תּוֹלְדֹת
Toldot/Generations
Genesis 25:19-28:9
HafTorah Portion Malachi 1:1-2:7
Brit Chadasha Romans 9:6-13

     Blessings or living for self…

     This year, before this Torah portion is read, we will enter into the month of Kislev, a month that includes the lighting the hanukkiah. The lighting of the hanukkiah remind us of the eternal light that abides within the Father, Spirit, Torah and the Living Torah, His Son.  Through this light and in our obedience, whether we feel we are worthy or not, we learn about and receive His blessings. Blessings do not occur in our time, but rather through the faith and obedience that we have in His faithfulness to keep the light shining.
     The focus of this parsha might be the curses, but is also about blessings. The Hebrew word for blessed, baurch, is significant in this Parasha because out of 106 verses, baruch appears 34 times. Baruch, comes from brachah, which means blessing. With a small change in a vowel, it becomes breicha—a wellspring of water or even a pool. This alludes to the fact that reciting a Bracha opens up the breicha, the wellspring of blessing from Heaven, and our blessings to God. 
      The numerical values of the word "Bracha" – bet, reish, chaf – are 2, 20 and 200. While the number one signifies the minimal amount of anything, two begins multiplicity, double blessings. The word Bracha is made up of all the "two's," hinting to the power of a Bracha to bring additional blessings and gratitude. 
     Scripture teaches that a wellspring is a source or fountainhead of water, and is used metaphorically to represent life, wisdom, and the blessings that flow from God. The imagery of a wellspring is deeply rooted in the Hebrew culture, where water was a precious and life-sustaining resource. 
     Proverbs 18:4 ‘The words of a man’s mouth are deep waters; the wellspring of wisdom is a flowing brook.’
     Isaiah 12:1-3 ‘And in that day you will say: “O Lord, I will praise You; though You were angry with me, Your anger is turned away, and You comfort me.  Behold, God is my salvation,
I will trust and not be afraid; for Yah, the Lord, is my strength and song; He also has become my salvation.’  Therefore, with joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. (Yeshua).
     In John 4:13-14 Yeshua alluding to the prophet Isaiah, tells the Samaritan woman, ‘Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. But the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.’   
    Blessings to and blessings from come from our faith. But what is it about faith that sometimes we lack?  It is the ability to surrender to His control. We as fleshly beings, desire and almost demand control of our lives and decisions under the pretense that ‘it is God’.  This renders us out of obedience to Him and us to obedience to our self.  This is when our blessing to God is hindered, and blessings back to us. 
     Did Rebecca lack faith or was it something deeper.  The birthright in this parsha wasn’t stolen, it was taken by barter. Because of several incidents in her life, Rebecca knew that it would be Jacob, not Esau, who would continue the covenant and carry on the vision of Abraham given by God into the next generations. She was chosen by God to carry on the lineage. She was the one that displayed the extra kindness by watering the camels, and those actions were the sign that the servant sought.  She knew of the turmoil because she directly heard from God before the twins were born in Genesis 25:23, ‘‘Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the other, and the elder will serve the younger.”
     She knew because she had watched the twins grow up. She knew that Esau was a hunter, and a man of violence. She also witnessed him sell his birthright for a bowl of soup, and later lie to his father that it was ‘stolen’. She had watched and heard while he “…ate, drank, rose and left. So Esau despised his birthright.” Genesis 25:34. No one who despises his birthright can be the trusted guardian of a covenant intended for eternity that began with Abraham.
     And, she knew because just before the blessing of Jacob, Genesis 26:34 states that Esau married outside of the covenant, grieving his parents, Isaac and Rebecca. This showed Esau’s denial to comply with what the covenant required. By marrying Hittite women, he proved himself indifferent to the structure of the covenant. In all three incidents there is a direct statement: he didn’t care and was concerned only with ‘self’.
     In Genesis 27:33-40 when Esau came before Isaac, Isaac trembled exceedingly, then Esau let out a bitter cry. Genesis 27:36 states, ‘And Esau said, “Is he not rightly named Jacob? For he has supplanted me these two times. He took away my birthright, and now look, he has taken away my blessing!” And he said, “Have you not reserved a blessing for me?”  But in Genesis 25:34 it reads that Esau despised his birthright. 
      Self is our inner ego, the reason why we make the decisions that we do. We live for self, we die for self, we move for self. However, when we claim to live in the covenant of God, to abide by His Torah with the filter and salvation of Yeshua, we have to die to self, which is different than to die for self.
     Ephesians 4:20-24 ‘But you have not so learned Messiah, 21 if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Yeshua: 22 that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, 23 and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, 24 and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.’
     Luke 9:23 ‘And He was saying to them all, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.’
     Romans 12:1-2 ‘Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.’ 1 Peter 4:1-2 ‘Therefore, since Messiah has suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same purpose, because he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, so as to live the rest of the time in the flesh no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God.’
     Galatians 5:24 ‘Now those who belong to Yeshua have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.’
     Romans 8:12-13 ‘So then, brethren, we are under obligation, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh— for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die; but if by the Spirit you are putting to death the deeds of the body, you will live.’
           We must not live as Esau did, denying the ways of God, His Covenant and living for self, rendering blessings as nothing. When Esau discovered Jacob had received their father's blessing, his tears were not of true repentance but of selfishly wanting the blessing he had already forfeited. Throughout his life, Esau showed a consistent pattern of prioritizing his own desires and worldly concerns over God's plan. He was a skilled hunter who lived for the present, but his focus on the here and now blinded him to the long-term value of his birthright and the future consequences of his actions. His actions countered the blessings of God.
    We know that God desires our gratitude. Scriptures tell us to be thankful, and studies show that gratitude positively influences our joy, happiness and health. Judaism has a slightly different approach to thanking God and the idea of blessings. Instead of simply saying “Thank You, God,” Jewish tradition “blesses” God for His gifts to us. 
     When we hear the word blessing, we recognize that someone is the blesser — the giver and someone is the receiver. We pray for and thank God for His blessings on us, or we bless others by giving them gifts to meet their needs. How, then, do we “bless” God, the Creator of the universe who owns everything and needs nothing as Psalm 50:10-12 states. 
     Psalm 28:6 says, “Blessed be the Lord because He has heard the voice of my supplications!” The Hebrew word used here is barak, the primitive root of which means “to kneel.” To bless, by implication, means to kneel as an act of adoration before the blessed one. It means to honor. When we bless God, we honor and worship Him. 
     The difference between thanking and blessing God for a gift He has bestowed on us, even though both express gratitude, is that one shifts the focus from the gift and recipient to the Giver. The Jewish tradition of blessing God goes beyond giving thanks for the gift. It extends to worshiping God. Blessing God kneels in adoration before Him for His power, His majesty, sovereignty and benevolent favor to give anything to us. It honors Him as Creator, Sustainer and Giver of All Good Things, which reminds us that we don’t merit any of the gifts God gives us, but by His generosity and love, He gives.
     When we live for self, die for self, and demand lentil stew for immediate gratification we deny the blessings to and from God.    

תּוֹלְדֹת
Toldot/Generations
Genesis 25:19-28:9
HafTorah Portion Malachi 1:1-2:7
Brit Chadasha Romans 9:6-13

        Honesty and Deceit;

        Toldot opens with the genealogy of Abraham and Isaac to the birth of Jacob and Esau. Chapter 25 is the account of the twins wrestling in Rebekkah’s womb, the warning from God regarding their future, the infamous stew, and the birthright. In Genesis 26, the mirror encounter with Abimelek occurred with Issac as with Abraham.
     Genesis 20:1 ‘Now Abraham moved on from there into the region of the Negev and lived between Kadesh and Shur. For a while he stayed in Gerar, 2 and there Abraham said of his wife Sarah, “She is my sister.” Then Abimelek king of Gerar sent for Sarah and took her.’
     Genesis 26:7 – ‘When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” because he was afraid to say, “She is my wife.” He thought, “The men of this place might kill me on account of Rebekah, because she is beautiful.”
     Chapter 26 closes with Esau marrying ‘Judith daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and also Basemath daughter of Elon the Hittite, bringing grief to his parents.’
     Genesis 27 contains the entire encounter of Isaac, Esau, the tasty meal, Jacob, Rebekka, and the deceitful plan to fool Isaac. 
     Toldot closes with the blessing from Isaac to Jacob, instructions regarding the wife of Jacob and the wives of Easu’s.
   What is the honesty in Toldot? Adonai, of course.  He forewarned Rebekkah about her sons, He gave all the information she would need in Genesis 25:23.  In Genesis 26:3-6 Adonai encourages Issac regarding his descendants and the future, and again in Genesis 26:24.  But there is an abundance of deceit in Toldot. 
     Scripture never reveals that Rebekka ever went to Isaac with the prophecy from God when she was pregnant. It is also remarkable, that even after God’s prophecy and clarity to her during her pregnancy, she still lacked the faith and found it necessary to switch the identities of the two sons to receive the blessing at the expense of the old age of Isaac.
    What were the consequences of this deceit? Isaac, old and blind, felt betrayed by Jacob. He “trembled violently” when he realized what had happened, and said to Esau, “Your brother came deceitfully.” Esau likewise felt betrayed and felt such violent hatred toward Jacob that he vowed to kill him, forever instituting this life of hate for generations to come. Rebekka sent Jacob away to hide from his brother, and in doing so deprived herself of the company of the son she loved. As for Jacob, the consequences of the deceit lasted a lifetime, resulting in strife between his wives, and between his children. “Few and evil have been the days of my life,” he said as an old man to Pharaoh.  Lives and generations were scarred by one act that was not even necessary in the first place.
      The history of Esau and Jacob continues. Esau was a cunning hunter; Jacob was called a dweller in the tents of learning. The two have been at odds since birth, as Rebekka experienced a difficult pregnancy since the children struggled inside of her. God tells her that there are two nations in her womb and the younger will prevail over the elder. Throughout their lives this prophecy is fulfilled up to the time of death; the consequence of thoughts, speech and actions of Esau was to forego his birthright. Much later at the burial of Jacob, Esau has his head cut off while trying to prevent the burial of the patriarch Jacob in Machpelah. Thus, Esau lies at the feet of Jacob, as the elder will serve the younger.
     However, Jacob does not leave this world unscathed. The trickery in Genesis 27:19 seemed to haunt him during his life. In Genesis 29:22 Laban tricks his son-in-law, Jacob, by giving him Leah instead of Rachel, Laban states, “It is not done in our place, to give the younger before the firstborn.”
     The pattern of the deceiver being deceived continues.  When people continue to deceive, their conscience becomes irrational, which is a seared conscience. They may eventually lose their ability to recognize when their actions are evil, and when people reject the truth, they make themselves vulnerable to deception.  Self-deception is when people deceive themselves about their security or spiritual condition. 
Galatians 6:7-8 ‘Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.’
Proverbs 10:9 ‘Whoever walks in integrity walks securely, but he who makes his ways crooked will be found out.’
Proverbs 12:22 ‘Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord, but those who act faithfully are His delight. Psalm 52:2 ‘Your tongue plots destruction, like a sharp razor, you worker of deceit.’
Romans 12:2 ‘Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.’
James 1:22 ‘But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.’ 
Proverbs 11:3 ‘The integrity of the upright guides them, but the crookedness of the treacherous destroys them.’
     Research states that there are main reasons people deceive: to get something they want, to protect or promote themselves, to preserve their self-image, to keep their status quo, to protect a relationship, to evade conflict, to harm others, to manipulate others, and to instant gratification. We see all of these reasons play out in Toldot. 
    The Word of God is eternal; it is humankind who waivers, doubts, lies, and changes the Word to fit the world. Scripture is clear:
Titus 1:2 ‘… in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began…’
Hebrews 6:18 ‘… that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie…’
Proverbs 30:5-6 ‘Every word of God is pure; He is a shield to those who put their trust in Him.
6 Do not add to His words, lest He rebuke you, and you be found a liar.’
Psalm 12:6-7 ‘The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver tried in a furnace of earth,
Purified seven times. 7 You shall keep them, O Lord, You shall preserve them from this generation forever.’
Numbers 23:19 ‘God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should repent.
Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?’