Torah Posting: תולדת
And these are the generations of Yitzhaq, son of Avraham.
Yitzhaq’s life immediately begins to recapitulate the family karma. He is unable to father a child, so he entreats the Lord. Unlike the long and winding road his father took, though, Yitzhaq’s prayers are answered immediately, within the same sentence as his prayer.
Rivkah conceives twins, in fact, “ויתרצצו הבנים בקרבה” — and the sons struggled with each other within her. In pain, she asks God why this is, and God gives her a prophecy.
Two nations struggle within her, and they shall be separated, and the elder shall serve the younger.
This is the family karma again, but this time, it is the mother who is given the prophecy of how things must play out with the sons.
Perhaps God learned from the disaster that happened last time. Or perhaps God knows Yitzhaq will be unable to hold such terrifying prophecy about his sons, given the trauma inflicted on him by that same disaster.
The first son to be born is “אדמוני כלו כאדרת סער” — red all over like a hairy garment — and they gave him the name ’Esav (עשו), which has always amused me as a pun on ’esev (עשב), like grass or weed.
That’s not the juiciest etymology in ’Esav’s introduction, though. אדמוני (“admoni”) — red — is like אדם (“Adam”) and אדמה (“adamah”) — earth — the connection that had me calling the primordial humans “earthlings” throughout the first parashah. It is also connected to דם (“dam”) — blood.
So the elder son — the one Rivkah’s prophecy says will serve the younger — is the primordial one, the bestial one, the earthly one.
He is followed out of the womb by his brother, who is clinging בעקב (“b’ekev”) — to ’Esav’s heel, and so he is named יעקב, Ya’akov.
The contrast is drawn immediately.
’Esav is a hunter and an איש שדה, a man of the field. Already ’Esav is linked with his father, Yitzhaq, who went walking with God in the field last parashah.
But Ya’akov is תם — plain, simple, pure — and he is described as ישב אהלים — “dwelling in tents.” This connects him with both Avraham and his tent where he received his angelic guests and Yitzhaq, who dwelt in his mother’s tent when he received his beloved.
It is obvious who ’Esav is. Ya’akov is more mysterious. He keeps to himself.
With the stage set, the text makes it plain: Yitzhaq loves ’Esav, for he loves his meat. Rivkah loves Ya’akov, but it doesn’t say why.
One day, Ya’akov the homebody is cooking some stew. ’Esav comes home famished from hunting, and he begs his brother, “הלעיתני נא מן–האדם האדם הזה” — “Please give me some of that red-red.” At this point, the text goes ahead and gives ’Esav the nickname אדום, Red.
Ya’akov looks up simply and says, “I’ll give it to you in exchange for your birthright as eldest.”
’Esav is like, “I’m literally going to die if I don’t eat some of that, so who cares about a stupid birthright,” and he takes the deal.
Meanwhile, Yitzhaq continues working through his ancestral karma. Another famine strikes, but God appears to him and says, “Do not go down to Egypt (i.e. like your father did). Stay in the land I have promised to your descendants.” And God tells Yitzhaq all the same beautiful things, but God says it’s for the sake of Yitzhaq’s father’s righteousness.
As he tries to solve the ancestral famine problem, Yitzhaq sojourns in the land of Avimelekh, king of the Pelishtim, just like his father did. He even gets into the “she’s my sister” situation. But again, something different happens.
This time, Avimelekh looks out a window, and he sees Yitzhaq and Rivkah making whoopee. This is how the king finds out about the sister thing — not by dint of scary strictness from God but because the two lovebirds can’t keep their hands off each other.
Yitzhaq derives the same material fortunes from the peace treaties that follow, and again it raises tensions with the locals, who have stopped up the wells his father dug when he dwelt there in the land of the Pelishtim. Yitzhaq departs, not wanting to cause trouble, but he re-opens those wells on his way. And then, to settle more struggles between herdsmen of the different tribes, he digs some more.
The people all come to see Yitzhaq as not only elect of God like his father, but an innovator.
This is essentially the whole story of Yitzhaq’s life.
The next thing we know, he is old, and his eyes are failing him. Confronting his mortality, he calls to his beloved ’Esav and asks him to shoot him some venison, so he can get a little more worldly comfort. Then he’ll give ’Esav his birthright blessing, which Yitzhaq does not know has been sold.
This is the way Yitzhaq wants to go out. He is not a man of the mountain like his fearsome father. He just wants a little more of that red-red.
Rivkah overhears this and goes to Ya’akov while ’Esav is out hunting. She tells him what’s happening, and she instructs him with the force of prophecy: Go bring her two young goats — again with the wrong animal offering — and she will cook Yitzhaq something good, and then Ya’akov will bring it to him and receive the blessing.
Ya’akov says, “Mom, ’Esav is hairy, and I am smooth. Won’t dad figure it out? Won’t he think I’m a מתעתע — a trickster — and curse me rather than bless me?”
Rivkah says, “The curse will be on me, my son. Just do as I say.” And he does.
Before Ya’akov goes to his father, Rivkah dresses him in ’Esav’s finest clothes, and then she (genius) puts the goat skins on Ya’akov’s smooth arms and neck, so he’ll feel hairy like his elder brother.
Then Ya’akov goes to his father and says “אבי” — “Father?” — and Yitzhaq says “הנני” — “Here I am.”
This moment echoes the one where young Yitzhaq asks his father, Avraham, where the lamb for the slaughter is.
But it’s different. Avraham says “הנני בני” — “Here I am, my son.”
Here, Yitzhaq says, “הנני מי אתה בני” — “Here I am. Who are you, my son?”
He knows this is his son, he’s just not sure which one. Something is off. Avraham, in his sacrificial moment, was totally sure. Yitzhaq, the son who was to be sacrificed, is now the one holding the knife, and he is not sure like his father was.
Ya’akov confidently tells him he is ’Esav, his firstborn, but Yitzhaq does not believe him easily.
Yitzhaq wonders how he got back so fast. Ya’akov credits God for bringing him speed. Yitzhaq asks Ya’akov to come near, so he can feel him. “The voice is Ya’akov’s voice, but the hands are the hands of ’Esav,” Yitzhaq concludes. He asks one more time, “Are you really ’Esav?”, and Ya’akov says yes.
Then Yitzhaq asks for his beloved venison, and Ya’akov brings him goat instead, with some wine. Yitzhaq feasts happily on the wrong food, and then he pronounces a banger of a blessing upon his son.
They kiss, and Yitzhaq smells his garments for one more test, and he declares that the smell of his son is “כריח שדה אשר ברכו יהוה,” like the smell of a field which God has blessed. Therefore, Yitzhaq continues, “May God give you מטל השמים — the dew of the sky — ומשמני הארץ — and the fats of the land — ורב דגן ותירש — and plenty of corn and wine.” Yitzhaq is a man of the senses and the material world, and he wants this birthright for his son as well (along with the usual aims of tribal power).
As soon as this blessing is complete, ’Esav returns with his bounties. Yitzhaq asks “מי אתה” — who are you? — no בני this time. When ’Esav tells him, Yitzhaq begins to tremble and asks aloud who it was who just received his blessing, making clear the deed is done.
’Esav is wracked by this and asks to be blessed as well. But Yitzhaq says, “Your brother came with trickery and took your blessing.”
Here ’Esav admits Ya’akov “took” his birthright — he does not say how — and now the blessing, too??
Yitzhaq knows the power of blessing and says it’s too late, he has made Ya’akov ’Esav’s ruler. But when ’Esav cries and wails, Yitzhaq manages to eke out another blessing. He blesses him with the same material bounties, but he pronounces that he will live by the sword and serve his brother — until one day, he will liberate himself.
In his heart, ’Esav resolves to kill his brother once Yitzhaq has died.
Mysteriously, the text says ויגד לרבקה את–דברי עשו בנה — and Rivkah “was told” these words of ’Esav, her son. How “was” she “told” these words ’Esav said בלבו — “in his heart”? As we know, Rivkah is the one with the gift of prophecy in this generation of the family. She knew all of this was going down.
So she sends Ya’akov off to live with her brother, Lavan (white, as in “of the eye” and an epithet for the Moon), to hang out until ’Esav cools off.
Then she goes to Yitzhaq and makes her move.
In yet another echo of the previous generation — the conversation by which she herself was brought into this family — she takes the role of Avraham, as though to remind Yitzhaq of the rest of their job as ancestors. She says the same thing about not wanting her lineage to pass to the locals but to their own people.
And Yitzhaq calls to Ya’akov and blesses him, this time consciously, to go find a wife amongst the holdings of Lavan, his mother’s line.
’Esav, we have read earlier, did the opposite. ’Esav learns from this second blessing of Ya’akov that his own choice to marry a daughter of Kena’an displeased his father, so he marries another wife, Mahalat, daughter of Yishma’el. And here the parashah ends.
Worldly ’Esav just wants to please his father, but he cannot seem to. And the tragedy of this is made painfully clear here at the end, because sending Ya’akov to Lavan was Rivkah’s idea, not Yitzhaq’s.
Yitzhaq no longer knows why he bestows his blessings. He goes along with the trick played on him and even endorses it by blessing Ya’akov again. Does Yitzhaq see now that his love of the material is in antithesis to his father’s murderous awe of Heaven? Does he no longer consider himself responsible enough to direct God’s promises to his lineage himself? Has God confirmed this by dealing directly with Rivkah, who manages it all for Yitzhaq?
Or does he simply love his wife more than anything?
🍛
