July 5 - Saturday of the 13th Week in Ordinary Time, Year I

(Gn.27:1-5,15-29;   Ps.135:1-6;   Mt.9:14-17)

 

“Pour new wine into new wineskins,

and in that way both are preserved.”

 

“Jacob.”  The name means “the supplanter”.  Here he supplants his twin brother, Esau, whose name means “red earth”.  Though born second, Jacob receives the blessing of the firstborn.  Of what significance is this supplanting, is this blessing of Jacob, who is to be “Israel”, and from whom the twelve tribes shall proceed?  Far more than some sibling rivalry, it shows the coming of the New Covenant of the spirit which shall supplant the Old of the flesh.

It is not the will of Isaac to bless Jacob; his love is for Esau – who before this time has forfeited his birthright to Jacob in order to feed his hungry belly.  But Isaac is blind.  He is blind because he, too, is a natural man, a man of the flesh seeking to feed his belly.  And so the Lord inspires Rebekah to intercede, to see that His will is accomplished.  Notice please the words of Isaac when Jacob comes to him dressed in the hairy skin of a beast and the clothes of Esau: “Although the voice is Jacob’s, the hands are Esau’s.”  Indeed, the voice is of the spirit; the skin he feels is of the flesh.  And the Word must go to the word, the Spirit to the spirit; and so it is Jacob who must receive the blessing, despite the will of Isaac. 

And how is Isaac brought to do the Father’s will?  He is deceived by his own preoccupation with the flesh, with the old wineskin.  Upon eating his fill, and drinking his fill of the old wine, he is blinded further.  And smelling the clothes of Esau he is inspired to pronounce his blessing.  But what Esau possesses in his clothes, Jacob holds i