The Example of Esau

As Jacob was returning with his large family to the land of his father, he sent messengers before him to learn about Esau his brother. He had left twenty years earlier, and at that time Esau was threatening to kill him because of the way Jacob took the birthright. The messengers returned to Jacob as he was still traveling and said this: “We came to thy brother Esau, and also he cometh to meet thee, and four hundred men with him.” Jacob appears to have taken this as an ominous sign about his brother’s feelings towards him, for he was “greatly afraid and distressed” (Genesis 32:6-7). He prayed to the Lord for protection, he divided up his group into different camps, and he prepared gifts to offer to Esau in hopes of softening his heart towards Jacob and his family. The encounter is described this way: “He passed over before them, and bowed himself to the ground seven times, until he came near to his brother. And Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him, and fell on his neck, and kissed him: and they wept.” Esau was no longer angry with Jacob, and there was in fact no actual danger for Jacob’s family. Esau clearly was a changed man, for when Jacob offered gifts he responded, “I have enough, my brother; keep that thou hast unto thyself” (Genesis 33:3-4, 9). It is a beautiful scene of reconciliation that came because Esau had, it seems, chosen to forgive and repent.

               One of the witnesses to this scene was Joseph. Though Jacob put “Rachel and Joseph hindermost” as Esau approached, surely Joseph was still a witness to this scene. Joseph was the youngest of Jacob’s children, and I think we can estimate that Joseph was about six years old at this time. Joseph’s birth was recounted in Genesis 30:24-25, and right after that Jacob said to Laban, “Send me away, that I may go unto mine own place, and to my country.” I believe that marked the fourteen years that Jacob had promised to labor for the two daughters. But after that there was a complicated business of the cattle, and, according to the chapter heading, “Jacob works for Laban for wages of cattle and sheep.” In the next chapter Jacob then said to Laban, “Thus have I been twenty years in thy house; I served thee fourteen years for thy two daughters, and six years for thy cattle” (Genesis 31:41). So it may be that Joseph was born right as Jacob starting working for the cattle, and so he would have been about six years old when Jacob actually left. This means that he would have had some understanding, albeit from a child’s eyes, as to what was happening with Esau and Jacob. I’d like to think that this scene left an impression on Joseph and that if not in that moment he came to understand the forgiveness that his uncle Esau had offered to his father Jacob in that pivotal moment for his family. Without that forgiveness, his whole family could have been destroyed.

               I think this is interesting because Joseph would later, consciously or not, follow the example of his uncle Esau and offer powerful forgiveness to his own brothers. In fact, the forgiveness that Joseph offered similarly saved the family of Jacob just as Esau’s had done. This time it preserved them from the terrible famine that was in the land. Here is the moving scene when Joseph finally revealed himself to his brothers: “Come near to me, I pray you. And they came near. And he said, I am Joseph your brother, whom ye sold into Egypt. Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that ye sold me hither: for God did send me before you to preserve life…. And he fell upon his brother Benjamin’s neck, and wept; and Benjamin wept upon his neck. Moreover he kissed all his brethren, and wept upon them: and after that his brethren talked with him” (Genesis 45:14-15). Just like Esau “embraced [Jacob], and fell on his neck, and kissed him: and they wept,” so too did Joseph do the same to his brethren when he finally revealed who he was. And in that powerful moment his brothers realized the wonderful forgiveness that Joseph was offering them. I have to wonder if sometime in that incredible reunion, Joseph’s mind didn’t go back to the time when he was a young boy watching his father being embraced and forgiven by his brother Esau.