Esau Takes the Wealth and Jacob Takes the Land

Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 138:1

"And he went to a land away from Jacob his brother." Esau said to Jacob: divide all that our father left into two portions, and I will choose, for I am the elder. Jacob said: this wicked man, his eye is never satisfied with wealth. What did he do? He divided everything their father left into one portion, and the Land of Israel and the Cave of Machpelah into another portion. Esau went to Ishmael to take counsel with him. He said to him: the Canaanite dwells in the land, and Jacob trusts to inherit the land; take what your father left, and Jacob will have nothing. So Esau took everything his father had left, and the Land of Israel and the Cave of Machpelah he gave to Jacob, and they wrote a deed of peace between them. Jacob said to Esau: go from the land of my possession, from the land of Canaan. And Esau took his wives and his sons and went off to Mount Seir, away from Jacob his brother. And as a reward for departing, He gave him a hundred provinces, from Seir to Magdiel - that is Rome. Then Jacob dwelt secure, untroubled and at peace, in the land of his possession, in the land of his birth, and in the land of his fathers' sojournings, as it is said, "And Jacob dwelt" (Genesis 37:1).

Themes