I get the feeling that there's a lot of context missing in our Bible stories, because some of them seem a little "off." Case in point, we just read about Jacob and Esau, and how Esau sold his birthright for a mess of pottage, or, considered from a different perspective, how Jacob sold Esau a mess of pottage, and the asking price was Esau's birthright.
Frankly, that just seems wrong to me. Many have rightly pointed out that a birthright and a bowl of food are nowhere near equivalent in value, and how Esau shouldn't have sold his birthright so lightly, but, by the same reasoning, Jacob shouldn't have asked him to. This was not an equivalent exchange; it was a scam. Jacob shouldn't have asked for something so valuable in exchange for something so worthless.
In fact, Jacob shouldn't have asked for anything at all. It was a bowl of food, Esau was hungry, and they were brothers. Most religions teach us that we should care for the poor and needy, and I haven't yet found any religion that recommends checking the poor and needy for birthrights they can sell us in exchange for our "charity." People should help each other freely, and they should especially help their own siblings.
Granted, there's a lot I don't know about how that deal went down. As I said before, I feel like there's a lot of context missing from that story. Hopefully, some of it explains Jacob's "offer," because, without that context, this story doesn't seem to make much sense to me.
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