This parashah begins with the story of Isaac and Rebekah, how she struggled with her pregnancy and was told (by God) that she had two nations in her. When the time came to give birth, Esau came out already hairy, with Jacob holding onto the heel of Esau.

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One day years later, Esau came back from a hunting trip and he was starved (I’m sure he wasn’t really at death’s door, as he whined about), and coming to Jacob’s tent he asked Jacob to give him some of the lentil stew he was making.

Jacob made Esau promise to sell him the rights of the firstborn in exchange for the stew, and Esau (always first to do and second to think about it) immediately transferred this right to Jacob, for a bowl of stew and some bread and water.

Meanwhile, Isaac remained in the land and God blessed him, but he (like his father, before him) lied about his relationship with Rebekah, saying she was his sister. The king, Abimelech (maybe the same one that Abraham knew?) saw them fooling around once and learned the truth. He asked Isaac why he lied, which might have caused someone to sin and bring disaster on the people, and Isaac gave the same answer Abraham did, which was that he was afraid he would be killed so someone could take his wife for himself.

Time out! So you’re telling me that it was wrong to take another man’s
wife, but it was OK if you killed him first, making her a widow?

Back to the parashah…so Isaac was blessed and became very powerful, so much so that Abimelech went to him and basically told him to leave the area because they were afraid of him. So Isaac went, digging wells along the way, but the locals kept taking the wells claiming the land, and therefore the water, is theirs. After the third well, Isaac was able to remain. When this happened, Abimelech had a change of heart and decided it was best to make a pact with Isaac instead of just sending him away, which they did.

Now we come to the well-known story of how Jacob tricked Isaac into giving him the blessing of the firstborn. Of course, we need to remember that it was Rebekah’s idea, not Jacob’s. In any event, Jacob (with Mom’s help) received the blessing reserved for the firstborn, and when Esau learned of this, he cried to his father for any blessing at all and received the “B Team” version of the blessing, the one that Jacob most likely would have received.

Angry, Esau vows to kill Jacob as soon as Isaac is dead, and hearing of this, Rebekah has Isaac send Jacob to her brother, Laban, to find a wife, claiming that Esau’s choice of the local women as wives is an abomination to her.

That’s the end of this parashah.

If you look in most bibles, they will title this story as something along the lines of “Jacob Steals Esau’s Birthright” or “Jacob Steals the Blessing of the Firstborn.”

I never liked that because it isn’t correct: Jacob did not steal anything. He did not take something that belonged to someone else, he bargained for it. If you see someone with a car you like and offer to buy it from him or her and they sell it to you, is that stealing? If they accept an offer much lower than its intrinsic value, is that stealing? It may be getting a steal, as the expression goes, but technically it is just getting a good price, that’s all.

When I was a Tinman, which is the term for someone selling siding (I also sold replacement windows and kitchen refacing), I learned that the sale is made when the buyer’s perceived value of the product is higher than the price tag. Someone may think a product isn’t worth $25, and someone else may feel that same product is a great buy at $75!

I never told anyone how to spend their money: my job as the salesman was to build the most value I could into the product so when I gave the final price to the buyer (after I let them negotiate) it would be less than their perceived value. And I never lied to do that- you don’t have to lie to be a good salesman.

The important point in this parashah, which is almost always ignored by almost every Bible version, is not that Jacob stole the birthright but that the birthright had no value to Esau. I mean, c’mon- the guy sold what at that time would have been a double-share of the father’s estate, which the Bible tells us was significant, for a bowl of stew!

And later, when Jacob allegedly stole the blessing of the firstborn, that wasn’t stealing, either- the blessing belonged to him! He was the legal owner of the firstborn’s birthright, which included the blessing!

Here’s the real message that I want to give today, which is just briefly mentioned in the very beginning of this parashah but is significant for any Gentile who has been taught that when they accept Yeshua as their Messiah, they are not subject to the Torah commandments.

I’m talking about Genesis 26:5; but first, let’s review the background.

Leading up to this verse, we read there is a famine and God tells Isaac to not go to Egypt but remain in the land of Canaan, and that if he goes where God tells him to go then God will fulfill the same promise to Isaac that he gave to Abraham.

Throughout my 25+ years as a believing Jewish man, I have constantly heard that we are saved by faith, and throughout the Bible, both Old and New Covenants, we are reminded that it was because Abraham believed God when God told him something, that his faith was counted as righteousness (Genesis 15:6.)

And that is where Christianity stops talking about Abraham’s faith. They constantly use his faith as the only reason he was considered righteous; today, we don’t just need to have faith in God but also faithfully accept that Yeshua is the Messiah, and it is that faith through which we are “saved.”

But there is more to it than that, and that’s what God tells Isaac in Genesis 26:5 which is why God promised Abraham what he did (Genesis 26:5 CJB):

All this is because Avraham heeded what I said and did what I told him to do -he followed my mitzvot, my regulations and my teachings.

What? Abraham’s faith wasn’t all that God wanted? Apparently not, since God said his promises to Abraham were because he heeded what God said (i.e., believed him) and DID everything God told him to do.

Yes, as uncomfortable as this is, God is saying that faith, alone, isn’t all you need: you must not just faithfully believe but also DO what God says.

That is why Abraham received the promises: he believed and he did.

That is what James means in James 2:14 when he says that faith without works is dead.

Sorry to bust so many people’s comfort zone bubbles, but just believing in God and Jesus ain’t gonna cut it all the way through. Oh, yeah, you may end up in heaven, or have a place on the new earth; you may not have to spend eternity out of God’s presence, but if you are in, it will be at the lowest level possible.

God already knew what I learned a long time ago: people don’t mean what they say, they mean what they do.

So if you think you are saved but do none of the things that God requires of everyone (maybe your religion has told you the Torah is just for Jews, but that is a lie), then you should reconsider whether God wants you to do what he said, or what some religious leader with a seminary degree tells you to do.

Abraham received blessings from God for believing and doing as God said; Isaac received blessings for believing and doing as God said.

So, nu? What makes you think you don’t have to?

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And I always welcome your comments.

That’s it for this week, so l’hitraot and Shabbat Shalom!

This parashah begins with the death of Sarah. Abraham buys the field and cave in Machpelah, known today as Hebron, and buries Sarah there. This is the burial place of all three patriarchs and their wives, except for Rachel who was buried elsewhere when Jacob was returning to Canaan.

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Abraham is now old and decides it is time for Isaac to marry, so he sends his servant, Eliazer, back to Haran to find a wife from Abraham’s family still living there. Eliazer comes to a well and prays for God to send the proper woman for Isaac, asking that a sign be given for Eliazer to know. Rebekah comes to fetch water and when Eliazer asks her for a drink, she lowers her jar to let him drink and offers to water his camels, as well. This was the sign asked for, so Eliazer asks her who’s family she is from and when she says she is the daughter of Abraham’s nephew, he gives her some jewelry. She runs home to tell her father and her brother, Laban, seeing the goodies runs out to fetch Eliazer and bring him home to be fed and rested.

Eliazer refuses food until he has stated why he is there, and after hearing the entire story, the family agrees to let Rebekah marry Isaac.

Eliazer hurries her back, and when Isaac sees Rebekah he immediately consummates the marriage and sets her up in his mother’s tent as his wife.

We are told that Abraham took another wife and had a number of sons through her, all of whom were given gifts and money, but then were all sent on their own way; only Isaac received all that Abraham owned. Abraham dies and he is buried by Isaac and Ishmael; we are then told of the lineage of Ishmael and his death.

This is where the parashah ends.

I was reading the commentary on this parashah in my Chumash, and when it came to the verses about Isaac setting Rebekah up in his mother’s tent, it mentioned that he installed her as mistress of the house. More than that, though, it also said that she filled the gap in his life caused by the death of his mother, which also stopped the household from receiving the blessings they had received before. When Rebekah reinitiated the ceremonies and rituals that Sarah had done, the blessings of the household returned.

Time for a quick story that will lead us into today’s message…when I was visiting Israel, the guide (who was great) told us the biblical stories that were associated with the parts of Israel we were visiting. One thing he did, which is standard for Orthodox Jews, was to tell us not just the biblical history but to interject the Talmudic stories, as well, as if they and the Torah were one and the same.

I, respectfully (of course), kept interrupting him and pointing out that what he was saying was not in the Tanakh but in the Talmud. This was for the benefit of the Christians on the tour with me (believe it or not, there were 22 of us and I was the only Jew) because, as sad as it seems, most Christians do not know the Torah and cannot identify what is in the Bible and what is rabbinic commentary from the Talmud.

And that brings us to today’s message, one which I have stated over and over, and will never stop saying: You MUST know the entire Bible.

When reading the commentaries in the Chumash you must remember that you are reading from a Talmudic/rabbinic/anti-Christian viewpoint. Yes, I said anti-Christian and I meant it because traditional Judaism wants absolutely nothing at all to do with Christianity and some of what you read in the Chumash commentary, especially regarding messianic passages, will not be very friendly towards Christianity. Despite this, though, I do recommend having and reading a Chumash because it will give one tremendous insight into the Jewish mindset.

When I read this commentary, about Rebekah reinstituting the religious rites that Sarah had been doing, I just couldn’t help asking myself, “Growing up in Nahor’s household, which we know had household gods (Genesis 31), it is apparent that Nahor didn’t have the same beliefs that Abraham did, so where did Rebekah learn about the religious duties of the wife?”

There has been no mention of any part of Nahor’s life or the lives of his children in the Torah passages, except at the very end of the previous parashah (Genesis 22:20-24) where we are given a report of the fact that he had children.

I enjoy hearing the rabbinic stories, but I am concerned that so many Jews, and especially Christians, who do not really know the Tanakh will accept these fables as fact. The only facts are what we read in the Tanakh, and not what some rabbi, at some time, somewhere decided fits into the storyline.

In my opinion, many of the Talmudic stories are there to make the Torah story sound a little better.

The Talmud is called the Oral Law, and it is supposedly the many laws and regulations that God gave to Moses on Mount Sinai that Moses did not write down, but passed down orally through Joshua, et.al. That being said, the Talmud does fill in the gaps, so to speak, where the Torah seems to be missing important information.

For example, we are told which animals are to be used for the sacrifice and also that we must treat animals humanely, but there is nothing in the Torah about how to humanely kill the animal for the sacrifice. Well, the Talmud tells us about the Shechitah, which is a humane and nearly painless way to kill the animal.

There are other things in the Talmud, though, that border on mysticism and mythology, such as the stories of the Golem and even a reference to Lilith, a she-demon of Jewish mythology but also referred to as the first wife of Adam. Clearly, these are not biblical and should not be considered factual, but within Judaism, they are accepted as real as the other people mentioned in the Tanakh.

Having talked about the Talmud and how it can misguide us, let’s not forget about all the Christian religions which have also misguided people by adding their own “spin” to what is in the New Covenant writings. For instance, the idea that once saved, you are always saved or that Yeshua did away with all the laws in the Torah. Another one, which I believe to be the most sinful of all traditional Christian teachings (thankfully, most Christians don’t buy this one) is Replacement Theology, which says the Jews (for having rejected Yeshua) have been rejected and cursed by God and that the Born Again Christians are now the true chosen people of God.

In the Torah, God told us how to worship him and how to treat each other; the rest of the Bible is a historical narrative showing not just how we all came to be, but how God has always kept his promises and guided us into righteousness. It is imperative that you know what God says and what religion says because they are so often, so different.

It is up to you to know the difference between what God has dictated to be the way you should worship and live, and what some religion tells you is how you should worship and live, because as sad as it is, there are way too many things they disagree on.

You will be judged not on what your religion tells you is right, but on what God says is right, so make sure you know the difference before you choose because your eternal life depends on it.

Thank you for being here and please share these messages with everyone you know, subscribe to both my YouTube channel and my website, and remember that I always welcome your comments.

If you are interested in the different lies about the Messiah within both Judaism and Christianity, then get my latest book, “The Good News About the Messiah for Jews, Debunking the Traditional Lies About the Jewish Messiah.”

That’s it for this week, so l’hitraot and Shabbat Shalom!