Wesley Corpus

4.) In the following verses we have an account of the manner wherein he was supplanted by his brother Jacob. Upon Isaac's relation of this, “Esau cried with a great and exceeding bitter cry, and said unto his father, Bless me, even me also, O my father !” (Verse 34.) But “he found no place,” says the Apostle, “for repentance,” for recovering the blessing, “though he sought it carefully with tears.” “Thy brother,” said Isaac, “hath taken away thy blessing: I have blessed him, yea, and he shall be blessed.” So that all Esau’s sorrow and tears could not recover his birth-right, and the blessing annexed thereto. And yet there is great reason to hope, that Esau (as well as Jacob) is now in Abraham’s bosom. For although for a time “he hated Jacob,” and afterward came against him “with four hundred men,” very probably designing to take revenge for the injuries he had sustained; yet we find, when they met, “Esau ran and embraced him, and fell on his neck and kissed him.” So throughly had God changed his heart! And why should we doubt but that happy change continued? 57. You can ground no solid objection to this on St. Paul's words in the Epistle to the Romans: “It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger. As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.” (ix. 12, 13.) For it is undeniably plain, that both these scriptures relate, not to the persons of Jacob and Esau, but to their descendants; the Israelites sprung from Jacob, and the Edomites sprung from Esau. In this sense only did “the elder” (Esau) “serve the younger;” not in his person, (for Esau never served Jacob,) but in his posterity. The posterity of the elder brother served the posterity of the younger. The other text referred to by the Apostle runs thus: “I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons of the wilderness.” (Mal. i. 2, 3.) Whose heritage was it that God laid waste? Not that which Esau personally enjoyed; but that of his posterity, the Edom ites, for their enormous sins, largely described by several of the Prophets. So neither here is there any instance of any man being finally condemned by the mere sovereign will of God. 58.