Jacob showed no fear of angels when
he had to wrestle with one, but he feared
his brother Esau, both men greedy when
they lived at home together. Unendeared
by the deer hunter, Jacob took his birth-
right, but they shared a blessing. He could handle
rebukes from God, but ones more down to earth,
caused by the birthright and the blessing scandal,
made Jacob panic, knowing that God makes
far better deals with men who have offended
than humans, who do not forgive mistakes,
including those in some ways unintended.
Jacob couldn’t tell himself that he
had never meant to harm his brother who
thus had no reason to forgive him. We
may sympathize with Esau – though no Jew
like Jacob – and the fact that Esau did
forgive his brother is far harder to
explain than angels fighting with a Yid,
a less than model, problematic Jew,
by Esau not just vanquished but
now blessing him just as the patriarch
had blessed them both, his heart not shut
to his own favorite or the matriarch’s.
Neither Esau nor his brother Jacob, Frère Jacques, was a sleeper,
as maybe Frère Jacques was in the nursery rhyme;
instead they both agreed that each should be his brother’s keeper,
with Esau not prepared to copy Abel’s brother’s crime.
