Toledot

[12] As the reading continues in chapter 26, another famine struck the land, and Isaac went to the house of the Philistine King Abimelech in Gerar.

[35] In the continuation of the reading, when Esau was 40 years old, he married two Hittite women, Judith and Basemath, causing bitterness for Isaac and Rebekah.

Hosea taught that God once punished Jacob for his conduct, requiting him for his deeds, including that (as reported in Genesis 25:26) in the womb he tried to supplant his brother.

Reading the words, "Because she was barren," in Genesis 25:21, Rabbi Judan said in the name of Resh Lakish that Rebekah lacked an ovary, whereupon God fashioned one for her.

[87] Reading the words, "and she went to inquire of the Lord," in Genesis 25:22, a Midrash wondered how Rebekah asked God about her pregnancy, and whether there were synagogues and houses of study in those days.

[92] Reading the words of Genesis 25:23, "Two peoples shall be separated from your body," a Midrash taught that Jacob was born circumcised.

[93] Noting that in Genesis 25:24, regarding Jacob and Esau, the word "twins" is written תוֹמִ֖ם‎, defectively (without an א‎ or a י‎), whereas in Genesis 38:27, regarding Peretz and Zeraḥ, the word "twins" is written תְאוֹמִ֖ים‎, more completely (with an א‎ and a י‎), a Midrash taught that the text signals that Peretz and Zeraḥ were both righteous, but Jacob was righteous and Esau was wicked.

Rabbi Joḥanan taught in the name of Rabbi Jose that God gives a boundless portion—a very large reward—to anyone who delights in the Sabbath, for Isaiah 58:13–14 promises: "If you keep your feet from violating the Sabbath, from pursuing your affairs on My holy day, and you call the Sabbath a delight, the Lord's holy day honored, and you honor it by not going your own way, or attending to your own matters or speaking idle words, then you shall delight in the Lord and I will cause you to ride on the heights of the world, and to feast on the inheritance of Jacob your father, as the mouth of God has spoken."

Serah told the elders that Moses was the one who would redeem Israel from Egypt, for she heard (in the words of Exodus 3:16), "I have surely visited (פָּקֹד פָּקַדְתִּי‎, pakod pakadeti) you."

[115] The Sifre cited Isaac's reproof of Abimelech, Ahuzzath, and Phicol in Genesis 26:27 as an example of a tradition of admonition near death.

[125] Rabbi Joḥanan taught that when Jacob explained his rapid success in obtaining the meat by saying in Genesis 27:20 that it was "because the Lord your God sent me good speed," he was like a raven bringing fire to his nest, courting disaster.

[127] Rabbi Judah ben Pazi interpreted Isaac's blessing of Jacob with dew in Genesis 27:28 merely to pass along to his son what God had deeded to his father Abraham for all time.

)[97] The Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer saw in Isaac's two blessings of Jacob in Genesis 27:28–29 and 28:1–4 an application of the teaching of Ecclesiastes 7:8, "Better is the end of a thing than the beginning."

[132] Rabbi Tarfon taught that Isaac's blessing of Esau in Genesis 27:40, "By your sword shall you live," helped to define Edom's character.

"[133] The Midrash Tehillim told the circumstances in which Esau sought to carry out his desire that Genesis 27:41 reports, "Let the days of mourning for my father be at hand; then will I slay my brother Jacob."

The Gemara explained that the name Machalat is cognate with the Hebrew word for forgiveness, mechilah, and thus deduced that Genesis 28:9 teaches that Esau's sins were forgiven upon his marriage.

Expanding on Genesis 35:27, the Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer told that Jacob took his sons, grandsons, and wives, and went to Kiryat Arba to be near Isaac.

So Esau took Isaac's wealth and gave Jacob the land of Israel and the Cave of Machpelah, and they wrote a perpetual deed between them.

Rabbi Simeon interpreted the words of Genesis 27:28, "And God give you of the dew of heaven," to mean "the heritage of Jacob" in Isaiah 58:14.

Rabbi Simeon taught that with these words, Isaac indicated that Jacob's children would rise again from the dead at the time to come, by means of heavenly dew that shall issue forth from God.

The Baal HaTurim concluded that this hints at the Mishnaic dictum (in the Pirkei Avot[144]) that one should always reach out to be the first to greet any person, even an adversary.

But then, in the 10th century BCE, David unified Israel and conquered Edom (see 2 Samuel 8:13–14; 1 Kings 11:15–16; and 1 Chronicles 18:12–13), and that is why the oracle Genesis 25:23 gave Rebekah during her pregnancy said that "the older will end up serving the younger."

Kugel reported that scholars thus view the stories of the young Jacob and Esau as created to reflect a political reality that came about in the time of David, indicating that these narratives were first composed in the early 10th century BCE, before the Edomites succeeded in throwing off their Israelite overlords, at that time when Israel might feel "like a little kid who had ended up with a prize that was not legitimately his."

But Isaac's blessing of Esau in Genesis 27:40, "By your sword you will live, and you will indeed serve your brother; but then it will happen that you will break loose and throw his yoke from off your neck," reflects a reformulation (or perhaps new creation) of the story in the light of the new reality that developed half a century later.

Rendsburg also noted that in Genesis 27:40, Isaac predicted that Esau would throw off the yoke of Jacob, reflecting the Edomite rebellion against Israel during Solomon's reign reported in 1 Kings 11:14–22.

Rendsburg concluded that royal scribes living in Jerusalem during the reigns of David and Solomon in the tenth century BCE were responsible for Genesis; their ultimate goal was to justify the monarchy in general, and the kingship of David and Solomon in particular; and Genesis thus appears as a piece of political propaganda.

[151] Reading the words of Genesis 25:22, "why do I live," Robert Alter wrote that Rebekah's "cry of perplexity and anguish" over her difficult pregnancy was "terse to the point of being elliptical."

"[154] Ephraim Speiser wrote that originally the name Jacob, rather than as explained in Genesis 25:26, was likely from Y‘qb-'l, and meant something like "may God protect.

[161] Speiser read the unintended blessing of Jacob by Isaac in Genesis 27 to teach that no one may grasp God's complete design, which remains reasonable and just no matter who the chosen agent may be at any given point.

In his heart, Isaac had long known that Esau could not carry on the burden of Abraham and that, instead, he had to choose his quiet and complicated younger son Jacob.