Haftarah V’yishlach
“Sibling Rivalry Distress”
Hosea 11:7-12:12 (A)
Obadiah 1:1-21 (S)
excerpted from TorahScope Haftarah Exhortations
By the time the Torah student arrives at V’yishlach (Genesis 32:4-36:43), describing the return of Jacob to Canaan—after an estimated twenty years in Haran building a family and establishing a sizeable estate—the reminder that a sibling rivalry was still simmering with Esau, comes as no surprise. When you recall the circumstances of Jacob’s surreptitious escape from the potential clutches of the swindled Esau, ill feelings understandably persisted (Genesis 27:41). The opening passages of this parashah demonstrate how Jacob was definitely not finished, with what modern theologians often label as the “sanctification process”:
“Jacob sent messengers in front of him to Esau, his brother, to the land of Seir, the field of Edom. He commanded them, saying, ‘This is what you shall tell my lord, Esau: “This is what your servant, Jacob, says. I have lived as a foreigner with Laban, and stayed until now. I have cattle, donkeys, flocks, male servants, and female servants. I have sent to tell my lord, that I may find favor in your sight”’” (Genesis 32:3-5, WMB).
Fear of the justified retribution of Esau prompted Jacob to send waves of gifts, seemingly bribing his brother for mercy, knowing that he had threatened earlier to kill him when Isaac died:
“Then Jacob was greatly afraid and was distressed. He divided the people who were with him, along with the flocks, the herds, and the camels, into two companies. He said, If Esau comes to the one company, and strikes it, then the company which is left will escape.’ Jacob said, ‘God of my father Abraham, and God of my father Isaac, the LORD, who said to me, “Return to your country, and to your relatives, and I will do you good,” I am not worthy of the least of all the loving kindnesses, and of all the truth, which you have shown to your servant; for with just my staff I crossed over this Jordan; and now I have become two companies. Please deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau; for I fear him, lest he come and strike me and the mothers with the children. You said, “I will surely do you good, and make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which can’t be counted because there are so many.”’ He stayed there that night, and took from that which he had with him a present for Esau, his brother: two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, thirty milk camels and their colts, forty cows, ten bulls, twenty female donkeys and ten foals. He delivered them into the hands of his servants, every herd by itself, and said to his servants, ‘Pass over before me, and put a space between herd and herd.’ He commanded the foremost, saying, ‘When Esau, my brother, meets you, and asks you, saying, “Whose are you? Where are you going? Whose are these before you?” Then you shall say, “They are your servant, Jacob’s. It is a present sent to my lord, Esau. Behold, he also is behind us.”’ He commanded also the second, and the third, and all that followed the herds, saying, ‘This is how you shall speak to Esau, when you find him. You shall say, “Not only that, but behold, your servant, Jacob, is behind us.”’ For, he said, ‘I will appease him with the present that goes before me, and afterward I will see his face. Perhaps he will accept me’” (Genesis 32:7-20, WMB).
It was at this point, after Jacob had divided his camp and done everything humanly possible to manipulate the potential confrontation with his twin brother, that an incredible wrestling match with a supernatural being took place (Genesis 32:24-32). It was from this stressful set of circumstances when Jacob was not only renamed Israel, but the crippling aftermath of a permanent limp would now remind him of his human frailty and encounter with God until his death. While the offerings of flocks might have moved Esau to forgiveness, it could have been the sight of his limping brother stooping to his knees, which actually triggered a merciful exoneration for stealing Esau’s blessing as the eldest son.
Yet one problem remained: the prophetic word heard by Rebekah during her pregnancy, was more than simply a message about two twins in a womb. It was also about two peoples which would come from the descendants of the two men who were Isaac and Rebekah’s only children:
“The children struggled together within her. She said, ‘If it is like this, why do I live?’ She went to inquire of the LORD. The LORD said to her, ‘Two nations are in your womb. Two peoples will be separated from your body. The one people will be stronger than the other people. The elder will serve the younger.’ When her days to be delivered were fulfilled, behold, there were twins in her womb” (Genesis 25:22-24, WMB).
It is possible that by the time this delicate reunion was to take place, both Jacob and Esau were very aware of what motivated Rebekah to take the actions she did, to secure the blessing of Isaac for Jacob. But after some twenty years of separation, and the obvious differences in relative strength, as Esau was commanding a band of 400 warriors, compared to Jacob’s much smaller company of family, livestock, and servants—the stronger Esau was in a position as the eldest to offer help to the younger. In fact, when you read through the rest of the parashah, you discover that Jacob, after an unpleasant experience in Shechem, did make it to the encampment of his father Isaac. Then we find, in what had to be a somewhat similar scene to Ishmael and Isaac burying Abraham decades earlier, Esau and Jacob burying their father Isaac in the same cave at Machpelah, which was the final resting place for Abraham. Some time after the burial, it is recorded that because of the relative overcrowded conditions of the livestock, that Esau chose to leave Canaan and resettle in what became known as Edom, in the hills to the east:
“Esau took his wives, his sons, his daughters, and all the members of his household, with his livestock, all his animals, and all his possessions, which he had gathered in the land of Canaan, and went into a land away from his brother Jacob. For their substance was too great for them to dwell together, and the land of their travels couldn’t bear them because of their livestock. Esau lived in the hill country of Seir. Esau is Edom” (Genesis 36:6-8, WMB).
We are beginning to see some of the fulfillment of Rebekah’s prophetic word taking root. The stronger budding nation of Esau’s descendants, as evidenced by all of the children and grandchildren listed in Genesis 36, was actually serving the younger nation, by leaving the area they occupied and moving to the east. When reading the prophecy of Obadiah, which the Sages chose to reflect upon as they considered the messages contained in this parashah, we can see how these passages can instruct us about the course of history which God has ordained for Israel (cf. 1 Corinthians 10:11).
As our Torah readings will later lead us to look at the sojourn of Ancient Israel from Egypt back to the Promised Land, we are told a number of times of how Israel wanted to travel through Edom. This was a land occupied by their cousins, the offspring of Esau:
“Moses sent messengers from Kadesh to the king of Edom, saying: ‘Your brother Israel says: You know all the travail that has happened to us; how our fathers went down into Egypt, and we lived in Egypt a long time. The Egyptians mistreated us and our fathers. When we cried to the LORD, he heard our voice, sent an angel, and brought us out of Egypt. Behold, we are in Kadesh, a city in the edge of your border. Please let us pass through your land. We will not pass through field or through vineyard, neither will we drink from the water of the wells. We will go along the king’s highway. We will not turn away to the right hand nor to the left, until we have passed your border.’ Edom said to him, ‘You shall not pass through me, lest I come out with the sword against you.’ The children of Israel said to him, ‘We will go up by the highway; and if we drink your water, I and my livestock, then I will give its price. Only let me, without doing anything else, pass through on my feet.’ He said, ‘You shall not pass through.’ Edom came out against him with many people, and with a strong hand. Thus Edom refused to give Israel passage through his border, so Israel turned away from him” (Numbers 20:14-21, WMB).
The animosity which was inbred into Edom from the womb of Rebekah, took on greater strength. Here in Numbers, the threat of warfare with Edom actually turned the fleeing Israel to many more years in the wilderness.
It is at this point of contention, that when you read the prophecy of Obadiah, you get a foreshadowing of not only what is going to happen at some time in the future—but also a reiteration of what the Edomites did to Israel when the Babylonians took away the Southern Kingdom exiles. Because the absolute date of when the prophecy was given, is not possible to determine, you can discern that some of the admonitions to Edom from Obadiah concerned how it was not to react in Judah’s days of distress:
“In the day that you stood on the other side, in the day that strangers carried away his substance and foreigners entered into his gates and cast lots for Jerusalem, even you were like one of them. But don’t look down on your brother in the day of his disaster, and don’t rejoice over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction. Don’t speak proudly in the day of distress. Don’t enter into the gate of my people in the day of their calamity. Don’t look down on their affliction in the day of their calamity, neither seize their wealth on the day of their calamity. Don’t stand in the crossroads to cut off those of his who escape. Don’t deliver up those of his who remain in the day of distress. For the day of the LORD is near all the nations! As you have done, it will be done to you. Your deeds will return upon your own head. For as you have drunk on my holy mountain, so all the nations will drink continually. Yes, they will drink, swallow down, and will be as though they had not been. But in Mount Zion, there will be those who escape, and it will be holy. The house of Jacob will possess their possessions. The house of Jacob will be a fire, the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble. They will burn among them and devour them. There will not be any remaining to the house of Esau.” Indeed, the LORD has spoken” (Obadiah 11-18, WMB).
When you consider this passage, you are reminded of not only the Babylonian exile of the Southern Kingdom and the destruction of the First Temple, but perhaps also the Roman siege which came in 70 C.E. when Jerusalem and the Second Temple were destroyed. Additionally, the significant references, to the day of destruction and day of distress, are possibly an indication of what Jeremiah referred to as Jacob’s distress (Jeremiah 30:7)—the Great Tribulation.
Obadiah’s references to the holiness of Mount Zion and the escape of the House of Jacob, is reminiscent of some Tribulation scenarios. The description of the House of Jacob being a fire and the House of Joseph being a flame, is somewhat indicative of all Israel coming back together, involving the considerable reduction of Edom to stubble. How this all manifests itself, is up to conjecture and speculation, but it is interesting to note that the concluding verses indicate how this all transpires at the End of the Age when the Lord’s Kingdom prevails:
“Those of the South will possess the mountain of Esau, and those of the lowland, the Philistines. They will possess the field of Ephraim, and the field of Samaria. Benjamin will possess Gilead. The captives of this army of the children of Israel, who are among the Canaanites, will possess even to Zarephath; and the captives of Jerusalem, who are in Sepharad, will possess the cities of the Negev. Saviors will go up on Mount Zion to judge the mountains of Esau, and the kingdom will be the LORD’s” (Obadiah 19-21, WMB).
Here as the prophecy concludes, even specific people groups are declared the ultimate residents of various parts of Edom and Canaan. You may be reminded of some later words from the Apostle Paul, written to the Roman Believers as he was attempting to clarify how God sovereignly chooses certain peoples for certain destinies. In the case of the descendants of Esau or Jacob, the final choice was the Great Potter’s, as He selected some vessels for glory and others for destruction:
“Not only so, but Rebekah also conceived by one, by our father Isaac. For being not yet born, neither having done anything good or bad, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him who calls, it was said to her, ‘The elder will serve the younger’ [Genesis 25:23]. Even as it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated’ [Malachi 1:2-3]. What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? May it never be!…But indeed, O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed ask him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’ Or hasn’t the potter a right over the clay, from the same lump to make one part a vessel for honor, and another for dishonor? What if God, willing to show his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, and that he might make known the riches of his glory on vessels of mercy, which he prepared beforehand for glory—us, whom he also called, not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles?” (Romans 9:10-14, 20-24, WMB).
The sibling rivalry established from the conception of Jacob and Esau, is going to persist into the end-times. Why it is going to persist is a legitimate question. I believe the answer is only understood when you recognize your position before the Creator God. If you have to wrestle with Him for understanding what this means, then please start now! It is a good sign if you are concerned about whether you are going to ultimately be a vessel for His mercy and glory, or a vessel prepared for His wrath and destruction. As Jacob eventually discovered, going through life with a limp, is far more desirable than separation from the Holy One.
Esau seems to have regretted his decisions about selling his birthright and despising the blessing. He wept bitterly about this, and you get the distinct impression that there was genuine remorse from him:
“Isaac answered Esau, ‘Behold, I have made him your lord, and all his brothers I have given to him for servants. I have sustained him with grain and new wine. What then will I do for you, my son?’ Esau said to his father, ‘Do you have just one blessing, my father? Bless me, even me also, my father.’ Esau lifted up his voice, and wept. Isaac his father answered him, ‘Behold, your dwelling will be of the fatness of the earth, and of the dew of the sky from above. You will live by your sword, and you will serve your brother. It will happen, when you will break loose, that you will shake his yoke from off your neck.’ Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father blessed him. Esau said in his heart, ‘The days of mourning for my father are at hand. Then I will kill my brother Jacob’” (Genesis 27:37-41, WMB).
Based on what transpired in the generations following Esau’s death, and even with what is depicted in Obadiah, there is every indication that this particular sibling rivalry persists through time, as the inclination for evil remains in the human heart. The warning for Believers today, is that if you find yourself in a position where you are ambivalent toward your inherited blessings—or the birthright of another Believer who has come to salvation via the shed blood of Messiah Yeshua—let me urge you with all my heart to cry out for mercy! The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob reminds us how His mercy triumphs over judgment (James 2:13). The problem is that you have to ask, plead, beg, implore, beseech, and entreat Him with all your heart to receive this mercy. Now is better than later, because we cannot be sure when later might turn into never!
