Questions: Did Rebecca have a hidden agenda throughout the episode involving the stolen blessing? Is the story about stealing Esau’s blessing really about the blessing, or something entirely different?
Key Verses:
Genesis 27:43 Now, my son, listen to my voice; rise and flee to Laban, my brother, in Haran
26:34 And when Esau was forty years old, he took a wife, Judith the daughter of Be’eri the Hittite, and Basmat the daughter of Elon the Hittite”
26:35 And there was a bitterness of spirit to Isaac and Rebecca
27:46 Rebecca said to Isaac, “I am weary in my life because of the daughters of Heth; If Jacob takes a wife fro the daughters of Heth, like these, the daughters of the land, why should I live?”
When a dramatic program is on television, there’s normally a build up of excitement just before a commercial break, and then when the show returns, whatever it was that engendered excitement with the audience is played out. It’s usually compelling drama.
In the Torah scroll, a similar dynamic often exists in the way segments of the text are laid out on the parchment. A letter “samech” or “pei” in the book version of the Bible indicates that a segment has ended and that a new one will begin. In the Torah scroll, there’s a space, sometimes the blank space goes to the end of the line, “pei,” other times, there’s no text just for a few spaces before the calligraphy resumes, “samech.” In many places of the Bible, the drama builds and then there’s a space, almost as a commercial break, before the text resumes and the drama fully unfolds.
In Toledos, Chapter 27 is the acme of the weekly portion. It’s the story of the stolen blessing, where Rebecca and Jacob conspire to steal Esau’s blessing from a blind, old Isaac. One might even argue it’s the most dramatic story in the entire Bible.
While the story revolves around the stolen blessing, there’s more to the narrative. Once Jacob has pulled off the heist, Esau returns to find out he’s been cheated and weeps. Isaac gives him a supplementary blessing, but it’s not what Esau was expecting and it’s overtly inferior. At this point, Esau vows to kill his brother in the future and Rebecca swoops into the story again. She steers Jacob to flee their home and find refuge with her brother Laban (27:43), in faraway Haran. She informs Jacob that once Esau’s anger has subsided, she’ll send for him. But that never happens. However, the chapter has one more parry by Rebecca. In the closing sentence (27:46), she quickly convinces Isaac that Jacob may not marry from the local population, for if he did, her life was for naught. It’s drama – some might say histrionics – at its best.
Isaac takes control in Chapter 28, and does exactly what his wife requested, instructing Jacob to leave their home, go to Aram, where his Uncle Laban resides and to find a wife there. In other words, everything that Rebecca has orchestrated, the stolen blessing, the flight from Canaan and the demand to marry a woman who’s a first cousin, has and will come to pass. Rebecca has manipulated all the characters into doing everything she wanted.
However, the question is whether there was a master plan all along, or whether Rebecca just adapted to the unfolding situation. And if there was a master plan, what was behind it all? What motivated Rebecca to do it? A closer look at the text will show that there was a master plan from the very beginning.
The final sentences of Chapter 26 are the key to understanding this entire episode. It’s the dramatic crescendo that leads to a break in the text in the Torah scroll and leaves the readers ready for something big to happen. But these two sentences, 26:34-35, are very easy to overlook. Verse 34 is innocuous enough. Esau marries at the age of 40. He takes two different women as his wives, both from the Hittite nation. In Esau’s defense, whom was he supposed to marry, if not from the local women? Did his family not travel to this land just two generations earlier in order to lay claim to the land, inherit it and set roots? Of course he would marry from the local population. It’s the only thing that makes any sense.
Verse 35 reveals that both parents reviled Esau’s choices. The text says they had a “bitter spirit” from these two unions. At this point, the text breaks and we’re left wondering what’s going to happen. Ordinarily, one might surmise the text would then resume with a reprimand of Esau, or perhaps something even more dramatic, such as his banishment. But it doesn’t. Instead we have the story of the blessing.
Rebecca hatches a plot to seize the blessing from Esau and have it given to Jacob. Is this a direct result of Esau having chosen his wives improperly (according to his mother)? Although his father also experienced a “bitterness of spirit” over the choice of his spouses, it doesn’t seem to perturb him enough to revoke the blessing or alter it. Esau’s the one who will inherit the family and carry on its name. His mother, Rebecca, it seems, is the one affected by Esau’s decision. She won’t take it lying down either.
Is this because of the oracle who prophesied that the elder of the twins would serve the younger, as the commentators say about 25:23, that Rebecca must ensure Jacob receive the blessing? The two brothers are forty. It seems implausible Rebecca never discussed the oracle with Isaac over the course of four decades. The theories about Isaac descend into conjecture over whether he was left mentally impaired by the Akeidah. How could he not give the blessing to Jacob? What’s wrong with him? The text doesn’t show anything wrong with Isaac. It shows him to be decisive and in control, ready to pass the family mantle to the more capable of his sons, the hunter, the one who had already become a leader in the community.
But the chess master of the story is Rebecca, moving all the pieces to achieve her plan. It’s very clever, manipulative, but clever. Let’s return to Esau’s choosing wives that displeased his mother. It seems Rebecca concluded she had to act quickly to prevent Jacob from doing something similar. He’s forty years old. They’ve lived their entire lives in Canaan. Does Jacob have a girlfriend or perhaps even a fiancée in the local community? It would explain his mother’s haste to get him out of town. What mother wants to chase her son away from her, maybe to never see her again? But if Jacob was about to follow his brother Esau by marrying a girl he might have gone to school with, known from the marketplace or from hanging out with her brothers, then Rebecca had to act. In this scenario, the stealing of the blessing is a means to an end. It’s not the main feature of the plan, but it’s needed to aggravate Esau to the point where he becomes murderous, thereby allowing for a seamless transition to Part II of her plan, that of Jacob’s immediate flight from Canaan. And by the way, while you’re hiding out, Jacob, from the wrath of your brother, marry your first cousin, you’ll like her, she’s cute.
The commentators would disagree about the blessing being secondary. The chapter is known for the story of the stolen blessing. But from Rebecca’s perspective, the blessing may have had importance, but her language will tell you what was more important for her. In 27:46, she tells Isaac if Jacob were to marry a local girl, her life would be worthless. In 27:13, when Jacob’s worried that Isaac will see through the plan and curse him, Rebecca volunteers to take on the curse, as if it hardly matters. No problem, son, I’ll absorb the curse. Were this entire story just about getting Jacob the blessing, once he had the blessing, Rebecca, who was prepared to take the curse, would have approached Esau and taken the blame. She was prepared to take the curse but not incur the wrath of her own son? That’s highly doubtful. Who better than a loving mother to pacify her eldest son? But she doesn’t do that because she needed Esau’s anger to get Jacob to flee. Hence she does nothing to help soothe Esau. In fact, she has so riled up Esau by forcing Jacob to run away that he takes a third wife, from within the family, Ishmael’s daughter (28:9), just to appease his clearly irate mother. She’s not pacifying him; he’s pacifying her! A son who responds this way to his mother’s ire would certainly be appeasable if his mother had chosen to accept the blame for Jacob’s actions in stealing his blessing.
How does Rebecca know her brother Laban has a daughter? It’s evident from the text there was correspondence between her and her family. After all, she tells Jacob she’ll send for him, implying there’s a message route, a pony express of some sort. Therefore, she’s kept in touch and knows for a fact that Laban has daughters.
As Jacob flees to Haran, Rebecca has gotten him away from girls she considers problematic. That was the goal all along. It was a masterful plan, executed to perfection. We’re never told of a reunion of Jacob with his parents. Ostensibly, he never saw them again. Rebecca probably knew that too. It seems she worked everything out to the last detail and weighed the difficult consequences to her own life. In sum, Rebecca perceived the problem, that Jacob was going to marry a local woman, and as soon as she saw the perfect opportunity, which was the intended blessing of Esau, she acted, riling Esau to the point of intending to murder his brother. This was the pretext she needed to get Jacob away from the local girls. She coopted Isaac into the plan and Jacob was whisked away. All the male characters in the story are pawns on Rebecca’s chessboard. She had all three in checkmate without them even knowing there was a game going on. She was a very clever and impressive matriarch.