Genesis 27

1 old. The ages of Isaac and his son are inferred from a comparison of the following passages: xxx. 25; xxxi. 38, 41; xli. 46, 53, 54; xlv. 6. Supposing Jacob to have been twenty years in Charran, he will be now seventy-seven, and his father one hundred and thirty-seven (the age of Ishmael at his death). But if we allow forty years for Jacob’s residence in Charran (as seems almost necessary), he will be now only fifty-seven, and Isaac one hundred and seventeen; and Isaac in that case must have lived more than fifty years after these transactions. These computations, however, are difficult and uncertain.

16 skins. The hair of the young of the Syrian goat is peculiarly soft and silky. It was used in later days by the Romans as an artificial substitute for human hair.

17. Jacob. All the parties were to be blamed: Isaac, for seeking to set aside the Divine oracle

(xxv. 23) to indulge personal partiality; Esau, for wishing to deprive his brother of the blessing he had relinquished; Rebekah and Jacob, for attempting to secure it by fraudulent means. Jacob suffered for his deception in his separation from his mother for the rest of her life, for they seem never to have met again (see on xxxv. 8); as well as by fear of his brother and in the endurance of many years of toil and hardship.

27 raiment. The sportsman’s rough dress would long retain the smell of the aromatic herbs with which Palestine abounds.

28. God give thee. In the blessing here pronounced, the spiritual promises are much less explicit than usual. A fertile country, extended power, and superiority in his own family, are the most prominent. The value of the dew in a land which was often without rain for months together is often noticed in Scripture, as well as in other books.

33 where. Or, “Who then is he”? (R.V.).—shall be blessed. Isaac saw that God had been over-ruling his own weakness, and the deceitfulness of Jacob, for the accomplishment of the promise; and though he “trembled,” he acquiesced.

39 the fatness, etc. Or, “Away from the fertile part of the earth, and from the dew of heaven from above; for in thy desert thou shalt live: and thou shalt serve thy brother; but the time shall come when thou shalt wander freely; for thou shalt break his yoke from off thy neck.”

45 both. Of one by murder, and of the other by the “avenger of blood.”

46. Rebekah said. To contrive a pretext for sending Jacob to Haran, which Rebekah managed with characteristic duplicity.