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Meaning Esau Have I Scorned
(a Bible study)

Jacob was
Preferenced
To set the course of Israel
To become a people
Who shall live
The same
With an identity

Moses having gotten the name
Of God
Or as close as we shall get
(being I am that I am
not unlike Popeye
in our time)
To have a name
And also laws
Carved in organic stone
For living people

And these
Are not as hazy
As a name that needs no name

The laws are clear
And shall become
A code
A compass
And a litmus
Who readings shall prove
Judgment
In favor or against
This people

And
In fact
Jacob shall become
Israel in name
And in that amazing purpose
Claiming certain tribes
Marked from the children
And eventually
A homeland
For the twelve
With all conviction
And the foibles
That this people carry
While God must bear with them
And so
With all of us
Called Israel
Or something else

But now this matter about
Jacob loved
And Esau
Even hated

We know that Esau was the older
And so
Should inherit
The identity
And naming
Of the family

Should be in charge
Of all things
Of Esau’s own
And the family that shall grow
And the nation that shall
Grow from the family

And it seems
That Jacob was called
Already having
All the mother’s favoritism
And so t
Plot
Works tricks
Sarah with Jacob
To set
And own
Israel
At last
 
And tricks they are
To use a situation
In which
Esau says
Out of exigence
Yes
My younger brother
You may have the birthright
And inheritance

And then to fool the father
To fool Isaac
With tricks of wool tied to an arm
So that Joseph would be taken
For Esau
And so
As we say
Seal the deal

And in an eon later
The Apostle Paul
Confirm
That not only was a providence
At work
To found then nation
But that the founder
Was
In truth
Loved by God
While the official candidate
Was hated

My
What had Esau done

And I think
The answer might be
Nothing

Paul asked for the assignment
And got it
To kill the followers of Christ
The ones who in Antioch
Were for the first
Time
Called Christian
And yet
Paul came to be a founder of that
Church in Antioch
And several other cities
In the region
Going north and east
And west
From Jerusalem
And finally ending his evangelistic travels
Inside Rome
Itself

Peter was brash
(we shouldn’t be surprised
if he pushed Andrew
around)
And he consistently said
That wrong thing to Jesus
Showing a rhetorical
Tendency
To go too far

He also maimed
A guard
When Jesus was arrested

And for the all the wrong things
He said
He did
That showed mismanagement
Among other things
He was called by Christ
To be the church’s rock
Once the movement
As it were
Solidified

Peter would become the first leader
Of the church
First pope
First “papa”
So to say
The first in charge
In the days when
Such groups
Can go under

Often do

And Moses

Well
We know
That he had grown
Inside a lie
Through childhood
That should have ruined him
And nearly did
Upon disclosure

And Moses
Murdered an Egyptian
And rather than face justice
Chose to flee
Seeking to live away
From the court of Pharaoh
Also maybe
God
For all the years he might have
Remaining
In Midian
As it
Turned out

But
No
This murderer
And coward
Who on top of these
Offered excuses
To the Lord
Why it could not be he
To free the people
And to lead them
Though that is
Through many chapters
Precisely
What transpired

So shall we say that
Jacob got in
And Esau was out
Because God favors paradox
Maybe mischief
Like an association with the raven
Or the spider
Which he made
After all
The creatures as well as mischief

Or is there
Something else
A reason for one sibling
Technically
The wrong one
To be raised
While the right one
Was put down

Sigh
So much deception
By the way
Especially
Even over generations
To get the broad
Extraordinary story
Going

Adam and Eve
And the blame over
Who did what
Between the people
And the serpent
And the casting
Out
(or down)
Regardless

Then the Nephilim
Who were not supposed to exist
By order of
The Lord
But through rebellion
Of some sort
(the kind that angels cause
as well as we
might foment)
Well
Happened
Anyway

With Abraham
The futures of two nations
Were at stake
And so at risk
Through the faithlessness
Of those who heard the prophecy
About numberless
Family
And
Specifically
A child

Sarah laughed
We know
And sent a servant to become
Pregnant by Abraham
And so secure
The lineage
As if the word of God
And God through angels
Could not
Be enough

And there was
Ishmael
And then there was Isaac
And the younger Isaac
Had to be favored
Over Ishmael
Who out of lack of mercy
And of jealousy
Was
Cast out
To die somewhere
With the mother Hagar
And they did not
For God
In fact
Is higher
Than the mischief

God said
To Israel
The nation
You don’t want a king
Who will take your youth
And crops
And wealth
Inside the palace
To feed decision-makers
Also idlers
As always happens
And to people up an army
That means
The young ones that are taken
Might die
More so than if
They stayed at home
Or rose to fight
As volunteers
With will

You don’t want a king
And Israel said
Yes
We do
And God said fine
And what a pair were set
To rule
Saul
And then David
Before the long prosperity
And peace
With Solomon

The first two realms
Indeed possessed
Strength
And beauty
Also corruption
Broken faith
And politics
Without perspective for the
Welfare of the nation

More paradox
More
Mischief
I don’t think so
I think
Rather it was
More than Esau being negated
Was that Jacob
Was uplifted
Like serving on a search committee
And we find ourselves
Talking down some candidates
When the job is to
Cite the reasons why
We should hire
The one
We think well
Should be hired

Which is to say
Jacob was favored
Maybe not because
In life
Esau was not
But in the naming and the keeping
Of the people of the Lord
Despite officialness
Jacob
Was the one
And that might be all

To be the one
For good or ill
Like Moses
Or like Miriam
Like Abrahaham and Sarah
Like Peter
And like Paul

Somewhere within these
And without
Inside the region
And the age
Certain ones are needed
And God shall have that happen
Though our will
Be predominant
More so
Is the widest will
And way
Of God

Don’t like the limitations
On our discretion
And
I think
Our pride

Well
That is understandable
Since the choice for faith
Is paramount
And determines
Afterlife salvation
On our part
Because God’s part
Is done
And is reliable
Unchanging
The love and judgment brought
To bear
On people of the Earth
Past and present

But
Things are
You know
The way things are
And we must hold the limitations
Of the worldly way
On us

While God is unlimited
To own perfection
To impose a will
Unfaulty
And unfailing

The timelines
And the composition
Might seem strange to us
Though we are not celestial
Yet
And there is enough
To manage
Through our foibles
And the things that seem like foibles
From the Lord
But are
As Narnia might say
Deep magic
With rules that came before the rules
The foundation of commandments
And of all experience
To come
And then light and dark
Were made
To overcome
Not chaos
But the void

Rather than nothingness
We have so many things
And we are loved
And there is
Indeed celestial
A hope
That goes with love and judgment
That the world
Through that part
And that person of God
Be saved

c l couch


coda

One might say
Well
Esau himself was brash

He threw away
Birthright
And inheritance
To satiate
An immediate need
Which we could argue
Was not a need
So much
As we might have needs
At all

But
I don’t know

How should Esau
Be called to task
So to say
On this

Moses was not hooked
For murder
Or for cowardice
Or even for the several excuses
He gave to God
Very God
In order to bow out
Of his assignment

I think
Rather
We have to say
There is the will of God
And it is positive
So that we do better
Than excoriating Esau
Lifting Jacob
As the one
Even with foibles
That could complement
Those of the other
Matriarchs
And patriarchs


Genesis 25:19-34, the story of Jacob and Esau in the Bible
Matthew 5:44, the injunction to love our enemies
Romans 9:13-15, the part in Romans about loving Jacob and hating Esau

This poem could become the substance of a Bible Study or even a sermon, if one doesn’t mind reading poetry for a sermon (I’ve done that).

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash