Esau hates Jacob. The text is direct: he said in his heart, the days of mourning for my father are near; then I will kill Jacob. Rebekah hears this and acts as she always has: immediately. She summons Jacob and tells him what Esau has said. She uses almost the same words as when she gave him the plan for the blessing: obey my voice, arise, go. This is the third time she speaks and Jacob listens. After this there is no fourth time.
Her instructions are measured: go to Haran, to Laban, stay a few days until your brother’s fury subsides, until he forgets what you did. Then I will send for you. She believes this. She plans this. She does not know she will never send for him. She tells Isaac her reason for sending Jacob away differently: she cannot bear a son who marries Hittite women as Esau did. Both reasons are true. One is the real one.
Jacob leaves. He will spend twenty years in Haran. Rebekah will die before he returns — or that is the tradition, since the Torah never records her death, only her burial in the cave of Machpelah at the end of Jacob’s journey. What she intended as a few days became a generation. She said she could not bear to lose both sons in one day. She lost Jacob for the rest of her life to save him from Esau’s sword.
