Rereading Torah Towards Liberation

The heart-breaking story of Esau and Jacob and Isaac and Rebecca includes an interesting set of phrases in Gen 25:27:

Esau is “ish yodea’ tza’id [אִישׁ יֹדֵעַ צַיִד ]”: a “skillful” or “cunning” hunter, according to many translations. In Fox/Schocken’s more literal and awkward translation: “a man knowing the hunt.” In the less literal, Rashi-ized, translation: “expert in ensnaring” or “skilled deceiver.” He is also “ish sadeh [ אִישׁ שָׂדֶה],” a man of the field.

Jacob is “ish tam [אִישׁ תָּם]”: a “plain” man, or “quiet” or “mild.” Fox/Schocken: “Plain. Meaning of Hebrew uncertain. Others use ‘simple.’” Rashi-zed, it becomes: “simple, not trying to deceive,” “wholesome,” “of integrity” or “whole-[hearted].” He is also “yosheiv ohalim [יֹשֵׁב אֹהָלִים]”: “dwelling in tents” or “who stayed in the camp.” Fox/Schocken: “staying among the tents.” Rashi says the plural refers, specifically, to two tent-academies, tent of Eber and the tent of Shem, so we get complicated translations with reference to sitting and learning. JPS 2006 goes with “raising livestock,” citing Gen 4:20 as another tent=pastoralist verse (there tent is singular ohel).

Additional suggestions about these words:

Maybe Esau and Jacob are both folks of the mind: the former a thinker and planner, living in his head; the latter, someone who deliberate sets himself in different places to learn.

Maybe the plural “ohalim” means that Jacob is capable of dwelling in more than one context, among different groups, with more than one idea. Esau, meanwhile, might be understood as out there in the open, with many experiences and people available to him.

And maybe they’re both folks of the body: Esau out there in the open field, enjoying the hunt; Jacob, “tam, yosheiv,” simple enough to just sit or dwell.

(See also the schools of Shem and Eber in the Torah of Exile — and maybe more to come.)