Isaac's firstborn son; sold birthright to Jacob; became Edom.
Esau
Named in 84 verses across 9 books, first in Genesis 25:25.
עֵשָׂוEsau
ἨσαῦEsau
אֱדוֹםEdom
Also called Edom.
The name means “he that acts or finishes.” Hitchcock's Bible Names, 1869
- Father
- Isaac
- Mother
- Rebekah
- Brothers and sisters
- Israel
- Married to
- Oholibamah, Judith, Adah, Mahalath
- People
- Edom
About Esau Written by AI
Esau, also known as Edom, was the firstborn son of Isaac and Rebekah and the twin brother of Israel (or 'Jacob') (Genesis 25:25 to 26). He was a skillful hunter and his father's favorite son (Genesis 25:27 to 28). Esau sold his birthright to Jacob for a bowl of stew when he was famished (Genesis 25:29 to 34). He married two Hittite women, causing grief to his parents (Genesis 26:34 to 35). Esau lost his father's blessing to Jacob through deception (Genesis 27). He held a grudge against Jacob but later reconciled with him (Genesis 32-33). Esau settled in the hill country of Seir, which became known as Edom (Genesis 36:8 to 9). He had five sons and became the father of the Edomites (Genesis 36:1 to 43). The Edomites were later considered enemies of Israel (Numbers 20:14 to 21; 1 Samuel 14:47; 2 Samuel 8:13 to 14). God's love for Jacob and His rejection of Esau is used as an example of His sovereignty (Malachi 1:2 to 3; Romans 9:13).
Drafted by an AI model for STEPBible's TIPNR (Tyndale House Cambridge, CC BY 4.0). Check it against the verses below.
Easton's Bible Dictionary, 1897
Hairy, Rebekah’s first-born twin son (Gen. 25:25). The name of Edom, “red”, was also given to him from his conduct in connection with the red lentil “pottage” for which he sold his birthright (30, 31). The circumstances connected with his birth foreshadowed the enmity which afterwards subsisted between the twin brothers and the nations they founded (25:22, 23, 26). In process of time Jacob, following his natural bent, became a shepherd; while Esau, a “son of the desert,” devoted himself to the perilous and toilsome life of a huntsman. On a certain occasion, on returning from the chase, urged by the cravings of hunger, Esau sold his birthright to his brother, Jacob, who thereby obtained the covenant blessing (Gen. 27:28, 29, 36; Heb. 12:16, 17). He afterwards tried to regain what he had so recklessly parted with, but was defeated in his attempts through the stealth of his brother (Gen. 27:4, 34, 38).
At the age of forty years, to the great grief of his parents, he married (Gen. 26:34, 35) two Canaanitish maidens, Judith, the daughter of Beeri, and Bashemath, the daughter of Elon. When Jacob was sent away to Padan-aram, Esau tried to conciliate his parents (Gen. 28:8, 9) by marrying his cousin Mahalath, the daughter of Ishmael. This led him to cast in his lot with the Ishmaelite tribes; and driving the Horites out of Mount Seir, he settled in that region. After some thirty years’ sojourn in Padan-aram Jacob returned to Canaan, and was reconciled to Esau, who went forth to meet him (33:4). Twenty years after this, Isaac their father died, when the two brothers met, probably for the last time, beside his grave (35:29). Esau now permanently left Canaan, and established himself as a powerful and wealthy chief in the land of Edom (q.v.).
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Long after this, when the descendants of Jacob came out of Egypt, the Edomites remembered the old quarrel between the brothers, and with fierce hatred they warred against Israel.
M. G. Easton, Illustrated Bible Dictionary, third edition (1897), public domain, from CrossWire. Shown as written; its Scripture quotes are from older translations.
Where the Bible names him
- Genesis 25:25
The first one came out red, covered with hair like a fur coat; so they named him Esau.
- Genesis 25:26
After this, his brother came out grasping Esau’s heel; so he was named Jacob. And Isaac was sixty years old when the twins were born.
- Genesis 25:27
When the boys grew up, Esau became a skillful hunter, a man of the field, while Jacob was a quiet man who stayed at home.
- Genesis 25:28
Because Isaac had a taste for wild game, he loved Esau; but Rebekah loved Jacob.
- Genesis 25:29
One day, while Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau came in from the field and was famished.
- Genesis 25:30
He said to Jacob, “Let me eat some of that red stew, for I am famished.” (That is why he was also called Edom.)
- Genesis 25:32
“Look,” said Esau, “I am about to die, so what good is a birthright to me?”
- Genesis 25:34
Then Jacob gave some bread and lentil stew to Esau, who ate and drank and then got up and went away. Thus Esau despised his birthright.
- Genesis 26:34
When Esau was forty years old, he took as his wives Judith daughter of Beeri the Hittite and Basemath daughter of Elon the Hittite.
- Genesis 27:1
When Isaac was old and his eyes were so weak that he could no longer see, he called his older son Esau and said to him, “My son.” “Here I am,” Esau replied.
- Genesis 27:5
Now Rebekah was listening to what Isaac told his son Esau. So when Esau went into the field to hunt game and bring it back,
- Genesis 27:6
Rebekah said to her son Jacob, “Behold, I overheard your father saying to your brother Esau,
- Genesis 27:11
Jacob answered his mother Rebekah, “Look, my brother Esau is a hairy man, but I am smooth-skinned.
- Genesis 27:15
And Rebekah took the finest clothes in the house that belonged to her older son Esau, and she put them on her younger son Jacob.
- Genesis 27:19
Jacob said to his father, “I am Esau, your firstborn. I have done as you told me. Please sit up and eat some of my game, so that you may bless me.”
- Genesis 27:21
Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Please come closer so I can touch you, my son. Are you really my son Esau, or not?”
- Genesis 27:22
So Jacob came close to his father Isaac, who touched him and said, “The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.”
- Genesis 27:23
Isaac did not recognize him, because his hands were hairy like those of his brother Esau; so he blessed him.
- Genesis 27:24
Again he asked, “Are you really my son Esau?” And he replied, “I am.”
- Genesis 27:30
As soon as Isaac had finished blessing him and Jacob had left his father’s presence, his brother Esau returned from the hunt.
- Genesis 27:32
But his father Isaac replied, “Who are you?” “I am Esau, your firstborn son,” he answered.
- Genesis 27:34
When Esau heard his father’s words, he let out a loud and bitter cry and said to his father, “Bless me too, O my father!”
- Genesis 27:37
But Isaac answered Esau: “Look, I have made him your master and given him all his relatives as servants; I have sustained him with grain and new wine. What is left that I can do for you, my son?”
- Genesis 27:38
Esau said to his father, “Do you have only one blessing, my father? Bless me too, O my father!” Then Esau wept aloud.
- Genesis 27:41
Esau held a grudge against Jacob because of the blessing his father had given him. And Esau said in his heart, “The days of mourning for my father are at hand; then I will kill my brother Jacob.”
- Genesis 27:42
When the words of her older son Esau were relayed to Rebekah, she sent for her younger son Jacob and told him, “Look, your brother Esau is consoling himself by plotting to kill you.
- Genesis 28:5
So Isaac sent Jacob to Paddan-aram, to Laban son of Bethuel the Aramean, the brother of Rebekah, who was the mother of Jacob and Esau.
- Genesis 28:6
Now Esau learned that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him to Paddan-aram to take a wife there, commanding him, “Do not marry a Canaanite woman,”
- Genesis 28:8
And seeing that his father Isaac disapproved of the Canaanite women,
- Genesis 28:9
Esau went to Ishmael and married Mahalath, the sister of Nebaioth and daughter of Abraham’s son Ishmael, in addition to the wives he already had.
- Genesis 32:3
Jacob sent messengers ahead of him to his brother Esau in the land of Seir, the country of Edom.
- Genesis 32:4
He instructed them, “You are to say to my master Esau, ‘Your servant Jacob says: I have been staying with Laban and have remained there until now.
- Genesis 32:6
When the messengers returned to Jacob, they said, “We went to your brother Esau, and now he is coming to meet you—he and four hundred men with him.”
- Genesis 32:8
He thought, “If Esau comes and attacks one camp, then the other camp can escape.”
- Genesis 32:11
Please deliver me from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid that he may come and attack me and the mothers and children with me.
- Genesis 32:13
Jacob spent the night there, and from what he had brought with him, he selected a gift for his brother Esau:
- Genesis 32:17
He instructed the one in the lead, “When my brother Esau meets you and asks, ‘To whom do you belong, where are you going, and whose animals are these before you?’
- Genesis 32:18
then you are to say, ‘They belong to your servant Jacob. They are a gift, sent to my lord Esau. And behold, Jacob is behind us.’”
- Genesis 32:19
He also instructed the second, the third, and all those following behind the herds: “When you meet Esau, you are to say the same thing to him.
- Genesis 33:1
Now Jacob looked up and saw Esau coming toward him with four hundred men. So he divided the children among Leah, Rachel, and the two maidservants.
From STEPBible's TIPNR, Tyndale House Cambridge (CC BY 4.0): names, family, references and the AI written article. Verse text is the BSB.