Toldot

Isaac prays for Rebekah, who is barren; she conceives twins who struggle within her, and is told that two nations are in her womb, and that the older will serve the younger. Esau is born red and hairy, a hunter and man of the field; Jacob follows grasping his heel, a quiet man dwelling in tents. Coming in famished from the field, Esau sells his birthright to Jacob for bread and a stew of lentils.

In a famine Isaac stays in Gerar, where he repeats his father's ruse — calling Rebekah his sister — until Abimelech sees through it. Isaac sows and reaps a hundredfold, grows great, and re-digs the wells of Abraham as the Philistines stop them up; after disputed wells at Esek and Sitnah he digs Rehoboth, "for now the LORD has made room for us," and Abimelech comes to make a covenant with him at Beersheba.

Old and blind, Isaac asks Esau to hunt game and receive his blessing. Rebekah overhears and dresses Jacob in Esau's clothes, with goat skins on his hands and neck; Jacob brings the dish and takes the blessing of dew and grain, of nations bowing, meant for his brother. Esau returns to a stolen blessing and cries out bitterly, receiving a lesser word, and resolves to kill Jacob once the mourning for their father comes. Rebekah arranges for Jacob to be sent to her brother Laban in Haran — and Isaac blesses Jacob again, charging him not to marry a Canaanite woman.