Good Morning Yamon Ki Yesepar and Nevim Arith Hayomin:
Malachi 1:2-3: “I have loved you, saith the Lord. Yet you say: Wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Easau Jacob’s brother? Said the Lord; yet I loved Jacob; but Esau I have hated and made his moutain a desolation, and gave his heritage to the jackals of the wilderness.”
Christians have a real problem with these verses because we like to believe that God loves everyone equally, yet here is a case where God loved someone more than another person. Not only that he says he “hated” this person. The context shows that God is not only speaking of two individuals but two nations as well. One is blessed by Him that other is not. This passage gives no hint as to why one is favored over the other.
I viewed a number of commentaries on this passage and it is generally agreed that the term “hate” is relative. Some say it is not meant as an emotional word but a word to express a fact that God showed favor to one over the other. Well that takes the sting out this verse but it still does not explain why God should show favor to some and not to other. Nor do any of these commentators explain why they find this term relative other than the fact that they say it is and that the context would suggest it. The simple fact is that the word means to “hate.”
I would like to look at this word in English first. In English the word expresses a very negative emotion and a desire that some harm would come to the object of one’s hate. Well, the context of this passage does suggest that God is seeking harm to the object of His hatred. He is making his mountain a desolation and giving his heritage to jackals. I am not too sure what that means, but it does not sound too good to me. Based upon this and the definition given of this word in the Lexicon, this is hate as we know it. No matter how you try to sugar coat it with saying it is relative and unemotional, you still can not get around the fact that God is playing favorites.
So we are faced with a real contradiction. If God is perfect love, how can he hate. If it is a sin to hate then is God playing a “do as I say not as I do?”
I have one question that needs to be addressed. The word used here in the Hebrew for “hate’ is “shana.’” If you look in your lexicons it will tell you plain and simple the word means “hate.’ My question is, who are these handful of people who decided that “shana’” means hate as we in our English culture understand hate? Someone a few hundred years decided to plug in the English word “hate” and from that point on scholars just followed in lock step rendering this as “hate.’ Let’s face it, during the middle ages, and up to the time of the KJV the church exercised a lot of control over people. It was important to preach and teach a God who can not only love, but if you cross him up by not attending church and paying your tithes, you will also discover a God of hate. It is no secret that the Oxford scholars who translated the KJV did have an agenda for the church. They rendered an overseerer as a bishop even through the term bishop did not exist in the time that the Apostle Paul wrote his letters. Yet in the middle ages bishops had power and you wanted a biblical basis for that power. So when our church fathers rendered “shana’” as “hate” I am not saying that they were wrong, but that I just don’t trust them. I would rather look at 4,000 years of Judiaism rather than 2,000 years of Christianity when we get to a deal buster like “shana.’”
So I will look at this word esoterically. For one thing when I look at the spelling of the word “shana’” I find the letters Shin, Nun, Aleph suggest a cutting off, a separation or, as some commentators suggest, not choosing. The Shin represents a passion, the Nun represents living in fear and ignorance and the Aleph represents God. In the word “hate” or “shana’’ God comes last. Esau was motivated by his “Shin” or passion which led to ignorance and fear. He sold his birthright out of a moment of passion fearing he would die if he did not eat. God came in last as in the word “shana’”
God loved Jacob. The word “love” is “ahav” which is spelled Aleph, Hei Beth. The Aleph represents God and in the word love, God comes first. This is then followed by the Hei which is the breath of God. The sages teach that God created the world with the letter “Hei.” The Hei represents His creative destiny that He plants within us to be fulfilled as we obey Him. That destiny is where He dwells and the last letter in the word “love” or “ahav” is the letter Beth which represents our heart where he dwells. Jacob may have went about it the wrong way but he was trying to fulfill his destiny that God put in his heart. Thus, God loved Jacob, or God was Jacob’s primary motivation, where Esau’s primary motivation was his passion.
So the issue of God loving Jacob and hating Esau is not a matter of God’s feelings or emotions as directed to Jacob and Esau, but with the syntax being as fragile as it is with this passage you could easily render this as God saying: “Jacob put me first and Esau put me last.” Suddenly, that gives me pause. Am I a Jacob or an Esau?”
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