Esav and Anti-Semitism
I. Anti-Semitism is unique
Racial hatreds and prejudices are widespread. Is antisemitism unique in anyway? There are a number of characteristics that suggest that it is different from antagonisms directed against other minorities. First, anti-Semitism is far more pervasive than other forms of racism and prejudice. It is embraced by elements of the political right and widespread within the liberal community. The sole difference is that the extreme right is more explicit in its attitude toward Jews. The left cloaks its anti-Semitism in its incessant, unbalanced criticism of Israel. The mantra of these critics is that they are not anti-Semitic; it is concern for the welfare of oppressed peoples – in this case the Palestinians – that motivates them. However, the underlying antisemitism is belied by the obsessive character of these critics’ vilification of Israel.
An interesting outcome of the unique character of anti-Semitism is the unusual manner in which Jewish organizations battle it. Other minorities confront prejudice, discrimination, and hatred directed against them very directly. Their focus is specifically upon the treatment of their minority. The “Black Lives Matter” movement targets treatment of Afro-Americans. It does not divert resources to confronting negative attitudes toward other minorities.
In contrast, Jewish organizations dedicated to fighting anti-Semitism generally extend their efforts to opposing hatred directed against other minorities. To an extent, this posture expresses a more enlightened approach to opposing anti-Semitism. It recognizes a degree of kinship between all hatreds directed against minorities. However, the strategy also suggests a more cynical motive. To enlist wide-spread, broad-based support in the battle against anti-Semitism, the campaign must be more inclusive.
In other words, other minorities are confident that they can appeal to the general community by focusing upon their specific experience as victims of hatred. Jewish organizations do not have this confidence. Instead, they suspect that campaigns targeting anti-Semitism, specifically, will have limited support beyond the Jewish community.
An enormous body of study has developed on antisemitism. This includes Jean-Paul Sartre’s Anti-Semite and Jew and Sigmund Freud’s treatment of the issue in his Moses and Monotheism. However, in-depth analysis of antisemitism can be a distraction from recognizing its empirical and most explicit aspects. Parshat Toldot and its analysis by the commentators provides an invaluable insight into antisemitism and its resilience.
And Hashem said to her, "Two nations are in your womb, and two kingdoms will separate from your innards, and one kingdom will become mightier than the other kingdom, and the elder will serve the younger”. (Sefer Beresheit 25:23)
II. Yaakov replaces Esav
Parshat Toldot opens with the birth of Yaakov and Esav. Rivkah was childless. Yaakov pleaded with Hashem and she conceived. During her pregnancy, she experienced extraordinary pain. Hashem revealed to her that she carried twins. These would be the progenitors of two nations. He also revealed that the elder son would serve his younger brother. Rivkah delivered her twins. Esav was the firstborn. Yaakov was the younger brother.
The parasha explains that Yaakov purchased from Esav his rights as firstborn. Esav viewed these rights as worthless and was willing to assign them to his younger brother in exchange for minor compensation. The parasha also describes Yaakov – following the counsel of his mother, Rivkah – securing from his father the blessings Yitzchak had intended for Esav.
In the closing portion of the parasha, Yitzchak instructs Yaakov to travel to Padan Aram. There, he is to seek a wife. Before his departure, Yitzchak confers upon Yaakov the blessing of Avraham. Yaakov is Avraham’s spiritual heir. The blessings that Hashem had conferred upon Avraham and Yitzchak will be extended to Yaakov and fulfilled in his descendants. In short, over the course of the parasha, all the privileges that Esav would have expected as the firstborn son were transferred to Yaakov. Esav eagerly squandered his birthright; Yaakov secured the blessings Yitzchak had intended for Esav, and the blessing of Avraham was conferred upon Yaakov.
And Esav hated Yaakov because of the blessing that his father had blessed him, and Esav said to himself, "Let the days of mourning for my father draw near, I will then kill my brother Yaakov. " (Sefer Beresheit 27:41)
III. Esav resents Yaakov
What was Esav’s attitude toward Yaakov? The above passage explains that Esav hated Yaakov and envisaged killing him. Rashi comments that despite periods of reconciliation, Esav remained steadfast in his animosity toward Yaakov.[1]
Esav’s antipathy toward Yaakov is understandable. Yaakov had completely displaced him. Nonetheless, his attitude deserves further consideration. Yishmael’s experiences were similar to Esav’s. He was Avraham’s firstborn. Yet, his younger brother, Yitzchak, was selected as Avraham’s spiritual heir and as the beneficiary of the blessings that Hashem had bestowed upon Avraham.
At the close of Parshat Chayey Sarah, Avraham takes a wife – Keturah. She bears children. Some of these were progenitors of nations. None were beneficiaries of the blessings bestowed upon their father. None were selected to partner with Yitzchak in advancing Avraham’s spiritual message.
Like Esav, Yishmael and his brothers may have harbored animosity toward their more favored sibling. However, our Sages do not attribute to them the intractable hatred harbored by Esav. Why were these shunned siblings more accepting than Esav?
Do not covet your friend’s house. Do not covet you friend’s wife, his servant, his maidservant, his ox, his donkey, or anything of your friend’s. (Sefer Shemot 20:14)
IV. The premise of coveting
This passage from the Asseret HaDibrot – the Decalogue – commands us to not covet. This commandment is sometimes misunderstood. It does not mean that one cannot want a car or home that is like one’s neighbor’s. The prohibition is against wanting his car or his house and pressuring one’s neighbor to sell it. A second commandment prohibits even contemplating how one might secure one’s friend’s property, even though one does not act on these ruminations. The commentators ask an obvious question. How can the Torah expect a person to control one’s thoughts? It is reasonable to prohibit acting on the desire. But the desire itself is spontaneous and involuntary.
Rav Ovadia Sforno responds:
“The thing should be to you completely impossible. For that which is impossible one’s nature does not at all covet.”[2]
Sforno’s position is that we covet that which we imagine could be ours. Coveting is founded upon dismissal of the other person’s ownership rights to his property. The response to coveting is to more clearly understand and firmly accept that someone else’s property is absolutely that person’s and prohibited to all others. This may not be easily accomplished but once achieved, this realization will quash the desire for another’s possessions.[3]
Sfrono’s basic principle – one covets only that which one believes is attainable – is applied by Rabbaynu Nissim to Esav. The intensity of Esav’s hatred for his brother is explained by his belief that the blessings and privileges secured by Yaakov rightfully belonged to him. He was the elder son of Yitzchak and Rivkah. He was entitled to be the more privileged son and to be the heir to his father.
And Avraham gave all that he possessed to Yitzchak. And to the sons of Avraham's concubines, Avraham gave gifts, and he sent them away from his son Yitzchak while he [Avraham] was still alive, eastward to the land of the East. (Sefer Beresheit 25:5-6)
Now these are the descendants of Yishmael the son of Avraham, whom Hagar the Egyptian, the maidservant of Sarah, bore to Avraham. (Sefer Beresheit 25:12)
V. Yishmael accepts Yitzchak
Based on this analysis, Rabbaynu Nissim – RaN – explains why the animosity of Yishamael and his siblings for Yitzchak did not approach Esav’s hatred. The above passages discuss Yitzchak’s siblings. The children born to Avraham’s final wife are referred to as the sons of his concubine. Yishmael is described as the son of the maidservant. RaN suggests that these descriptions are significant. Yishmael and his brothers understood the implications of being offspring of a servant and a concubine. They were not the children Sarah – Avraham’s true wife. They did not expect to attain Yitzchak’s standing with their father. Yishmael, at times, was jealous of Yitzchak. Perhaps, his brothers also envied Yitzchak. But their antipathy toward Yitzchak did not rise to the level of Esav’s resentment of Yaakov. Esav’s hatred was inflamed by his conviction that Yaakov had received the recognition and privileges that were due him. Yishmael and his brothers, to some extent, recognized that their parentage was not equal to Yitzchak’s.[4]
VI. Esav and anti-Semitism
The purport of RaN’s analysis is that a hatred akin to Esav’s will be intense and implacable. The person harboring the hatred feels cheated. The hatred is directed against the person who he feels has taken something that is rightfully his. This insight is very useful in identifying one of the sources of anti-Semitism.
Some forms of anti-Semitism share the character of Esav’s hatred of Yaakov. Religiously motivated anti-Semitism is a response to the Jewish nation’s claim of election – of being chosen. The role of this factor is evidenced by the fundamental premises of two other major religions – Catholicism and Islam. Catholicism declares that although the Jewish people were selected by Hashem, they lost their status and it has passed to the members of the Catholic church.[5] Islam alleges that Yitzchak was not Avraham’s spiritual heir; his true scion was Yishmael. Those practicing Islam regard themselves as Yishmael’s spiritual progeny – the truly chosen people. In other words, a fundamental focus of both religions is denial of the Jewish nation’s claim of election and the appropriation of this status by the practitioners of these religions.
This dynamic is an explicit foundation of religiously motivated anti-Semitism. The religious person resents the Jewish people’s assertion of being chosen. These anti-Semites believe that they are as deserving as any other to be members of G-d’s favored nation. Like Esav, they feel that the distinction claimed by the Jewish people is rightfully their own.
Many anti-Semites are not religiously motivated. Many do not strongly identify with any religion; others are agnostic or even atheist. The Soviet Union was intensely anti-Semitic despite its rejection of all religions as the “opium of the people”. This anti-Semitism is not as easily explained as religiously motivated hatred. It requires its own analysis. However, RaN’s insight may have relevance to also this form of anti-Semitism.
[1] Rabbaynu Shlomo ben Yitzchak (Rashi), Commentary on Sefer Beresheit 33:4.
[2] Rabbaynu Ovadia Sforno, Commentary on Sefer Shemot 20:14. Very possibly, Sforno’s comments are based upon Ibn Ezra. See his comments ad loc.
[3] One’s wife is not a possession. However, the same reasoning applies. The Torah strictly prohibits intimacy with someone else’s wife. If one fully understands and accepts this prohibition, he will not be able to covet another’s wife.
[4] Rabbaynu Nissim ben Reuven Gerondi (Ran), Derashot HaRan (Machon Shalem, Jerusalem, 5734), pp. 21-23.
[5] Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik enumerates in his Kol Dodi Dofek various impacts of the establishment of the State of Israel. He explains that before its creation, the Church pointed to the exile of the Jewish people from their homeland as evidence G-d’s rejection. The creation of the State of Israel nullified this argument.