A look at recent Torah readings gives us perspective on our relationship with Eisav.
Last week, Parashat Vayeitzei opened with Ya’akov fleeing from his twin brother Eisav’s murderous vindictive wrath. Fleeing into exile, a destitute and homeless fugitive, וַיִּפְגַּע בַּמָּקוֹם, “he encountered the place” (Genesis 28:11) - not “a certain place” as so many translations have it, but “the place”, a specific and significant and known place - the place on which the Holy Temple was one day to be built (Sanhedrin 95, Hullin 91b, Bereishit Rabbah 68:9, Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer 35 et al.).
There he dreamt his famous dream of angels ascending and descending on a ladder reaching from earth to Heaven.
And Parashat Vayeitzei closed with Ya’akov returning to Israel after his decades-long exile, a wealthy patriarch with four wives, twelve sons and a daughter, servants and maidservants galore, and flocks, herds, camels, and pack-animals in the hundreds.
His dream came true: those angels which he could only dream of when he was leaving Israel, he saw in reality as he was returning to Israel.
And at the beginning of Parashat Vayishlach, Ya’akov reached a higher level yet: he sent those self-same angels as his emissaries on a reconnaissance-mission. This is the elevation which only the Land of Israel can infuse a Jew with: from dreaming of angels, to seeing angels, to being able to command angels.
“Ya’akov sent angels ahead of him, to Eisav his brother…” (Genesis 32:4). “Eisav his brother” was Ya’akov’s hopeful perspective: Even though he is Eisav, he is nevertheless my brother.
But when the angels returned, their report was far more threatening:
“We came to your brother, to Eisav, and he too is coming towards you, and four hundred men with him” (v. 7).
“Your brother, Eisav” is their objective perspective: Even though he is your brother, he nevertheless remains Eisav. Beware of him, he is still an enemy.
And this explains Ya’akov’s immediate reaction: “Ya’akov was greatly afraid” (v.8). And it explains Ya’akov’s prayer to G-d: “Save me please from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Eisav, because I fear him, lest he come and smite me, mother and sons” (v.12).
Ya’akov prayed that G-d save him from “the hand of my brother, from the hand of Eisav”: he understood by now that even though he was his brother, he nevertheless remained Eisav.
On the fateful night before encountering Eisav his brother, Ya’akov sent “an offering to Eisav his brother” (v. 14): he still hoped to appease him, to convince him that as much as he is Eisav, he nevertheless remains Ya’akov’s brother.
Did it work?
We still don’t know. More than three-and-a-half millennia on, our relationship is still ambiguous. Ya’akov still didn’t trust him: though he was his brother, he nevertheless was still Eisav.
Knowing that the meeting (confrontation?) was inevitable, not knowing if he was going to encounter Eisav his brother or his brother Eisav, but knowing that in any even he was approaching with 400 men, Ya’akov divided the children among Rachel and Bilhah, Leah and Zilpah; but he put his favourite wife and son, Rachel and Joseph, at the back…most protected, able to escape if necessary.
But in the event, when Eisav and Ya’akov saw each other for the first time in 22 years, “Eisav ran towards him and hugged him, and fell on his neck and kissed him, and they wept” (33:4).
Was this genuine love?
Again, we still don’t know. More than three-and-a-half millennia on, this reunification of brothers is still ambiguous.
The word וַיִּשָּׁקֵהוּ (“and kissed him”) appears in every hand-written Sefer Torah and almost every printed edition of the Torah with a dot above each letter of the word: וׄיׄשׄקׄהׄוׄ. Typically, dots above letters in the Tanach indicate exclusion or limitation, and there are different explanations as to what the six dots above these six letters connote.
The Talmud says that “each letter is dotted to teach that [Eisav] did not kiss [Ya’akov] sincerely; Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar says: This kiss was sincere, but all the others were insincere” (Avot de-Rabbi Natan 34:5).
The Midrash gives more detail:
“Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar says: Whenever you find more letters than dots, then you expound upon the letters; when there are more dots than letters, then you expound upon the dots. Here there are neither more letters than dots nor more dots than letters, which teaches that his compassion was aroused at that moment and he kissed him with all his heart. Rabbi Yannai said to him: If so, why are there dots on this word? - This teaches that [Eisav] came not לְנַשְּׁקוֹ (to kiss him) but rather לְנַשְּׁכוֹ (to bite him) - but our father Ya’akov’s neck became marble, and that evil man’s teeth were blunted. And what does the phrase ‘and they wept’ mean? - The one wept for his neck, and the other wept for his teeth” (Bereishit Rabbah 78:9, and compare Shir ha-Shirim Rabbah 7:5 [1] and Targum Yonatan and Targum Yerushalmi ad loc.).
Another Midrash records a similar difference of opinion: “There is a dot above each letter because [Eisav] did not kiss [Ya’akov] wholeheartedly. Rabbi Shimon bar Yochay says: It a known rule that Eisav hates Ya’akov - but at that moment [his hatred] was changed into love, and he kissed him with all his heart” (Sifrei Bamidbar, Beha’alot’cha 69).
All agree that Eisav hated his brother, but some opine that this hatred remained at this moment, but that Eisav was prevented from harming his brother; Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar and Rabbi Shimon bar Yochay opine that on this specific occasion Eisav’s habitual hatred was turned to genuine brotherly love.
In any event, Ya’akov knew only too well that he could not rely on Eisav’s continued goodwill. And so, when Eisav suggested that he and his entourage accompany him and his entourage (Genesis 33:12), Ya’akov declined the offer:
“My lord knows that the children are tender, and the flock and the herd are suckling. If they will be driven hard for one day, all the flocks will die. So let my lord pass on ahead of his servant, and I will make my slow way at the walking pace of the herd before me and the pace of the children, until I will come to my lord, to Seir” (Genesis 33:13-14).
It was an excuse, Ya’akov would never go to Seir. He knew better than to trust his brother. Because even though he was his brother, he was still Eisav. Even if his love was genuine on that one occasion, Eisav would remain Eisav.
Ya’akov’s distrust of his brother Eisav was well founded, as he was soon to find out:
Immediately afterwards (Chapter 34), Ya’akov and Leah’s daughter Dina went sight-seeing in Shechem. Shechem son of Hamor, the Hivvite prince, saw her and was smitten at first sight. He abducted her, took her to his palace, and raped her.
Ya’akov was outraged. His sons were outraged. They devised a stratagem to rescue their sister, and Shimon and Levi, Leah’s second and third sons, massacred all the men of the city.
Ya’akov was uncertain as to the wisdom of such an over-reaction: “You’ve disconcerted me, making me odious to the Land’s inhabitants, to the Canaanite and the Perizzite; I am few in number, and if they gather against me, I’ll be exterminated - me and my household!” (34:30).
Ya’akov clearly knew that in the event of open war with the Canaanites, he couldn’t rely on his brother Eisav. On his sons yes - but not on his twin brother.
Because his twin brother, the man who had shown him genuine love when meeting him after 22 years, the skilful hunter who knew how to use his sword and bow-and-arrow to kill, the successful fieldsman who had hundreds of armed warriors at his disposal, was still Eisav and would always be Eisav.
Even when his niece had been abducted and raped, he wouldn’t fight for her, as his grandfather Avraham had fought to rescue his nephew Lot when he was taken captive (Genesis 14).
Ya’akov felt vulnerable because he knew with certainty that if it came to open war, his brother Eisav would never fight for him. He was his brother - but he was still Eisav.
Jews throughout the world over the last two years have confronted countless Eisavs. In Israel, but particularly in the lands of our dispersal, almost every Jew has had his or her Ya’akov-Eisav moment.
One possibility: Yes he is my brother - but nevertheless he is still Eisav.
Otherwise: Yes he is Eisav - but nevertheless he is still my brother.
We have all had friends, neighbours, colleagues, business partners, who throughout the years were pleasant enough to get along with, tolerant, smiling - until Sh’mini Atzeret a little over two years ago, and then suddenly became Eisav, snarling and biting, vicious Jew-haters.
We have also had friends, neighbours, colleagues, business partners, who suddenly and unexpectedly stood by us, offering genuine support.
Eisav is Edom (Genesis 25:30, 36:1, 36:8), and Edom morphed into Rome, the Roman Empire (vide Makkot 12a, Yerushalmi Avodah Zarah 1:2, Eichah Rabbah 4:21, Tanhuma Bereishit 7 et al.).
Rome is the basis of all Western Christian civilisation; and our relationship with Western Christian civilisation is just as ambiguous as was our relationship with the Roman Empire, which was just as ambiguous as was Ya’akov’s relationship with his brother Eisav…or was it Eisav his brother?
While Ya’akov and Eisav were yet in their mother Rivka’s womb, their rivalry already begun, G-d told Rivka that “two nations are in your womb” (Genesis 25:23). But the word גוֹיִם (goyim), “nations”, is spelt גיֹיִם in the Torah, with a yud instead of a vav.
And so the Talmud (Berachot 57b, Avodah Zarah 11a) and the Midrash (Shocher Tov 9:7) offer a homiletic reading: not that there are שְׁנֵי גוֹיִם, two nations in Rivka’s womb, but שְׁנֵי גֵייִם, two great people in Rivka’s womb.
These two were destined to be Antoninus and Rabbi Yehudah the Prince.
We find Antoninus several times in the Talmud and Midrashim: a Roman Emperor who was a great tzaddik. “Your Kohanim will don righteousness” sang King David (Psalms 132:9), and the Midrash understands “Your Kohanim” to mean “the righteous among the nations, who are G-d’s Kohanim in this world, such as Antoninus and his friends” (Yalkut Shimoni, Isaiah 429).
Antoninus was a Roman Emperor, maybe Antoninus Pius (Emperor from 138-161), maybe Marcus Aurelius (Emperor from 161-180).
In any event, the Roman Emperor Antoninus was the epitome of the righteous among the nations.
And yet the Roman Empire was the most impure of idolatrous enemies, the enemy who destroyed the Holy Temple.
In Parashat Sh’mini (Leviticus 11:7) and Parashat Re’eh (Deuteronomy 14:8), the Torah forbids us to eat pig, calling it unclean. And in several places, we find that the pig represents Rome (Vayikra Rabbah 13:5, Tanhuma Sh’mini 14 et al.).
When the pig lies down, it thrusts its front legs forward, its cloven hoofs visibly on display. Hence the pig becomes the symbol of hypocrisy. It displays its feet, its cloven hoofs giving the outward appearance of a kosher animal - but inwardly it doesn’t chew the cud.
This represents the Roman Empire, whose outward appearance was magnificent architecture, impressive technology, literature - but inwardly it was based on murder and cruelty, on slavery, on oppression, on idolatry, on sexual immorality.
The pig in Hebrew is called the חֲזִיר, chazir, from the root חזר meaning “return” or “repent”, because the pig is destined in the future time to become a clean animal.
Since the internal anatomy of the pig isn’t going to change even in the times of Mashiach (see Rambam, Laws of Kings 11:3), this has to be a Midrashic-homiletic prophecy that Eisav - Edom - Rome - Western civilisation will yet repent. Eisav has at least the capacity for חֲזָרָה, repentance.
What defines Eisav? Is it the vicious Jew-hatred which has defined so much of Christian civilisation? Or is it the genuine love and support for Jews and for Israel that we have seen, particularly in this current war?
Will the descendants of the Roman Empire follow their leader Titus or their leader Antoninus?
When we fight for our freedom, our independence, our very lives - will Eisav join the fight for us?
Is Edom of today our brother Eisav? Or is he Eisav our brother?