The Haftarah of Parshat Toldot is one of those Haftarot whose connection with the Parasha is, on the face of it, quite evident. However, a closer examination reveals many deeper strata. The Haftarah, from the book of Malachi, begins with the first chapter and ends in the middle of the second chapter. The “L’vush” comments as follows:

The Haftarah (of Parshat Toldot) is taken from Malachi, because it contains the phrases “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother…” and “Yet I loved Jacob…”. This is the essence of the Parasha.

The entire Parasha deals with the birth of Esau and Jacob and the blessings. After the story of Esau and Jacob has run its course, we read from the book of Malachi, because it deals with Esau and Jacob.

The books of the prophets culminate with Malachi’s marvelous prophecies, ending with those words which are familiar to us all from Shabbat Hagadol: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord.” The book of Malachi consists of three chapters in all. Esau and Jacob take up a very small part of the whole, and in fact there appears to be no connection whatsoever between them and the general thrust of Malachi’s prophecies. The Haftarah is almost 30 verses in length. The first 4 or 5 refer to Esau and Jacob, followed by an abrupt change of topic – Kohanim and sacrifices!

Now I would like to pose some questions, on various levels. The first is the level at which we normally attempt to understand our sages’ intention when they determine that a particular Haftara reading is appropriate to a particular Parasha. I cannot accept the explanation of the L’vush – the reference to Esau and Jacob. There are countless chapters containing the same references. Jeremiah devotes an entire chapter to Esau, and Ovadia’s vision, (read with Parasha Vayishlach) also speaks of the houses of Jacob and Esau. Furthermore, despite the brief reference to Esau and Jacob, there does not appear to be any connection with the rest of the Haftarah, and its relevance to Malachi’s prophecy is not immediately evident. Most of the commentators view it as a separate subject.

The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi: I have loved you, said the Lord, yet you said: How have You loved us? Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? God said: I loved Jacob but I hated Esau. I have made his mountains a desolation and given his heritage to the jackals of the wilderness.

By the second verse Malachi’s style is evident (each prophet has his own style) – he conveys his message in the form of an altercation. The entire prophecy is a confrontation, a harsh argument, first with the priests, and then with the Jewish people, taking them to task for intermarriage, for lies and falsehood, ultimately concluding with: “Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet”. So far we have Esau and Jacob – but what of Edom? I do not intend to explore the historical identity of Edom, but there is no doubt that it is a central theme representing the evil of the nations – the antithesis of Israel. The passage continues:

Whereas Edom says: We are beaten down, but we will return and build the waste places. Thus says the Lord of hosts: They shall build, but I will overthrow; and they shall be called the border of wickedness, and the people whom the Lord reviles for ever. Your eyes shall see, and you shall say: The Lord is great beyond the border of Israel.

Now we have some marvelous verses corresponding fully to the history of Esau and Jacob. Their significance is – in this world it may not appear so, but “Your eyes shall see”… When all is said and done you will see that it is so!

Up to this point the subject of the text is the relationship of Esau and Jacob. No reference to destruction of any kind. “Your eyes shall see” – everything in macro, as it were. Now we move on to a new topic:

“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear?” Says the Lord of hosts says unto you priests who despise My name. And you say: “Where have we despised Your name?” “You offer polluted bread upon My altar, and you say ‘where have we polluted You?’ In that you say ‘the table of the Lord is contemptible’. And when you offer the blind for sacrifice, it is no evil! And when you offer the lame and sick , it is no evil! Present it now to your governor – will he be please with you? Or will he accept you?” says the Lord of hosts…. “But cursed be he who deals craftily, whereas he has in his flock a male, and vows, yet he sacrifices unto the Lord a blemished thing. For I am a great King”, says the Lord of hosts, “and My name is feared among the nations. And now, this commandment is for you, O Priests”

These words are addressed to the priests. They are rebuked for bringing unsuitable sacrifices. They are accused of crooked behavior, while innocently asking “Where have we polluted You?”.

He goes on:

“And now this commandment is for you, O priests. If you will not listen, and if you will not lay it to heart, to give glory to My name”, says the Lord of hosts, “then I will send the curse upon you, and I will curse your blessings. I curse them because you do not lay it to heart.”

“I will curse your blessings” is an unusual expression. I will not curse you, but your blessings, in other words, the blessings will themselves turn into curses.

“Behold I will rebuke the seed and I will spread dung upon your faces, even the dung of your sacrifices, and you will be taken away unto it. Know then that I have sent you this commandment, that My covenant might be with Levi,” says the Lord of hosts. My covenant was with him – life and peace, these I gave to him, and fear, and he was afraid of Me, and afraid of My name. The law of truth was in his mouth, and unrighteousness was not found upon his lips; he walked with Me in peace and uprightness, and turned many away from iniquity.”

Our sages relate this to “Loving peace and pursuing peace” – Aaron the High Priest. This riveting passage describes the true duties of the priest in the priesthood, which has somehow become corrupt and filthy. Despite its beautiful facade, it is evil and crooked within. But what does this have to do with Esau and Jacob? Malachi ends his tirade against the priests at this point. Interestingly, the Haftarah begins and ends similarly – Malachi’s anger at the intermarriage practiced by the people of Israel. There is another problem as well:

And this is another thing you do: you cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping, and with sighing, so much so that He does not regard your offering any more, nor does He receive it with good will at your hand. Yet you say “why?” Because the Lord has been witness between you and the wife of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously although she is your companion and the wife of your covenant…”

Malachi now turns to the people, declaring them incapable of discerning between righteousness and iniquity. He assures them that the day will yet come when “the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasant unto the Lord, as in the days of old, and in ancient years” . The day will yet come when the offering will be genuine, not a false offering bathed in tears. And then what? Then we will truly be capable of discerning “between the righteous and the wicked, between he who serves God and he that serves Him not”. The problem is not one of making a distinction based on outward appearances, but on distinguishing between one who sincerely serves God and one who only appears to do so. The end of the book of Malachi is well known to us all:

“Remember the law of Moses My servant, which I commanded him in Horeb for all Israel, statutes and ordinances. Behold I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers; Lest I come and smite the land with utter destruction.”

I do not understand this book. It begins with 5 verses on the relationship between Esau and Jacob and ends with a commitment regarding the prophet Elijah. In all of the prophetic books, this is the only incidence of someone being taken from his relevant historical context and immortalized by the prophetic text. We read in the book of Kings that Elijah ascended to heaven in a storm – here he is transformed into the Angel of the Covenant, an angel of the Lord. “Behold I will send you Elijah the prophet” – apparently this is a riddle to be solved. Esau and Jacob at the beginning, Elijah at the end, no connection between them, and complaints and quarrels in the middle! It moves from the inside outward, from the priests to the sons of Judah and thence to the people of Israel, ending with “he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers”. This is an amazing prophecy. How does the finale, with its reference to Elijah, relate to Malachi? What is the format of this book? It is truly beautiful that the books of prophecy end with “Remember the law of Moses My servant which I commanded him…. statutes and ordinances,” culminating in “Behold I will send you Elijah the prophet”. It’s great, it’s terrific, but nevertheless we must examine the book’s format.

I now return to a legitimate question - how does the L’vush put it? “The Haftarah (of Parashat Toldot) is taken from Malachi, because it contains the phrases “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother…” and “Yet I loved Jacob…”. This is the essence of the Parasha.” Is it for this reason that we read 30 verses, out of which only the first five relate to our topic? If it’s so important, why not simply read the five verses, and we’ll have that much more time to devote to a “drashah” before Musaf!

The battle against corruption in ruling circles was waged by Yehoram ben Ahab, who later became a creditor, enslaving the children of a woman who was wife to one of the sons of the prophets. The Haftarah in which this is related is a resounding outcry against the fact that the habits and customs of Sodom have penetrated into the heart of Israel. We have frequently attempted to demonstrate that the Haftarah is a kind of separation – not a part, not a section, not the same topic, but something that comes to help us understand difficulties that arose in the Parashah. Sometimes it’s difficult to prove, yet it’s quite plain. We saw it in Va’era, and I maintain that this is definitely also the case in Parashat Toldot.

Apart from the story of the wells, Parashat Toldot deals mainly with Isaac and Rebecca – birth, growing up, selling the birthright, then the story of the wells and immediately back to the blessing, the theft of the blessings, Esau’s secret plan for revenge, Jacob’s fleeing to Laban, and finally, Esau’s marriage to Mahlat daughter of Ishmael. Very few Parashiot actually deal with one story in its entirety. According to Rashi’s calculations, Parashat Toldot covers a period of 80 years, including the “pre-birth” episode when Esau and Jacob “struggled within” their mother’s womb. The Parashah follows their development of their character traits and inclinations, the blessings, and how each brother utilized his own strengths in the matter of the blessings.

Something in this Parashah always strikes a jarring note. On the face of it, Esau as portrayed here is not Esau, the symbol of corruption. He’s not so bad after all! It is true that when he sells his birthright to Jacob his language lacks a certain refinement (“Let me eat…”), and there are definitely other ways to express oneself than “I’m about to die…”, and one can even approach the concept of the birthright from another angle than “Esau despised his birthright” – all this is unquestionably correct, but it’s not so bad! So what if his complexion was ruddy – that’s fairly common. But see how he respected and honored his father!

There is no dialog between Isaac and Rebecca, such as there was between Abraham and Sarah. Rebecca simply arranged matters so that Esau would not receive his blessing. It is quite clear that Isaac loved Esau, who was, according to the Torah, “a cunning hunter, a man of the field…” — I’m not sure that I understand this explanation, but at least there is a reason. But why did Rebecca love Jacob? The Torah tells us that “Rebecca loved Jacob” — with no explanation. This entire issue of Isaac loving Esau and Rebecca loving Jacob is difficult to understand. I offer the suggestion that the Haftarah answers this question.

Before addressing this issue, however, I would like to return to an extremely brief section – the encounter between the brothers and the sale of the birthright - and study it again. The text reads: “And when her days to bear were full, behold, there were twins in her womb. And the first went out red, all over like a hairy robe; and so they called his name Esau.” His characteristics are recorded – apparently they are important: red and hairy. This description does not usually go with the image of a righteous person. A hairy person is usually one who’s parents haven’t had much success in persuading him to get a haircut, because he won’t listen to them. But Esau was a baby, he was born that way. “Red” usually has associations with blood – we’ll go into that later. “And they called his name Esau” – the Zohar explains that “Esau” has the numerical value of “peace”. The Hebrew letters for “peace” can also denote wholeness and completeness, or great ambition. And so they called his name Esau.

“After that his brother came out, and his hand grasped the heel of Esau. And they called his name Jacob…” . I’m sure that at the brit milah celebratory feast for the babies, the explanation for Jacob’s name was more easily accepted by the assembled guests than the explanation for Esau’s name. Jacob’s name followed logically from his clutching of his brother’s heel (“Ekev”). But to call his twin Esau because he is “red and hairy all over” – it doesn’t follow! One would have expected his name to be Edom, as he was indeed called later on, or Sa’ir, which also became his name at a later date.

Now comes the story:

“And the lads grew; and Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field; but Jacob was a plain man, abiding in tents. And Isaac loved Esau, because he ate of his venison, but Rebecca loved Jacob. And Jacob cooked lentils, and Esau came from the field and he was weary. And Esau said to Jacob: Let me eat from this red, red thing, for I am faint. Therefore was his name Edom. And Jacob said: Sell me your birthright this day. And Esau said: I am going to die, and what use is the birthright to me? And Jacob said: Swear to me this day. And he swore to him, and sold his birthright to Jacob. The Jacob gave Esau bread and cooked lentils, and he did eat and drink, and he rose and went. And Esau despised his birthright.”

Jacob was a homebody. He was “a plain man, abiding in tents”. He stayed at home, learning, and between times he prepared tea and cooked a little. “And Esau came from the field and he was weary”. This is a fine portrayal of two brothers, each going his own way – there’s nothing wrong in coming in from the fields. By the way, the only man who had been successful in the fields until now was Isaac. He was preceded by Cain, who had failed. Cain brought the fruits of the earth – Abel was a shepherd. Now the same situation is unfolding again. Esau, the man of the field, is a hunter, while Jacob is a shepherd, dwelling in tents.

“And Esau said to Jacob: Let me eat from this red, red thing, for I am faint. Therefore was his name Edom.” Because he was red he was called Esau, but because he once he asked for a dish of red lentils he was called Edom – is this logical? This entire verse is not clear. Esau said “Let me eat… “ Why? “Because I am faint”. Since when was a dish of good soup the remedy for tiredness? I’m tired, so “Let me eat”. And why do we need so many explanations: “Isaac loved Esau because….”? Isaac loved Esau because he just did, in the same way that Rebecca loved Jacob. Esau also goes in for explanations: “Let me eat… for I am faint”. This is the second reference to his faintness and weariness. He comes in wearily from the field and declares his weariness. And then we have: “therefore was his name Edom…” Apparently Jacob called him Edom. “And Jacob said: Sell me your birthright this day”. To be perfectly honest, this isn’t fair of Jacob. Your brother is under stress, and you tell him to sell his birthright. “And Esau said: I am going to die, and what use is the birthright to me?” We started with a biblical description of his weariness, continued with “Let me have… for I am faint”, and now he’s not only weak, but about to die!

Jacob and Esau are fifteen years old. They’re young boys. How do the concepts of weariness and death fit here? Soon their father Isaac will call Esau and tell him that he wants to bless him, beginning with “Behold I am old and I don’t know the day of my death. He was one hundred and twenty three years old! Yet this young man, fifteen years old, says he’s about to die. It’s not just slang or merely a figure of speech, he means it. He’s weary and about to die. We must understand what is meant here. By the way, when Jacob asked for the birthright, Esau could simply reply with one word: OK, or No! Did anyone ask him for an ideological explanation of his reasons for the sale? And then Jacob asks Esau to swear – why? Is the sale invalid if he doesn’t swear? By the way, note that the phrase “this day” appears twice. It seems that Esau was not as tired as he made out, because we are told that after eating the lentils he arose, went, ate, drank, and despised his birthright. No mention of a quick nap – he was totally energized!

Why do we need to know that he received cooked lentils and bread as well? The bread was apparently “on the house” because he didn’t ask for it. Why all these details? Sforno tells us something very interesting in connection with the question of why Esau was Edom. According to Sforno, one thing bothered Jacob: Esau had arrived from the fields exhausted. Jacob didn’t say anything, although his brother’s tiredness hinted at something more than ordinary fatigue. Esau asked to be fed, while Jacob remained silent. Esau called the dish of lentils this “red, red thing” – a reference to its characteristics, rather than its name. Jacob wonders whether Esau sees the actual lentils, or whether he is too tired to realize what he is seeing. And then he wonders: exactly how tired are you, and what made you so tired?

Esau has just returned from the fields – not a bad thing in itself. Isaac, too, returned from the fields, and Rebecca’s first sight of her intended was when he came to meet her in the fields. Sforno says:

“When they saw that he was wholly occupied with his worthless work, which was not like the law of man, to a point that he did not recognize the lentils but only their color, they called his name ‘Edom’”.

I would like to refer to a well-known Midrash. Our sages maintain that the episode of the cooked lentils is not a simple matter. According to the Midrash, Abraham had recently died – Abraham the father and grandfather. The twins were born when their father was sixty years old. Now their grandfather died. It’s a matter of simple arithmetic - Isaac was born when his father was 100 years old so the boys were born when Abraham was 160 years old. Abraham died at the age of 175, and our sages say that Isaac prepared a meal with lentils, as was the custom with mourners, and announced the death at the meal. When Esau came in from the field, he asked Jacob what he was doing, and Jacob told him that their grandfather had died. Then Esau said to Jacob: “Let me have some of this red thing because I am weary. Therefore was he called Edom”. I have no strength right now – grandfather is dead! No doubt it is very difficult for a grandson to take part in his grandfather’s funeral, and as the firstborn he probably had to undertake special assignments in this regard.

An ancient argument was carried on in this household. Isaac loves Esau because he provided him with venison, but Isaac doesn’t only love Esau. Isaac has every intention of giving Abraham’s blessing to Jacob, but since Jacob impersonates Esau he receives Esau’s blessing by subterfuge: “Your brother came to me with subtlety…” but he doesn’t give him Abraham’s blessing, which he leaves for the end of the Parashah, when Jacob comes before him, to be told: “Go quickly to your mother’s brother”. In other words, Isaac always had two blessings, which explains Esau’s bitter cry: “Do you have only one blessing, my father?” How can it be? I have grown up in this house knowing that you believed in two blessings. My mother was aware of only one blessing, because she was totally focused on Jacob, but you believed in two! My brother has stolen my blessing, so give me his instead.

But Isaac doesn’t give him Jacob’s blessing. He says: “What shall I do now for you, my son?” Is it possible to change Jacob from a dweller in tents to “Be master of your brothers”, “Let peoples serve you”, “Plenty of corn and wine”? This blessing is suited to a man of the field, a hunter, certainly not to a simple man who lives in tents. But why, then, was it not possible for Esau to receive Abraham’s blessing? It was obtained by fraud “Your brother came with subtlety and stole your blessing… and he shall be blessed”. Why so? He has dealt fraudulently and lied, Isaac himself said so, and yet “he shall be blessed”! So why not simply reverse the blessings?

I return to the fifteen-year-olds. Jacob was typically at home, never going to the fields. He was a shepherd, so his duties kept him much closer to home. The sages interpret “dweller in tents” to mean that he studied Torah. Not so, says the Rashbam. It means that he tended sheep, close to the homestead. When he fulfils the instructions of his mother, he bring two kids, they are nearby, he doesn’t go to the fields to find them. Jacob, aged 15, witnessed something that transformed him. When Esau arrived, weary to the bone, and asked for some of the “red stuff”, Jacob’s response was merely to call him Edom. But then he suggested that Esau sell his birthright. I maintain that this was not an actual transaction, in the halachic sense. There was no meshichah, no hagbahah, no kinyan and no shevuah. I am sure the episode would have ended there if Esau had refused. But Esau’s response is: “Not only am I exhausted, I’m about to die. I’m a hunter, a man of the field. I will someday be lord of Timna, of Kenaz, Nebo, Teiman, Omer and Amalek, and much more. So I don’t have the strength for this right now. And what good is the birthright to me anyway?” For fifteen years Jacob had listened to the conversations between his parents, so he said to himself: “Perhaps my mother is correct. Now grandfather is dead, and if mother is correct, you don’t deserve to inherit from him”. And so he made Esau swear to give him the birthright. An onlooker would have seen Esau emerge from the transaction with bread and lentils, while Jacob only had a nebulous promise. No court of law would recognize the legality of trading an inheritance for a bowl of lentils. Jacob paid with a good meal to receive a spiritual quality in return. That’s the essential difference!

From this moment an argument ensued, which eventually culminated in the episode of the blessings. The argument was really between Isaac and Rebecca – can the field, the hunt, Esau’s outward characteristics of redness and hairiness ever be compatible with the inner qualities embodied by Jacob? From the outset, Rebecca views Esau’s positive traits as something external. Isaac sees more deeply into his son Esau. Rebecca, who know Isaac well, knows that his nature is such that he cannot see the wickedness of Esau. He cannot accept it.

At the end of the Parasha Esau says to himself: “When the days of mourning for my father are over, I will kill my brother Jacob”. Rivka realizes his intentions, and quickly says to Jacob: “Behold, your brother Esau intends to kill you” and she advises him to flee to Haran. She does not say a word on the subject of marriage. But now she has to explain to Isaac why she’s sending her son to Haran, and at the same time she wants him to receive his father’s blessing. So how does she put it? “My life is harassed by the daughters of Heth; if Jacob will take a wife from the daughters of Heth, like the daughters of the land, what is life to me?” She cannot tell him that there is tension between the brothers, because Isaac will not hear a word against Esau. She can mention it to Jacob, but never to Isaac. Her ruse works, and her husband calls for his son and blesses him before sending him on his way.

Esau, the man of the field and of the hunt, never succeeds in internalizing these things. When Jacob receives his blessing it is the one really intended for Esau. But conversely, the man who is “about to die” cannot receive the blessing intended for Jacob, the spiritual man. At the age of 63 the man who never laid eyes on a plough can, if necessary, accept the hunter’s blessing intended for Esau. Jacob will later be able to work in the fields, to occupy himself with matters of the field, and to see the fulfillment of his blessing and his brother’s as well.

Esau married at the age of 40. “Esau was forty years old when he took to wife Judith” and our sages have very harsh things to say about him. he married Judith daughter of Be’eri the Hittite, and Basmat the daughter of Elon the Hittite – we have see many names in Genesis and none of them are more Jewish than these. The next mention of Judith is in connection with Hanukkah, it is a symbol of Yiddishkeit. But read further – she’s the daughter of a Hittite. To what lengths did Esau’s grandfather go to prevent his son, Esau’s father, from marrying one of the Hittite women! Yet Esau saw fit to marry two of them.

Our sages said: “Judith – Basmat, their names are comely but their deeds are ugly” and they have good reason for saying so. The text reads: “And they were a vexation of spirit unto Isaac and unto Rebecca” – not just to Rebecca! In fact, first to Isaac and only afterwards to Rebecca. What kind of respect for one’s father is this? For twenty years you had them in your home, knowing full well that this displeased your father, or perhaps you never noticed how your father felt in all this time? When Isaac sent Jacob away to seek a wife and requested, in fact ordered him not to take a Canaanite wife, Esau was surely aware of it. The whole household knew because Rebecca discussed the issue quite openly with Isaac. And the Parasha ends with the words: “And Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan were evil in the eyes of Isaac his father.” So what did he do? It would have been appropriate for him to send them away, but instead: “Then Esau went to Ishmael, and took besides his former wives, Mahalat the daughter of Ishmael Abraham’s son, the sister of Nebahoth, to be his wife.” No less a personage than Abraham’s granddaughter! Moreover, he added her to his existing wives. So he had the best of both worlds – his Hittite women remained, but whenever he visited his father he would bring Mahalat and introduce her as the granddaughter of grandfather Abraham.

Mahalat was a righteous woman. Halachically a bride and groom fast on their wedding day, because this day is like Yom Kippur for them, and all their sins are erased. This halacha is derived from Mahalat, daughter of Ishmael the son of Abraham. How did she come by this name? At the end of Parashat Vayishlach there is an entire chapter devoted to Esau. We know that he had three wives: Judith, Basmat, and Mahalat. But at the end of Vayishlach we read as follows:

Now these are the generations of Esau, who is Edom. Esau took his wives of the daughters of Canaan: Adah the daughter of Elon the Hittite, and Aholibamah the daughter of Anah the daughter of Zibeon the Hivite; and Basmath Ishmael’s daughter, sister of Neviot.

This is confusing. We know of Judith, daughter of Be’eri the Hittite, and Basmat the daughter of Elon the Hittite but who is Adah? And what of Aholibamah? Where do they come from? Are Adah and Judith one and the same? Her name was Adah but he called her Judith. The second one’s name was Aholibamah, it had never been Basmat, but he called her so. And there was only one Basmat, but she was known as Mahalat. Why all this information about Esau’s wives?

The Haftarah of Parashat Vayera describes how Sodom succeeded in penetrating into the heart of Israel. The book of Malachi deals with Esau’s success in infiltrating us! We can set up a beautiful infrastructure of priests, but if Basmat and Judith are invited, the whole thing is built on lies! “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? Yet I loved Jacob but I hated Esau” – and you can be Esau! It is dangerous to be a hunter, a man of the fields. It’s much easier to be a “Tzaddik” if you’re a simple man living in tents.

The book opens with five verses about Esau and Jacob, continues with two and a half chapters on the realm of falsehood, the beautiful religious exterior and the emptiness within “but cursed be he who deals craftily, who has a male in his flock…” who sobs before the altar, whose tears cover the altar but all is lies and falsehood – and the finale: the prophet Elijah.

Esau was red and hairy. We know of two biblical personalities who stepped out of their historical context to accompany us throughout the generations. One was David, the ruddy one with the handsome eyes, the second was Elijah, who was extremely hairy. But why should hairiness be a negative quality? Who said redness is an unattractive characteristic?

The Haftarah of Parashat Toldot explains the Parashah quite simply and clearly. If you want to understand the Parashah, just study the Haftarah. It is not merely five verses about Esau and Jacob, it is in fact twenty five verses about “Esau-ness” and “Jacob-ness” – about the exterior, the facade, and the inner truth. The Book of Malachi is the final book of prophets and the pinnacle of all prophecies. It ends with an injunction not to be tempted by the outward appearance but to look within. Ultimately, all will be rectified when you learn to discern between the righteous man and the sinner, between he who serves God and he who does not, and then you will truly return to the Law of My servant Moses, not for the sake of Judith and Basmat, or for the priests and the flocks, but for the sake of Torat Emet” – the true Torah.

At the wedding, the bride and groom begin anew – not for our Father Abraham, or for Moshe Rabenu, but for Esau’s third wife – Mahalah. This is a kind of Yom Kippur - before the wedding, before the building of the new home, it is the Yom Kippur when the true question is asked – what are you planning to build? Walls? A ceiling? Judith and Basmat or Mahalah? The noise of the celebrants and the sound of the band is very loud right now, but when it’s all over, in a few hours, the real question is raised – what next? We must be as zealous as Elijah “I was zealous for the Lord of hosts”… Elijah eventually ascends to heaven in a storm – it is he who will, in the end of days, restore the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to the fathers, because the tension between them is often caused by their straying after external appearances. The sons and the fathers do not understand one another. Sometimes one is correct, sometimes the other. It needs someone of Elijah’s dimensions to restore them to one another. Only then will the prophecy be fulfilled.

There is much to be learnt from this story, and I think that’s why our sages want us to study it together with the Haftarah. It’s all of one piece – Esau, Jacob, the priests who desecrate the table of the Lord, and the prophet Elijah.

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