The Bible

 

Obadiah 1

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1 Thus said the Lord Jehovah to Edom, A report we have heard from Jehovah, And an ambassador among nations was sent, `Rise, yea, let us Rise against her for battle.'

2 Lo, little I have made thee among nations, Despised [art] thou exceedingly.

3 The pride of thy heart hath lifted thee up, O dweller in clifts of a rock, (A high place [is] his habitation, He is saying in his heart, `Who doth bring me down [to] earth?')

4 If thou dost go up high as an eagle, And if between stars thou dost set thy nest, From thence I bring thee down, An affirmation of Jehovah.

5 If thieves have come in to thee, If spoilers of the night, How hast thou been cut off! Do they not steal their sufficiency? If gatherers have come in to thee, Do they not leave gleanings?

6 How hath Esau been searched out! Flowed out have his hidden things,

7 Unto the border sent thee have all thine allies, Forgotten thee, prevailed over thee, have thy friends, Thy bread they make a snare under thee, There is no understanding in him!

8 Is it not in that day -- an affirmation of Jehovah, That I have destroyed the wise out of Edom, And understanding out of the mount of Esau?

9 And broken down have been thy mighty ones, O Teman, So that every one of the mount of Esau is cut off.

10 For slaughter, for violence [to] thy brother Jacob, Cover thee doth shame, And thou hast been cut off -- to the age.

11 In the day of thy standing over-against, In the day of strangers taking captive his force, And foreigners have entered his gates, And for Jerusalem have cast a lot, Even thou [art] as one of them!

12 And -- thou dost not look on the day of thy brother, On the day of his alienation, Nor dost thou rejoice over sons of Judah, In the day of their destruction, Nor make great thy mouth in a day of distress.

13 Nor come into a gate of My people in a day of their calamity, Nor look, even thou, on its misfortune in a day of its calamity, Nor send forth against its force in a day of its calamity,

14 Nor stand by the breach to cut off its escaped, Nor deliver up its remnant in a day of distress.

15 For near [is] the day of Jehovah, on all the nations, As thou hast done, it is done to thee, Thy deed doth turn back on thine own head.

16 For -- as ye have drunk on My holy mount, Drink do all the nations continually, And they have drunk and have swallowed, And they have been as they have not been.

17 And in mount Zion there is an escape, And it hath been holy, And the house of Jacob have possessed their possessions.

18 And the house of Jacob hath been a fire, And the house of Joseph a flame, And the house of Esau for stubble, And they have burned among them, And they have consumed them, And there is not a remnant to the house of Esau, For Jehovah hath spoken.

19 And they have possessed the south with the mount of Esau, And the low country with the Philistines, And they have possessed the field of Ephraim, And the field of Samaria, And Benjamin with Gilead.

20 And the removed of this force of the sons of Israel, That [is with] the Canaanites unto Zarephat, And the removed of Jerusalem that [is] with the Sepharad, Possess the cities of the south.

21 And gone up have saviours on mount Zion, To judge the mount of Esau, And the kingdom hath been to Jehovah!'

Commentary

 

Jacob or Israel (the man)

  

Jacob is told twice that his name will now be Israel. The first time is when he wrestles with an angel on his journey to meet Esau, and the angel tells him that his name will be changed. After he is reconciled with Esau, they go their separate ways. Jacob moves to Shechem and then on to Bethel, where he builds an altar to the Lord. The Lord appears to him there, renews the covenant He first made with Abraham and again tells him that his name will be Israel (Genesis 35). The story goes on to tell of Benjamin's birth and Rachel's death in bearing him, and then of Jacob's return to Isaac and Isaac's death and burial. But at that point the main thread of the story leaves Israel and turns to Joseph, and Israel is hardly mentioned until after Joseph has risen to power in Egypt, has revealed himself to his brothers and tells them to bring all of their father's household down to Egypt. There, before Israel dies, he blesses Joseph's sons, plus all his own sons. After his death he is returned to the land of Canaan for burial in Abraham's tomb. In the story of Jacob and Esau, Jacob represents truth, and Esau good. Jacob's stay in Padan-Aram, and the wealth he acquired there, represent learning the truths of scripture, just as we learn when we read the Ten Commandments or the Sermon on the Mount. The change of name from Jacob to Israel represents the realization that what we learn should not simply be knowledge, but should be the rules of our life, to be followed by action. This action is the good that Esau has represented in the story up to that time, but after the reconciliation between Jacob and Esau, Jacob as Israel now represents the truth and the good, together. It is interesting that even after his name change Jacob is rarely called Israel. Sometimes he is called one and sometimes the other, and sometimes he is called both Jacob and Israel in the same verse (Genesis 46:2, 5, & 8 also Psalm 14:7). This is because Jacob represents the external person and Israel the internal person, and even after the internal person comes into being, we spend much of our lives living on the external level.

(References: Arcana Coelestia 4274, 4292, 4570, 5595, 6225, 6256, Genesis 2:5, 46:8)