In the book of Genesis of the Hebrew Bible, the brothers Jacob and Esau are portrayed as very different and contrasting characters. In the beginning, they were born as twins with Esau being the older brother. Despite being twins, their appearances were different. Esau was portrayed as a hairy baby while Jacob was portrayed with no notable features. Esau’s hairy body would make him appear more beast-like and portrayed as less human than Jacob. This would foreshadow how the story would later depict favoritism towards Jacob rather than Esau. Their personalities were also opposites of each other. Esau was portrayed as a skilled hunter while Jacob was a mild man that remained at home. In addition, Jacob was portrayed as a trickster throughout the story as he deceived his father and brother for his own gains. Despite Esau’s hairy body making him appear more like an animal, he was portrayed as a more civil character than Jacob, who swindled him from his birthright and blessing. This idea is further shown when Esau forgives Jacob in Genesis 33, showing his ability to overcome his rage to find forgiveness.
The story of Jacob and Esau also portrays references towards the previous stories from the book of Genesis. The rivalry between Jacob and Esau is clearly a reference to the rivalry of Abel and Cain, since both pairs depict the younger sibling receiving more favor than the older sibling and the theme of revenge that was present in both older siblings. However, Jacob and Esau chose to approach their conflict without the need for violence. Jacob chose to fled from Esau and returns to him after several years to reconcile, which Esau accepts. This can reference back to the idea of Esau being more human-like despite his appearance. The story also references Genesis 3 with the character Rebekah. Rebekah does not make a lot of appearances in the story but her role in Genesis 27 was integral to the plot as she convinces Jacob to deceive his father to receive Esau’s blessing. Rebekah was acting as the instigator to entice a character to perform a negative action, which is the same role as the serpent in Genesis 3. Both stories also ends with the character that fell into temptation being forced to leave their homes due to their actions. However, while Adam and Eve were commanded to leave the Garden of Eden, Jacob left Beersheba out of his own will. This creates a recurring theme of deception and temptation throughout the Bible.
Hello Jacky,
I thought what you said about Jacob and Esau being similar to the story of Cain and Abel very interesting. Esau is also jealous of his brother just as Cain was with Abel. I believe in some lines of the text we can see Esau’s jealousy as in “And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing wherewith his father blessed him: and Esau said in his heart, The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then will I slay my brother Jacob.” Esau even mentions that he wishes to kill his brother just as Cain had murdered Abel. However, the fact that Esau was boasting of his plans to kill his brother, prevented it from happening. Cain took a different approach by keeping his plans to himself and killing Abel. I also agree with what you say about the foreshadowing of events based purely on the description of the characters. Esau was a hairy baby compared to Jacob and this foreshadowed the coming events of the story and the jealousy that would build up because of their differences.
Hi,
This post was a quite interesting interpretation of the Jacob and Esau story. What I thought was most intriguing was the part where Esau is supposed to be the more civilized of the two brothers, despite his animal-like being. When I had previously read the story, I always thought of Jacob as the civilized one despite his deception. Even though Jacob did do some questionable things the reasoning behind it seemed plausible, and the Bible doesn’t really condemn him for his actions. He is still represented as being a good person. Esau never receives the glory that Jacob receives so it is understandable that he would want him dead like Cain did Abel. However Esau and Jacob do end up coming to an agreement and are friends in the end so the differences in the story are quite obvious. The themes of deception and temptation are present throughout the Bible, but I think that is just contrast the forgiveness and righteousness that the Christian God wishes to show.