Toledot

The Generations (of Isaac)

Genesis 25:19 - 28:8

* Rebekah has twins, Esau and Jacob. (25:19-26)

* Esau gives Jacob his birthright in exchange for some stew. (25:27-34)

* King Abimelech is led to think that Rebekah is Isaac's sister and later finds out that she is really his wife. (26:1-16)

* Isaac plans to bless Esau, his firstborn. Rebekah and Jacob deceive Isaac so that Jacob receives the blessing. (27:1-29)

* Esau threatens to kill Jacob, who then flees to Haran. (27:30-45)

This chapter is the only one in which Isaac figures as an active protagonist. Before, he was a bound victim; after, he will be seen as a bamboozled blind old man. His only other initiated act is his brief moment as intercessor on behalf of his wife in 25:21.”

Excerpt From

The Hebrew Bible: A Translation with Commentary (Vol. Three-Volume Set)

Robert Alter

“It is ironic that while the text here emphasizes Jacob’s lack of physicality, later in Genesis (32:23–33), when Jacob wrestles with a mysterious stranger who might be either an angel or his brother (among many distinct possiblities), the supposedly unphysical Jacob demonstrates his physical strength. Jacob matures; he uses both his mind and his physical strength. Maturity is about wholeness, the integration of human talents and abilities.”

“How telling, then, that some commentators suggest that Isaac’s blindness is far more than a physical disability. Isaac is blind—that is, oblivious—to the consequences of following the ancient and honored principle of letting the firstborn inherit. Isaac’s love blinds him to the reality that his firstborn is unfit to head the family, because he lives only in the present and has no concept of the future.”

“Rabbi Samuel Karff, a Reform rabbi from Houston, Texas, reminds us in The Torah: A Modern Commentary:

Apparently even God must select imperfect instruments to fulfill His purposes. He must choose between Jacob—a man who desires the birthright so deeply he will cheat to secure it—and Esau who so lightly esteems it that he forfeits the birthright for a bowl of lentils. Jacob’s calculated cunning must be weighed against Esau’s undisciplined craving for immediate self-gratification. Working with “human material” involved God in a difficult but inescapable choice, and God decides: It is better to care too much than too little.1”

Excerpt From

The Modern Men's Torah Commentary

Rabbi Jeffrey K. Salkin

“And these are the generations of Isaac, son of Abraham: Abraham begat Isaac. (25:19)

The problem is obvious. The first half of the sentence tells us that Isaac was the son of Abraham. Why then does the text repeat, “Abraham begat Isaac”? Looking at the apparent redundancy of the text in the context of the Abraham-Isaac narrative as a whole, the sages offered the following interpretation:

The cynics of the time were saying, “Sarah became pregnant through Avimelekh. See how many years she lived with Abraham without being able to have a child by him.” What did the Holy One blessed be He do? He made Isaac’s facial features exactly resemble those of Abraham, so that everyone had to admit that Abraham begat Isaac. This is what is meant by the words “Abraham begat Isaac” – there was clear evidence that Abraham was Isaac’s father.”

“Examine Genesis carefully, and we see that Isaac is the least individuated of the patriarchs. His life reads like a replay of his father’s. Like Abraham, he is forced by famine to go to the land of the Philistines.2 He too encounters Avimelekh. He too feels impelled to say that his wife is his sister. He re-digs the wells his father dug. Isaac seems to do little that is distinctively his own.”

“The present is never fully determined by the present. Sometimes it is only later that we understand now. Covenant & Conversation: Genesis

Jonathan Sacks

https://books.apple.com/us/book/covenant-conversation-genesis/id757838329

This material may be protected by copyright. This is the significance of the great revelation of God to Moses, where He says “you will see My back; but My face shall not be seen” (Exodus 33:33) – meaning, God’s presence can be seen only when we look back at the past; it can never be known or predicted in advance. The indeterminacy of meaning at any given moment is what gives the biblical text its openness to ongoing interpretation.

“The words verav ya’avod tza’ir seem simple: “the older will serve the younger.” Returning to them in the light of subsequent events, though, we discover that they are anything but clear. They contain multiple ambiguities.

The first (noted by Radak and Rabbi Joseph ibn Kaspi) is that the word et, signalling the object of the verb, is missing. Normally in biblical Hebrew the subject precedes the verb, and the object follows – but not always. In Job 14:19 for example, the words avanim shaḥaku mayim mean “water wears away stones,” not “stones wear away water.” Thus, while the phrase told to Rebecca might mean “the older shall serve the younger,” it could also mean “the younger shall serve the older.” To be sure, the latter would be poetic Hebrew rather than conventional prose style, but that is what this utterance is: a poem.”

“The second – and this is fundamental to an understanding of Genesis – is that the future is never as straightforward as we are led to believe. Abraham was promised many children but had to wait years before Isaac was born. The patriarchs were promised a land but did not acquire it in their lifetimes. The Jewish journey, though it has a destination, is long and has many digressions and setbacks. Will Jacob serve or be served? We do not know. Only after a long, enigmatic struggle alone at night does Jacob receive the name Israel, meaning, “he who struggles with God and with men and prevails” (32:28).

The significance of this strange, ambiguous, passage is both literary and theological. The future affects our understanding of the past. We live our lives toward the future, but we understand our lives only in retrospect. Only looking back can we see whether we took the right road, whether a certain decision was justified, whether our dreams were intimations or illusions. Life involves risk, which is why we need faith, and the courage to which faith gives rise. We are part of a story whose last chapter has not yet been written. “That rests with us, as it rested with Jacob.”That[…]”

“Arendt summarizes her thesis in a single, telling phrase which links her analysis to that of Amy Chua. What gives rise to anti-Semitism is, she says, the phenomenon of “wealth without power.” That was precisely the position of Isaac among the Philistines.”

What is remarkable is less what happens than how the Torah describes it, its use of language and narrative art. In general the Torah is sparing in its details, especially about the emotional state of its characters. Its descriptions are minimalist, leaving the reader to supply what the text omits: what the characters look like, their location, body language and so on. Emmanuel Levinas was surely correct1 in seeing this as an invitation to midrash, summoning the reader to complete the text in dialogue with the written word – the Torah is more like radio than television, actively enlisting the imaginative participation of its hearers. This is, then, a passage unusual in its literary explicitness and psychological depth of drama.

“The “fat places of the earth” and the “dew of heaven” are not so circumscribed, implies Isaac, that there will not be enough for both of you. This is a blessing both sons can enjoy without the one diminishing the other. As for Jacob’s supremacy, it will last only as long as he does not misuse it. If he acts with unwarranted high-handedness, Esau will simply “throw his yoke off” his neck. There is a basis here for coexistence.”

“The fourth passage, Genesis 36, is the list of Esau’s descendants. At first glance it is no different from the many other genealogies in Genesis, but it contains two significant pieces of information, one explicit, the other implicit. The first is the statement, “These are the kings who ruled in the Land of Edom before any king reigned in Israel” (36:31). The second is the contrast between the closing verse of chapter 36 and the opening verse of chapter 37: “These are the tribes of Esau, each with its own settlements in its hereditary lands [eretz aḥuzatam] …Meanwhile, Jacob lived in the land where his father had lived as an alien [be’eretz megurei aviv].” The implication could not be clearer. Esau’s descendants establish themselves geographically and politically long before Jacob’s. Not for them the twists and turns of covenantal history – exile, slavery, redemption and the wilderness years. While both twins may eventually inherit the fat places of the earth and the dew of heaven, for one the route is straightforward, for the other, anything but.”

“This too is part of the Torah’s message. Just as we cannot predict God’s actions in advance (“I will be who I will be,” “I will have mercy and show kindness to whomever I desire”),8 so we cannot predict in advance where God’s image will shine in the affairs of mankind. It was the sectarians of Qumran, not the rabbis, who divided mankind into the “children of light” and the “children of darkness.” Such anthropological dualism is as alien to Judaism as is theological dualism.”

“[Jacob] also married Rachel, and he loved Rachel more than Leah…[God] saw that Leah was hated [senua]…(29:30)

I have translated this last phrase literally to give it its full, shocking force in the Hebrew. Leah, of course, was not hated – she was loved, Rachel was only loved more.9 Yet the sense of rejection cuts deep, so deep that the Torah does not hesitate to compare it to the feeling of being hated. And one who feels rejected may hate in return. That is why the brothers “hate” Joseph (the verb is used three times – a significant repetition – in chapter 37”

“To be chosen does not mean that others are unchosen. To be secure in one’s relationship with God does not depend on negating the possibility that others too may have a (different) relationship with Him. Jacob was loved by his mother, Esau by his father; but what of God who is neither father nor mother but both and more than both?”

Excerpt From

Covenant & Conversation: Genesis

Jonathan Sacks

“But the children struggled in her womb, and she said, “If so, why do I exist?”

—Genesis 25:22”

“Raising children to carry on our values and aspirations into a future we will never see is one such sacred task. Bequeathing a spiritual inheritance is a holy act that makes the sorrows intrinsic to every parent’s life worthwhile.”

Excerpt From

A Year with Mordecai Kaplan

Steven Carr Reuben

“During much of the biblical period, Tanakh tells us, people spoke to God, and God spoke back. More, God actively sought people out and communicated God’s will to them. But by the end of the biblical period, the line of direct divine communication had largely dried up. Instead of seeking direct dialogue with God, people began to seek guidance and inspiration in God’s teachings—that is, in Torah. Insisting that God’s will and presence could be found in Torah was one of Judaism’s greatest innovations and achievements. It was also one of its greatest gambles.”

Excerpt From

The Heart of Torah, Volume 1

Shai Held