Thomas J Parlette
“Birthright Stew”
Genesis 25: 19-34
7/12/26
I wonder how many of you remember the 1988 movie called “Twins?” It pops up every so often on a Saturday afternoon, or if TBS is running an Arnold Schwarzenegger marathon. The movie teamed Arnold with Danny Devito as an unlikely set of twins.
The premise of the movie was that the brothers were a result of an experiment to grow a perfect man – who is the Schwarzenegger character – named Julius. But when the genes were being manipulated in the pre-natal stage, there were scraps left over that were unused. These scraps were used to make the smaller, less than perfect man, played by Devito, named Vincent.
Thus, Julius is planned and grows to athletic proportions. Julius is an accident and develops from the scraps left over. While Julius is taken to a south sea island and raised by philosophers, Vincent is put into an orphanage. Grown up, Vincent becomes a bit of a low life and is about to be killed by loan sharks when Julius discovers that he has a brother and begins looking for him. The movie takes off from there.
In today’s passage from Genesis, we meet another set of twins – Jacob and Esau. Although they are twins, they could not be more different.
Esau is the first born. Therefore, he is the one who has the hereditary rights over his younger brother. Esau is a real man’s man – kind of like Arnold Schwarzenegger. He is strong, big, and rugger outdoorsman and a hunter. He is his father Issac’s favorite, especially because Isaac has a taste for the meat Esau brings home from his hunting trips.
On the other hand, Jacob is more of a homebody, a quiet person who spends most of his time helping out at home. So it’s no surprise that Jacob is his mother Rebekah’s favorite son.
Esau is a man of the outdoors, a man of action. He is impulsive, he is decisive, he is the one destined to take over the leadership of the tribe – as was his birthright.
Jacob is man of the tents, so to speak, an indoor sort of person, someone more comfortable helping out in the kitchen and taking care of the daily chores than tromping about the fields hunting down game.
They were twins – but they couldn’t be more different.
Which brings us to today’s story involving Esau’s birthright and a homemade bowl of stew.
Esau has been out on a hunting trip. He comes home and he is starving. He can think of nothing but getting something to eat. He’s is in one of the moods where he comes in saying – “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse!” Not the best state of mind to be in mind to make wise decisions.
Esau enters the tent and he smells this wonderful aroma of homemade red lentil stew simmering away. Doesn’t sound so good in the heat of summer, but think of that aroma during the fall and winter here in Minnesota – homemade soup on the stove, fresh bread baking in the oven… MMMM, wonderful.
Our NRSV translation has Esau saying to Jacob – “Let me eat some of that red stuff!” Pretty tame compared to what the Hebrew really says. In the original language, Esau is much more gruff, much more dismissive and disrespectful. Rabbi and author Burton Visotsky, says that a better translation would be “Gimme some of that red stuff.” In fact, Rabbi Visotzky points out that the Hebrew verb “gimme” is generally used in the Bible when talking about feeding livestock. (1) That’s how Esau approaches this meal.
Jacob, on the other hand sees an opportunity. Jacob maybe a bit of a Mama’s boy – but he is shrewd, “conniving” some might say, or maybe “opportunistic.” Jacob sees how hungry and irrational his brother is being, so he says, “Sure, I’ll give you a bowl of stew – but I want you to sell me your birthright. I want you to give me your claim to the inheritance as the first-born.”
Without much thought, Esau agrees, and sits down to a nice hot bowl of birthright stew. And Jacob goes back to his household duties with a contented smile on his face.
Esau is like many of us today. He is impatient. He wants what he wants, when he wants it. He doesn’t like to wait. For many in our world today, being patient is a sign of weakness.
The psychiatrist and author Scott Peck, points out in his book The Road Less Travelled, that life presents us with a series of problems, some of which are painful to deal with. Nonetheless, to avoid a miserable existence, we need to deal with them, because most do not go away on their own. One of the basic tools that we need to solve those problems is the willingness to delay gratification. Peck defines delaying gratification as “a process of scheduling the pain and pleasure of life in such a way as to enhance the pleasure by meeting and experiencing the pain first and getting it over with. It is the only decent way to live.” (2)
Or, to use the words I’ve seen on inspirational plaques that you might find at Hobby Lobby – “Do the hard stuff first.”
David Laibson, a professor at Harvard University, sees the matter as a battle between emotions and reason: “Our emotional brain has a hard time imagining the future, even though our logical brain clearly sees the future consequences of our current actions. Our emotional brain wants to max out the credit card, order dessert, and smoke a cigarette. Our logical brain knows we should save for retirement, go for a jog, and quit smoking.” (3)
What we have before us in this story about two brothers is an example of two extremes in how to live life.
In Esau – we see someone who lives life in the moment to such an extreme that he messes up his future, and he pays for that the rest of life.
In Jacob – we see someone who is not above a little trickery, but keeps the long view in mind.
We tend to be a little hard on Esau in this story. We portray him as a bit of a brute who only thinks about his stomach. And that is true. But he also has his positive qualities. Living in the moment is not a bad thing. We hear that advice quite a bit these days – and even from Jesus himself in the sermon on the mount, “do not worry about tomorrow, tomorrow will bring problems of it’s own.” But we would be wise to temper our “living in the moment” with a bit of delayed gratification as well. We would be wise to keep our eyes on the long term goals.
Jacob is certainly not above reproach here. He is hardly a model of righteous behavior. He takes advantage of his older brother to get the birthright. Later, he and his mother Rebekah, will pull a fast one on Isaac to get his blessing. Jacob is no angel.
But Jacob clearly has the ability to delay gratification and work towards long-term goals. Perhaps you remember how Jacob commits to working for 7 years to earn the wife he wants, and his potential father-in-law tricks him into working another 7 years. I’m sure it wasn’t an easy pill to swallow – but he did it. Jacob trusted in God – and he kept looking to the future. As a result, Jacob was the one from whom the people of Israel descended – because he was able to fit into God’s plan by taking the long view and delaying gratification.
We can learn something from each brother in this story of birthright stew. Like Esau, we should live our faith moment to moment, in the present. But like Jacob, we should keep our eyes open to the long view – God’s kingdom view – so that we sow the seeds of God’s Kingdom not just for immediate results, but a long-term harvest.
May God be praised. Amen.
