Genesis 27, the stolen blessing

So many of us know this part of the story so well! And yet all I have is questions about it!

1. Why was Jacob Rebekah's favorite and Esau Isaac's favorite? Was there a family feud going on here long before all this happened?

2. Why would Rebekah encourage Jacob to lie? Did she not trust God's prophecy? Did she, like Sarah before her, feel she had to 'help God along'? Both time when the women stepped in to 'help' God the results are brothers who end up estranged from each other and their descendants at war with one another. Lesson: God doesn't need our help, ladies!!!

3. Why would Jacob go through with the lie? Did he also not trust God's prophecy from before?

4. Why was Isaac not able to give Esau some kind of positive blessing apart from the blessing Jacob stole?

5. The patriarchal blessing was terribly important in those days and seemed to have a great deal of influence and power. What about now? Does the blessing a parent -- a Christian parent -- gives a child mean anything? Does anyone do that now?

As Isaac grows older and weaker, Esau bides his time. He plans to kill Jacob when their father is dead. Why wait until then? The only clue I can see is Rebekah's words to Jacob when she sends him off to her brother, Laban: "When your brother is no longer angry with you and forgets what you did to him, I'll send word for you to come back from there. Why should I lose both of you in one day?"

So evidently Esau would have to be killed for the murder of his brother? Or he would have to run off, thus depriving Rebekah of both sons?

One interesting note: Rebekah never does send for Jacob. She never sees him again, as she has died before he returns.

The last part of this chapter shows Rebekah telling Isaac that Esau's foreign wives are extremely distressing to her, and she informs Isaac that if Jacob marries as Esau has done, her life will not be worth living.

Just offhand, my impression of Rebekah at this time in her life is that she is really an emotional basket case! Her conniving and manipulating seem to have destroyed that early faith and sense of adventure she had when she went quickly to meet a husband she had no knowledge of in a distant land.

Although Rebekah is mentioned in passing in terms of who is related to her and, later, her death, this is the last we hear of her in Genesis. She leaves the narrative in the middle of one of her manipulations.

[ June 29, 2002, 01:33 AM: Message edited by: Helen ]

 

Glen: Yes, of course the Lord could have stopped anything He wanted to stop. He could have stopped Hitler, too, right? But the fact is He does allow evil to be expressed, and lies to be told, even though He will work around them. We certainly can't blame God for evil and lies!

And, to you both, about the blessing -- that was separate from the birthright. The birthright was literally by right of birth. The blessing was a choice made by the parent. Later you will see where Jacob has a special blessing for each of his sons.

The birthright was sold. The blessing was stolen. They were two different things.