Holly Bible - KJV with Concise Commentaries by Z Selam - HTML preview
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1. A causeless hatred. He hated him for no other reason but because his father blessed him and God loved him. Note, The happiness of saints is the envy of sinners. Whom Heaven blesses, hell curses.
2. It was a cruel hatred. Nothing less would satisfy him than to slay his brother. It is the blood of the saints that persecutors thirst after: I will slay my brother. How could he say that word without horror? How could he call him brother, and yet vow his death? Note, The rage of persecutors will not be tied up by any bonds, no, not the strongest and most sacred.
3. It was a politic hatred. He expected his father would soon die, and then titles must be tried and interests contested between the brothers, which would give him a fair opportunity for revenge. He thinks it not enough to live by his sword himself (Ge 27:40), unless his brother die by it. He is loth to grieve his father while he lives, and therefore puts off the intended murder till his death, not caring how much he then grieved his surviving mother. Note,
(1.) Those are bad children to whom their good parents are a burden, and who, upon any account, long for the days of mourning for them.
(2.) Bad men are long held in by external restraints from doing the mischief they would do, and so their wicked purposes come to nought.
(3.) Those who think to defeat God's purposes will undoubtedly be disappointed themselves. Esau aimed to prevent Jacob, or his seed, from having the dominion, by taking away his life before he was married; but who can disannul what God has spoken? Men may fret at God's counsels, but cannot change them.
42 And these words of Esau her elder son were told to Rebekah: and
she sent and called Jacob her younger son, and said unto him,