Isaac the Unknown
Isaac the Unknown

ISAAC THE UNKNOWN

We talk a lot about Isaac as one of the patriarchs but we actually
know very little about him.

The great events of his birth, his experience at the Akedah, the
search for his bride – all are recorded, but in a sense he is only the
excuse for the stories. His own personality does not shine through the
saga. It is not really he who moves through and shapes the events.

Isaac is a much less dynamic and colourful figure than either Abraham
or Jacob. His father and son are great, heroic figures – but Isaac is
almost a nobody. That is, unless we realise that it is his very
quietness and near invisibility that make him a hero in his own right.

The alternation of the generations often works like this, a dramatic
personality, a quiet personality, a dramatic personality. The one in
the middle is, however, not merely the bridge between the others, but
an exemplar of the fact that most human beings are not destined for
leadership or the headlines but for the back stalls, if we may mix our
metaphors. The sound loyalty and solid faith of the back stalls keep
history going.

No-one should ever say, “I’m a nobody”. Everyone is a somebody.


WHY DID HE SELL THE BIRTHRIGHT?

Every year when we read this sidra, we wonder why Esau was so
nonchalant about parting with his birthright. “You want my
birthright?” he more or less says to his brother. “It’s useless to me.
What can I do with a birthright when I’m so hungry and would rather
have a good bowl of soup than a mere title?”

Other families, other generations, other places, placed high value on
the status of “b’chor”, but not Esau. Was it that Esau was nothing
more than a rough, primitive creature whose priorities were limited to
today without thought of the morrow?

The answer that Ibn Ezra gives is rather different. In most cases the
birthright brought property rights with it, but, says Ibn Ezra, this
was not so with Esau. Why? Because Isaac, despite a solid inheritance
from his father, could not manage money and in old age he was reduced
to penury. He had hardly anything to give his older son, and Esau knew
it. “What am I going to get?” Esau asked himself. “A title but nothing
else. Jacob wants the title, does he? He’s welcome. It’s an empty
privilege. I’d rather have a bowl of soup.”

Many a sermon could be preached about the birthright story. Probably
most would remark that having a birthright was a key to destiny. Jacob
understood better than Esau that it isn’t your estates that really
matter, but your spiritual values. Parents can give their children
dignity even if they have no houses, no blocks of flats, no rolls of
money to leave them. Jacob certainly gave the Children of Israel
dignity and destiny… and it was all thanks to a bowl of soup!