II.

JACOB AND ESAU.

As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.Romans ix. 13.

THERE are few parts of the Bible more beset with moral difficulties than the account of Jacob and Esau, and the favour shown to the former as compared with the latter. Our sympathies scarcely seem to go with the Bible verdict in this matter, "Jacob have I loved but Esau have I hated." We scarcely love Jacob, and we by no means hate Esau. But our perplexity is increased a thousand-fold by the common interpretation of the words of my text; it is too commonly supposed that God reprobated Esau even before his birth, and doomed him to a life of sin on earth and an eternity of evil hereafter. “Esau have I hated." first sight, and to a careless student of Scripture, these words certainly do seem to mean that God regarded Esau, even before his birth, with feelings of anger and dislike; but this cannot be. Notwithstanding all

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seeming Calvinism in St. Paul's writings, our church is in full harmony with Holy Scripture when she declares in one of her collects that God "hateth nothing that He hath made." And I suppose it was God who made Esau.

But the word hate is used in the New Testament with considerable variety and latitude of meaning. To "hate" often means merely to value less; e.g. our Lord says that a man cannot be His true disciple unless he "hate his father and mother, and even his own life." Whereas St. John says that he who "hateth" his brother is a murderer. Therefore it is obvious that the meaning of the word "hate" in the Bible must be in great measure determined in each case by the context. And if we carefully consider the circumstances under which God is said to have "hated" Esau, and the drift of this passage of Scripture from which I have taken my text, we shall easily see that the word hated here means simply rejected, i.e. rejected in one special way, and not rejected altogether and for all eternity. Esau was rejected just as Ishmael had been. God intended Jacob and not Esau to be the heir of His great promises and the father of His chosen people. Esau was totally unfit by nature for that grand career which awaited his brother, and therefore he was excluded from it; but this by no means implies any anger

of God towards him. God no more hated Esau, in our usual sense of the word, than our Lord hated the rich young man whose good qualities He genuinely admired, but whom He yet chose not for one of His own disciples.

God carries out His great purposes in history by chosen men, predestined and fitted to perform a great part; and no mere accident, such as primogeniture, can give to an ordinary commonplace person those rare endowments which enable a man to leave his mark graven indelibly on the world's history. God chose Jacob for Israel just as He chose Athens for Greece. Jacob had the peculiar gifts needed in a leader of men and spiritual father at one period of the world's history. And Athens had the peculiar gifts needed in the leader of Hellas, and the intellectual light of the world at another period. "Athens have I loved, but Sparta have I hated," might well express the dealings of God with Greece at one time of its history. His choicest gifts, His chief blessings, were given to the Jacob-like Athens, and yet He had indeed reserved a blessing of an inferior sort even for rejected and hated Sparta. Sway over the intellects of all the ages to come was given to Athens, yet to Sparta was assigned the Esau-like gift of high and unflinching courage, the undying glory of Leonidas.

God, then, rejected Esau, and chose Jacob as the

father of His people Israel, and the organ of His revelation of Himself to man's spirit; and the chief significance for us of this choice and rejection lies in this, viz. that it shows plainly how highly God values spirituality of nature, placing it far above all other forms of excellence, even though it be (as in Jacob's case) marred and disfigured by great faults or vices. He that is least in the kingdom of Heaven is greater than the greatest of the unspiritual; and spiritual nobleness is higher and grander than any other nobleness-even moral nobleness. I think this is the clue to many a perplexing enigma in the Bible-God does not undervalue any form of goodness whatsoever, but all forms are not in His sight of equal value. That which is natural is lower than that which is spiritual. Esau is essentially inferior to Jacob.

And yet I cannot think that Esau was a really bad man, else he would not have been so deeply and truly loved by the good and gentle Isaac. In some respects Esau stands to Jacob as Saul to David; and just as David was essentially a higher being than Saul, so was Jacob than Esau. Esau has undoubtedly a sort of natural nobleness and generosity of character, as Saul also had in his better moments. At the memorable meeting of the two brothers the bearing of Esau is undeniably nobler than that of Jacob. Esau there displays real gene

rosity, Christian forgiving kindness; and I can never think that Christ hates, or can hate, anyone who thus obeys one of His most essential precepts. No; Christ did not hate poor Esau; rather, in that germinal, undeveloped, rude, and unspiritual nature, I doubt not that He saw of the travail of His soul, and was satisfied with some real glimmer of nobleness.

Esau was a profane person, but it does not follow that he was altogether a bad man; and in our days we have many Christian Esaus vastly inferior to Jacobs, but still for all that loyal children of God. The virtue of a well-developed Esau is high courage or heroism; and this, though of less value than saintliness-the proper virtue of a Jacob-is still for all that of very real preciousness. God never intended that all the world should be Jacobs; and we have no right to blame a well-meaning Esau because he is somewhat deficient in spirituality. Yet is spirituality of surpassing value in God's sight; and the world could better spare ten thousand Esaus than one Jacob, ten thousand commonplace men, than one man of originality and genius. No ordinary, every-day virtues can elevate their possessor to an equality with the man of profound thoughtfulness and vivid spiritual life. And no falls into sin can altogether rob the spiritual man of his great birthright. Even though gold be so covered with dirt