So when Esau left, she went to Jacob and told him to go and kill two goats from their flock. And was Esau Rebekah’s favourite? No, he was not. You might remember another story, when a woman heard everything through the thin walls of a tent? Well, it happened again. “And then,” he said, “I’ll give you a blessing.” He asked him to go hunting, and cook up what he caught, and bring it to him to eat. One day, he called in Esau, his favourite. But being a migrant was in their DNA.Īnd what with all the settling down, and pulling up sticks, and moving on, and settling down again, years passed, and Isaac grew old, and his eyes grew dim: maybe he had cataracts. But in time, the king of the region, King Abimelech, saw that the Lord was always with them, and so he promised to leave them alone. They were kicked out of one place, then another, then another. They lived all over, quarrelling with the locals over land and water. The next bit of the story is this: You might not know, but those brothers and their parents and their tribe were migrants, and they had to keep moving around. Then Jacob gave his brother lentil stew and bread, and Esau ate and drank and got up and went away. Esau said, “I’m dying of hunger! What do I care about the birthright?” Jacob said, “Sign on the dotted line, then.” So Esau did-the idiot!-and sold his birthright to Jacob. And what with the sheep, the goats, the cattle, the land, the tents, the gold, it was worth a lot! And Jacob wanted it. But Jacob said, “First sell me your birthright.” As the oldest son, Esau’s birthright was a double part of the family fortune. So he said to Jacob, “I’m totally starving! Gimme some of that red stuff!”-and so from then on, he was nicknamed “Edom”, what we call “Red”. He’d been out hunting, and he was ravenous. One day, Jacob was cooking-the original MasterChef!-when Esau came home. Isaac loved to eat the wild game that Esau caught, so he preferred the oldest but Rebekah’s favourite was Jacob. He was quiet, and he hung around the tents with the women and the little kids. Now, Esau grew up and became a hunter, and he loved to be outdoors but Jacob, well, he was a funny one. The youngest came out holding tight to his brother’s heel-maybe he was trying to get out first? Whaddaya think? Anyway, he was named ‘Jacob’, how we say ‘he grabs’. They named him ‘Esau’, what we call ‘Hairy’. The oldest came out all covered in red hair. Well, let me tell you: that made her think!Īt last, the babies were born. The one shall be stronger than the other, This is what God said:Īnd two peoples born of you shall be divided: So she went and asked the God of life about it. Her belly, it swelled and swelled, and the babies inside, they fought and fought, and she felt like she was being torn apart. Rebekah conceived-but oh! it was twins! and oh! it was difficult. For twenty years, 240 months, there was nix, nada, nothing! No baby! Finally, Isaac prayed to his father’s God, the God of life: and God heard his prayer. You’ve heard of Father Abraham and Mother Sarah, yes? And how they had a son named Isaac? Well, this is a story about Isaac and his wife Rebekah, and their double trouble. Isaac loved Rebekah dearly, but she couldn’t have children. Once upon a time, there was a family: and this is a story from its beginnings, what we call its genesis.
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