon Jacob. Esau decides that the day his father dies, his mother will lose her favorite son.

AFTERMATH (27:42-46)

Rebekah gets wind of what Esau is planning. In order to protect Jacob, she will get Isaac to agree to send him to her relatives in Paddan-Aram so that he can get a wife there and not from one of the women of the Canaanites like Esau had done. Isaac consents and sends hundreds of miles north, away from Esau.

All seems like things have worked out nicely for Rebekah. They have not. When she sends Jacob off to Paddam-Aram, she sends him off little realizing it is the last time she will ever see her favorite son. Little does she realize that the curse she was willing to bring down upon herself has actually come down upon her. She has probably not only lost her husband, she's lost her favorite son as well.

The ultimate blame for this tragedy though lies squarely upon the shoulders of Isaac. He has totally destroyed his family. His favored son Esau now lies under a curse. His younger son is basically in exile so that his older brother won't kill him. Rebekah will never see her younger son again. Who knows how this affected his relationship with Rebekah? All because he chose his own desires over God's will.

The saying "The acorn doesn't fall far from the tree" applies here with Jacob. Before we start criticizing Jacob too much for "deceiving" his father, remember that he learned this art from his own father and grandfather. "But," you might say, "he should have NEVER used it against his own father!" That's the problem with parenting. Whenever we teach our sons and daughters bad habits, we shouldn't get angry with them when they use those same traits against ourselves. "My kid is so stubborn towards me!" Well, guess who he probably learned it from? Who else probably was stubborn towards his own father? "My daughter lies! I can't believe it!" Well, guess who taught her to lie whenever her own mother decided not to tell her husband the whole truth: "Let's keep this from your dad!"

Is Rebekah partly to blame? Yes. She lied to and deceived her own husband; plus she engaged her own son in this deception. You don't do evil in order to accomplish God's plan. The truth is that God didn't need Rebekah to deceive Isaac in order for Him to bless Jacob. God was not going to be restricted by whatever actions Isaac took or did not take. He's greater than that. She did not mess up as royally as Isaac did; however, she should have NEVER taken matters into her own hands.

The result was disastrous for Rebekah and her family. The sad thing is that her favorite son Jacob will now bear the brunt of her manipulations. Not only is he in exile, he has now developed within him a deceptive spirit. God is going to have to hammer that out of him in order to transform him from Jacob "the deceiver" into Israel "the prince of God."