"Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated." [Lost, duh]

[pentothepage]

Feuding brothers riddle the Bible, but the Jacob and Esau story always stuck with me. I think it may be due to a childhood favorite book by Katherine Paterson, eponymous with the title of this entry: Jacob Have I Loved.  Because the speaker of the quotation above was God, it has always seemed especially haunting, in particular because the Bible,

Comments

[yuenmei]

Skipping lost because I haven't gotten that far, but in relation to the bible...

Isn't it pretty clear why Jacob was loved? Esau was harry and slow and brutish. I'm pretty sure there's also some racial commentary here, something about Jacob representing Israel and Esau being other races, but I don't remember everything I learned in class, unfortunately...

[greyseal]

I have no thoughts on the 12 tribes, but that is certainly an interesting line of inquiry. I get the feeling that Jacob is representing the "light" and his adversary representing the "dark". The struggle between good and evil; the struggle between free will and destiny? I'm not really sure how this all relates back to the Jacob and Esau story, but the Lost writers do intend for us to do it, I think, especially since (if I remember right) the "Jacob have I loved" quote shows up in Karl's room 23 indoctrination film.

The following is from a discussion of Jacob and Esau that may give you a perspective on the Jacob/Esau conflict (it has religious context, note). It may or may not have bearing on the Lost story, I'm not really sure at this point.

We soon find out more about the character of both of the sons by some specific words used to describe them. Jacob is described as "a plain man, dwelling in tents." By further study, this description tells us much about the type of person Jacob is. The Hebrew translation of the word "plain"

[greyseal]

The added insight to this story is given when one considers the type of sacrifice Rebekah prepares. She instructs Jacob to "go now to the flock, and fetch me from thence two good kids of the goats." In the book of Leviticus we are given the definition of this type of sacrifice in chapter 16