Genesis Chapters 27 - 28: Jacob and Rebekah's Deception of Esau and Isaac

Isaac grows old and blind and thinks his time is growing short. So he calls his favorite son Esau over and asks him to go hunting and make him a home cooked meal. In exchange for this, he will bless him.

Rebekah overhears this. As soon as Esau is out the door, she calls Jacob over and whispers to him, "Hey... your dad told Esau to get him some dinner and he'll get a blessing. But I think you should get that blessing. So go get a couple of goats and I'll make him some dinner. You bring it in to him and he'll bless you because he can't see at all anymore anyway."

Jacob says, "But mom, Esau is hairy and I'm not. If he reaches out and touches me, he'll know we scammed him and then he'll curse me instead of blessing me."

"Not problem, Jacob. I have a plan. Go get goats."

"Oh, Esau... It's ewe."

Rebekah cooks up the goats. She dresses Jacob in Esau's clothes, and takes the hairy goat hide and puts it on the back of Jacob's hands and on his neck. She puts the tray of food in his hands and pushes him into his father's room.

"Hey dad."

"Who's there?"

"It's... Esau... I brought you some food, just like you asked."

"Esau? You just left! How'd you find food so quickly?"

"Um. Yeah. God knew you wanted food so there was game like right outside the camp."

"You expect me to believe that? Come here so I can touch you."

Jacob moves close enough for Isaac to touch him.

"You sound like Jacob, but you're hairy as a goat, just like Esau. And you smell like Esau, too. And goat..."

Isaac blesses Jacob and eats the home cooked meal that Rebekah made.

As soon as the blessing is done, Esau comes home. Esau cooks the game that he caught, and brings it in to his father.

"Hey dad, here's your dinner!"

"WHAT? I just ate! Who are you?"

"Uh, it's Esau. Don't you remember? You said you wanted dinner."

"Ahhh! Someone else came in here and fed me and I blessed him! CRAP! I gave that blessing to someone else!"

Esau cries out, "NOOOOOO!!! That was mine! Bless me anyway!"

Isaac says, "I only had one blessing! Sorry! I gave it to Jacob!"

"ARGH! He cheated me again! Ok, maybe the stew thing was my fault for being overly dramatic and saying I would die of hunger when really I could have waited until dinner time, but this just takes the cake." Esau starts to cry, "You don't have a blessing for me at all?"

Isaac tells him that he's his brother's servant but when he grows restless he'll break the yoke from his neck.

Esau is furious and vows to kill Jacob. Rebekah catches wind of this and warns Jacob and sends him back to live with her brother in Haran until Esau cools off a bit. Then she goes in to Isaac and says she hates her life because of the Hittite women and that her life will be totally worthless if Jacob marries one of them.

Hittite women? Esau's wives? They weren't even involved. Surprisingly, there's not a lot written about them, especially since Rebekah's rant about them seems to comes totally out of the blue. One site says it's a warning about not marrying ungodly nonbelievers.  But Rebekah was the one that set up this whole scam, tricking Isaac to bless her favorite kid Jacob instead of his favorite kid Esau. How is that godly? It's a stretch to blame this on the stress that comes from living with Esau and his ungodly Hittite wives. But sending Jacob back to Haran will ensure that he picks a nice wife from their own people.

Esau sees that Isaac and Rebekah told Jacob not to marry foreigners, so Esau marries a third woman, one of Ishmael's daughters. The poor guy just tries to make his parents happy but can't seem to do anything right in the eyes of his mother.

On the way to Haran, Jacob has a dream. In this dream, angels are walking up and down a ladder that stretches to heaven. God is standing on the top of this ladder and reaffirms to Jacob that he and his descendants will inherit the land he is in. He says he will be with him wherever he goes and says he will not leave him until he has done what he promised.

Jacob wakes up and say, "I didn't know God was in this place!" (So much for him being the godly one.) He sets up the rock he'd been using as a pillow and promises that if God will be with him and provide for him and see him safely back home, then he will accept the Lord as his God. Again... Jacob was supposed to be the godly one, but here he is, making a deal that he'll accept the lord as his god only if he gets him home safely. And then he'll give him 10% of everything.

Genesis Chapters 23 - 26: Isaac's New Family and Some Bad Decisions Regarding Stew

Abraham grows old and tells his oldest servant to come and put his hand under his thigh and swear that he will go to his homeland and find Isaac a suitable wife. The servant doesn't have a name,but it's mentioned back in Chapter 15 that his name is Eliezer. So we'll call him Eli.

There are several explanations of "putting your hand under my thigh." It's a Patriarchal Oath. However... it may not actually involve the thigh. It seems that a circumcised penis is important enough to swear an oath by.

He tells Eli to go back to Mesopotamia, where Abraham's brother Nahor lives, and find Isaac a wife. The servant worries that he might not be able to convince a woman to follow him all the way back to Caanan and Abraham tells him that if he absolutely can't find a girl to follow him that he can bring Isaac back to her.

That's a lot of camels

Eli takes ten camels and some nice things that girls like as gifts, and he makes the camels lie down by the well. He prays and comes up with a plan. He decides that he will ask the girls who come to the well for a drink. If any of them gives him a drink AND offers his camels a drink, well, that's the girl for Isaac.

A woman named Rebekah comes to the well and the servant thinks she's really pretty, so he asks for a drink. She lets Eli drink and then she gives the camels water. He's flabbergasted and gives her some jewelry and asks who she is and if he could stay the night with her family.

She says that she Nahor's granddaughter. (So I think that makes her a second cousin to Isaac.) And she says of course he and his herd of smelly camels are welcome to spend the night.

Eli is welcomed and his camels cared for. They offer him dinner, but he insists that he tell them why he is there first.

He tells them that he is there at the behest of Abraham, who is now very rich and powerful. He tells how he was sent to find Isaac a wife and how he knew Rebekah was the one because she gave the camels water without him even asking.

Rebekah's brother and father say, "WOW! That's amazing! She's all yours!"

He gives her even more jewelry, and gives her mom some jewelry too, and they eat. After dinner, Eli gets up to go, but Rebekah's brother and mom ask if she can stay a few more days and then go back. Eli says they really ought to be on their way, and amazingly, they decide to ask Rebekah what SHE wants to do. She says that they can leave immediately. They bless her and she packs up her stuff and she and Eli return to Abraham and Isaac. Isaac thinks she's lovely and marries her.

Abraham takes another wife and has a bunch of children with her. He also has some children by some concubines, though he sends those children east. Abraham dies at 175 years old, and Ishmael comes home for the funeral. He and Isaac bury their father with Sarah in the cave that Abraham bought. Ishmael by the way has twelve sons.

Rebekah has no children for a long while, so Isaac prays for some kids. When she is 60, God gives her twins, but tells her that one will be stronger than the other and that the older will serve the younger.

The oldest, Esau, is born first, covered in red hair. Jacob follows him out hanging on to Esau's heel.

Esau becomes a skilled hunter and is their father's favorite. Jacob is a quiet man and is their mother's favorite.

What's this soup worth to you?

One day Jacob was home cooking some lentil stew. Esau comes in from hunting and says, "Ohhhhh red stew! Smells great! I am so hungry I'm about ready to pass out. Let me have some."

Jacob says, "Sure you can have some stew. In exchange for your birthright."

"Seriously? I'm your brother, about to DIE right here in front of you from starvation and you're bribing me with freaking stew?  Eh...whatever.  If I'm about to die, you'll get my birthright anyway won't you?  HA! Ok. It's yours. Give me some."

A drought and famine comes into the land and Isaac travels to Gerar, the land of Abimelach, the king that Abraham had dealt with back in Caanan.

And, surprise, surprise, Isaac tells Rebekah to pretend to be his sister. No one stole Rebekah, but the king looked out a window one day and saw Isaac and Rebekah laughing and from that he knew that they were not brother and sister. (My version says they were laughing. Other versions say "caressing" or "sporting".)

"Isaac," the king asks, "Again with the 'she's my sister' trick? What the heck is wrong with you people? Your father did the same thing. One of us could have slept with your wife and gotten us all in trouble!" And he tells Isaac to go away.

Isaac moves a little way off. There's some more quarreling over wells and Isaac moves farther away until they stop bothering him.

The king comes to visit and to let him know that he doesn't want any trouble since he know Isaac has God on his side.

Meanwhile, Esau marries two Hittite women which ticks Isaac and Rebekah off to no end.