Abraham and his wife Sarah are promised a son. It’s taking a long time so she has Abraham impregnate her handmaid, Hagar. Hagar has a son called Ishmael. But eventually Sarah has her own son, Isaac, and casts Hagar and Ishmael out into the wilderness.

Isaac, the favoured younger son, marries Rebekkah, and has two sons. He favours the older son, Essau. Rebekah favours the younger son, Jacob. She tricks Isaac into making Jacob his heir instead of his favourite son.

Jacob falls in love with a woman but is tricked into marrying her older sister first. He ends up marrying both of them and having 12 sons with 4 women (his wives and their handmaids) and he favours the youngest two because they’re the sons of the wife he loves. The older sons sell the second youngest into slavery because they’re mad dad favours him.

I guess the moral is parents shouldn’t play favourites

  • digger@lemmy.ca
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    1 day ago

    You are on the right track. There is so much more to unpack. It’s all stories of family dysfunction all the way down. Cain and Abel squaring with whose sacrifice was more acceptable. Noah cursing one of his sons/grandsons after the flood for uncovering his nakedness (read Ham had relations with Noah’s wife and fathered Canaan). Even Joseph’s sons got the old switcheroo with their blessings.