Blessing of Ephraim

Last week I noted how Esau's willingness to forgive Jacob was an act of incredible strength. Yesterday I was reading the story of Jacob's last moments on earth. I thought back to the trouble between Jacob and Esau when Jacob's blessed Joseph's sons. Let me do a quick recap of what has happened between Jacob facing Esau and Jacob blessing Joseph's sons:

Jacob favored his son Joseph over his other brothers and gave him a fancy coat. Joseph bragged about his dreaming of his brothers and parents bowing down to him. Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery, ripped his fancy coat, covered it in blood and let their father believe Joseph was dead. Joseph's brother Judah impregnates his daughter-in-law...but that is a story for another day. Joseph became successful while working for Potiphar but Potiphar's wife had the hots for Joseph so Joseph ended up getting thrown into prison. Joseph is eventually freed through interpreting dreams for the baker, cup bearer and Pharaoh. Pharaoh put Joseph in charge and there was a great famine. Only Egypt had food and it was under control of Joseph. Joseph's brothers came and bought food from Joseph but didn't recognized him. Joseph worked it out to get his whole family to Egypt, they were given choice land and everyone lived happily ever after...sort of.

Whew. Ten chapters in ten (sometimes run-on) sentences.

Jacob starts to near death and so Joseph brings his sons to Jacob (aka Israel) to be blessed by him:

"And Joseph took them both, Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel's left hand, and Manasseh in his left hand toward Israel's right hand, and brought them near him."

Now it is important to know that Manasseh is the older of the two and therefore was to be given the better blessing which would be signified by placing the right hand on his head. But Jacob had a different idea:

"And Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on the head of Ephraim, who was the younger, and his left hand on the head of Manasseh, crossing his hands (for Manasseh was the firstborn)."

It is clear that Jacob purposely gave the better blessing to Ephraim by crossing his hands. It wasn't a simple mistake of grabbing the wrong boy's head. Jacob even says as much when Joseph confronts him over it. It is almost the same thing that caused all the problems between Jacob and Esau. Jacob was the younger brother and stole his older brother Esau's blessing. But in this situation the blessing of the younger son was intentional.

What I find interesting is that Joseph was a beneficiary of preferential treatment. He was treated by Jacob as if he was a first born child even when he was not. Yet he objects to Jacob treating Ephraim as the first born over Manasseh. It is an instance of where Joseph was willing to accept the preferential treatment when he was younger but then saw it differently when he was older. It is a cautionary tale of how our perspectives may change as we mature. It is also a good example of how patterns in a family tend to repeat.

The Incredible Strength of Esau

Yesterday I shared how Jacob and Laban had a father-in-law/son-in-law relationship that left something to be desired. Laban had been dishonest in his dealing with Jacob and after a while Laban started to dislike Jacob. Jacob ended up fleeing with his family that led to a confrontation with Laban. The result of this confrontation was that Jacob and Laban agreed to go their separate ways. They put a pile of rocks on the ground and agreed to stay on their own side of the rocks. The agreement means that Jacob ends up in the same basic area of land as his brother Esau.

Jacob cheated and stole Esau's birthright and blessing. Esau vowed to kill Jacob which is what caused Jacob to end up with Laban in the first place.

Jacob is now left to face his brother. I am sure that Jacob could have simply avoided Esau if he really wanted to but to his credit he decided to face up to what he had done. Jacob sent some messengers to Esau to ostensibly see how Esau would react. The reaction that the messengers report doesn't seem quite what Jacob was hoping for but probably about what Jacob expected:

"And the messengers returned to Jacob, saying, 'We came to your brother Esau, and he is coming to meet you, and there are four hundred men with him.' Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed. He divided the people who were with him, and the flocks and herds and camels, into two camps, thinking, 'If Esau comes to the one camp and attacks it, then the camp that is left will escape.'"

It can be frightening to have to face the consequences for our actions. Especially when those consequences are impossibly big. I am sure Jacob figured that Esau coming out with 400 men meant only one thing.

Fortunately for Jacob, Esau had very different intentions than what was expected:

"And Jacob lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, Esau was coming, and four hundred men with him. So he divided the children among Leah and Rachel and the two female servants. And he put the servants with their children in front, then Leah with her children, and Rachel and Joseph last of all. He himself went on before them, bowing himself to the ground seven times, until he came near to his brother. But Esau ran to meet him and embraced him and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they wept."

Jacob went out in front of his family in order to face Esau. Yes, Jacob had first sent gifts to Esau. But when it came right down to it Jacob faced Esau. Jacob didn't try and use his family as a shield. Jacob didn't try and run away. Jacob stood alone before Esau.

There were two acts of strength and courage in this story. The first one was Jacob standing alone before Esau. The second one is when Esau forgave Jacob. Jacob's act took an incredible amount of strength. But it is Esau's willingness to forgive Jacob that I find really impressive. Letting go of the hurt when someone has wronged me can be very difficult. One of the hardest lines for me in the Lord's Prayer is:

"And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors."

What I have found to be helpful in forgiving others is when I remember just how much forgiveness I need. I realize that my forgiving others is still a work in progress. But like anything else the more I forgive others the better and easier it becomes.

 

Do three lefts make a right?

The relationship between Jacob and Laban was often a contentious one. Who hasn't heard a joke about how difficult a mother-in-law can be? But in this case Jacob was having trouble with his father-in-law. Laban was often deceitful in his dealings with Jacob. Laban agreed to let Jacob marry one daughter but then switched to the other one at the last minute (Genesis 29:15-15). Later Laban agreed to pay Jacob with all of his spotted and striped sheep and goats only to give them to his sons before Jacob could do anything (Genesis 30:25-26). Slowly Jacob starts building his own flock when Laban's flocks start to have more striped and spotted offspring. The problem is that Jacob starts to become rich and this doesn't sit well with Laban and his sons. Finally things come to a head in Genesis 31:1-7:

"Now Jacob heard that the sons of Laban were saying, 'Jacob has taken all that was our father’s, and from what was our father’s he has gained all this wealth.' And Jacob saw that Laban did not regard him with favor as before. Then the Lord said to Jacob, 'Return to the land of your fathers and to your kindred, and I will be with you.'

"So Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah into the field where his flock was and said to them, 'I see that your father does not regard me with favor as he did before. But the God of my father has been with me. You know that I have served your father with all my strength, yet your father has cheated me and changed my wages ten times. But God did not permit him to harm me.'"

If this was all we knew about Jacob then it might be easier to feel sorry for him. I know that I have a hard time seeing people being cheated and unfairly treated. But it is a bit of a different story when the person being cheated is dishonest. Who doesn't like to see someone get their comeuppance?

Jacob cheated and stole his brother's birthright and blessing so on a certain level it is satisfying to see Jacob get a taste of his own medicine. Hence the saying: "You reap what you sow."

But does Jacob's cheating behavior make it ok for Laban to cheat Jacob?

I would guess that most people would agree that it wasn't right for Laban to cheat Jacob regardless of what Jacob had done in the past. So if it isn't right for Laban to cheat Jacob then is it still right for us to take satisfaction in Jacob getting a taste of his own medicine? Can we still root for Jacob being cheated when we are condemning the person doing the cheating? Not if we want to be consistent.

My guess is that we aren't really rooting for Laban to cheat Jacob when we take satisfaction in Jacob getting a taste of his own medicine. Rather what is happening is that we have an innate desire to see justice done. The problem is that we can often seek to see justice done even when it comes in the form of an act of injustice. Seeking the right result through the wrong means is still wrong. There is a right way and a wrong way to seek justice. It is why vigilantism is illegal.

This isn't to say that all forms of punishment are wrong. We have a justice system (as broken as it may seem at times) for a reason. What we need to be careful about is when we start to take satisfaction in seeing unjust forms of justice take place. When we do we are promoting and justifying injustice.

 

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.


 

Christian Ethic vs. Karma

The story of Jacob and Esau is a fascinating tale and yet at the same time not very surprising. Anyone that has a brother or has seen brothers in action knows that the potential for conflict is great. As a bit of self-disclosure I must admit that my brother and I have had a pretty good relationship all things considered. Neither one of us–as far as I know–has tried to steal or trick the other out of their birthright or blessing as Jacob did to Esau. Nor has either of us–again I am assuming here–has plotted to kill the other as Esau did with Jacob.

But there has been some sibling rivalry. For example I was a better student in school while he was always the superior athlete. Jacob and Esau's rivalry far surpassed that. After Jacob cheated Esau out of Isaac's birthright and blessing Jacob took off to find a wife...and escape from Esau's murder plot.

Jacob went back to the "old country" to find a wife because his parents decided that they didn't want a Hittite or Canaanite for a daughter-in-law. Esau overheard the "Don't marry one of those Canaanite women" comment from his father. Unfortunately for Esau he already had two Hittite wives.

Talk about things not going right. Esau is the older brother and has lost all of the privileges that go with being the older brother and he finds out that his parent's don't approve of his wives.

So what does Esau do?

He marries a third woman who is not a Canaanite in order to try and make amends.

Not that divorcing his wives would have been the right thing to do, but Esau tried to make things better by putting a patch on to his old mistakes. And I think that we can often do the same thing.

We can fall into the trap of functioning under an ethic of karma rather than a Christian ethic which is an ethic of righteousness and grace. An ethic of karma is when we try and amend for our past mistakes by doing more good things. We are trying to balance out the scales. It is as if we say to ourselves, "Well I didn't get to church this Sunday so I will make sure that I say an extra prayer, put a few extra dollars in the offering and go to the midweek service. That will more than make up for missing church." And that may soothe our soul in our own eyes and maybe even in the eyes of others.

But that is not how it works in God's eyes.

In a Christian ethic when we make a mistake we ask for forgiveness and God forgives our mistake. That is the grace part. We don't get the forgiveness because we have made up for it in some way. No, God forgives us not because we deserve it but because he wants to forgive us. But there is another part to a Christian ethic. There is a righteousness part as well. After we make our mistakes we do try and right any wrongs that we have committed but more importantly we try and not make those same mistakes again. We try and live a righteous life not by simply adding a patch onto our old mistakes but by trying to avoid them all together.

In Esau's case marrying a non-Canaanite woman (or even divorcing his Hittite wives) does not make his relationship with his parents or his brother right. What ends up making Esau's relationship right with Jacob is when the two of them meet up again many years later is that Esau puts the past behind them.

Further Reading

The story of Jacob and Esau can be found in Genesis 25:19-36:43