A Short Tribute

“We came to your brother Esau; he himself is coming to meet you, and there are four hundred men with him.” Esau really had come to kill him, and it is astounding how he was transformed and began to love Jacob a moment after he reached him. The reason is that Jacob used a ruse to transform his brother’s heart and make him love him. We find that King Solomon, may he rest in peace, wisely said, “As face answers to face in water, So does one man’s heart to another.” For when a person feel hatred towards another, it is a sign that the other hates them as well, and the opposite (is also true); when a person loves another, it is a sign that the other loves them as well. Jacob used this to transform Esau’s heart from foe to friend, by considering his love for his brother Esau in his heart while waiting for Esau to arrive; by saying to himself that he had indeed sinned against his brother Esau by taking the blessing and firstborn’s birthright from him. By soothing himself about this he felt only good things about Esau. Love, therefore, arose in Esau’s heart towards Jacob, and he felt only good things about Jacob, despite his having taken his birthright from him. The power not to relinquish it had been his, and it was he who was responsible. Neither was Jacob responsible for receiving Esau’s blessings, which he did against his will and only because his mother had ordered him to do so. And since human hearts feel the blaze of love from one another, Esau came to love Jacob.