TruthVid's 100 Proofs that the Israelites were White, Part 40: 52, Jacob and Esau in Prophecy, continued

TruthVid's 100 Proofs that the Israelites were White, Part 40

Here we will continue our discussion of the bigger picture of Jacob and Esau in prophecy. To us, it is fully apparent in history, as the history of the White world has been recorded, that ever since Abraham placed Isaac on the altar dedicating him to Yahweh, world history has revolved around the blessings which Isaac had given to Jacob and Esau, and the resulting struggle between them and their respective descendants. Once the parties of Scripture are correctly identified, that struggle is manifest throughout history down to this very day. This is fully relevant to the circumstances under which we live in the modern world.

As we have explained, Malachi, the last prophet of the Old Testament, had begun his discussion of the corrupted priesthood with a portrayal of the mistaken concern which Jacob would have for Esau. This served as the basis upon which Malachi then condemned the priests, and it explains the division among the people of Judaea in the time of Christ, of which Malachi had also prophesied. This understanding of Biblical prophecy helps to explain very precisely the circumstances under which we live today, as world Jewry is the center of global politics and international attention, and as Christians – especially those in America – support Jewry without question, going so far as to worship Jews rather than Jesus. At the same time, World Jewry is at the vanguard of every policy favoring people of other races and nations to the detriment, and even to the destruction of White nations. This is not a coincidence, as we have seen that Esau had wanted to kill Jacob as soon as he realized that Jacob received his father’s blessing.

52) Jacob and Esau in Prophecy, Part 2

We have already discussed the sin of Esau and the resulting controversy between Jacob and Esau, and between Rebekah and Esau, which led to Jacob’s receiving the blessings of Abraham from Isaac in place of his elder brother. We have also discussed the prophecy of Christian Zionism which opened the words of the prophet Malachi, and the more immediate consequences of the situation it describes relative to the ministry of Christ. But what we did not mention is how the undue concern for Esau himself had also been manifested in the later life of Jacob himself.

When Jacob left Padanaram and the estate of Laban and returned to the land of Canaan with his family, after an absence of as many as twenty years, we read in Genesis chapter 32: “1 And Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him. 2 And when Jacob saw them, he said, This is God's host: and he called the name of that place Mahanaim. 3 And Jacob sent messengers before him to Esau his brother unto the land of Seir, the country of Edom. 4 And he commanded them, saying, Thus shall ye speak unto my lord Esau; Thy servant Jacob saith thus, I have sojourned with Laban, and stayed there until now: 5 And I have oxen, and asses, flocks, and menservants, and womenservants: and I have sent to tell my lord, that I may find grace in thy sight. 6 And the messengers returned to Jacob, saying, We came to thy brother Esau, and also he cometh to meet thee, and four hundred men with him. 7 Then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed: and he divided the people that was with him, and the flocks, and herds, and the camels, into two bands; 8 And said, If Esau come to the one company, and smite it, then the other company which is left shall escape.” So Jacob feared Esau in spite of having the favor and promises of God, and sought to shower him with gifts, calling him master (adon, which is often translated as lord) and displaying great concern for him. So this undue concern and respect which Jacob had displayed for Esau certainly also seems to be a type for the attitudes projected upon the descendants of Israel in Malachi chapter 1, and the attitudes found in the modern form of Christian Zionism of which it prophesies.

Now to continue our discussion of Jacob and Esau in prophecy, focusing on Esau, we will begin with the 136th Psalm: “6 If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy. 7 Remember, O LORD, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof. 8 O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us. 9 Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.”

In our last presentation discussing aspects of the history of Jacob and Esau in the Kingdom period, we cited a portion of this passage along with 1 Esdras 4:45 to show the role which Edom had played in the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple of Yahweh as allies of the Babylonians. But reading more of this Psalm, it is also evident that Edom is called the “daughter of Babylon”, so a connection between the two is being made. Surveying later history, it would not be unfair to extrapolate this connection through to the time of the writing of the Babylonian Talmud, down to the Mystery Babylon of Revelation chapter 18, as the Shetar, the commercial code in the Talmud of Jewry, became the basis for English mercantile law in the Middle Ages, and Mystery Babylon represents world commerce in the Revelation. There should be no doubt that Edomite Jews do indeed exert control of international commerce to this day, as they also had throughout the Middle Ages.

Now we shall return to some of the prophecies of Esau-Edom in regard to the vengeance of Yahweh found in the Book of Isaiah:

Isaiah 34:1-8 “1 Come near, ye nations, to hear; and hearken, ye people: let the earth hear, and all that is therein; the world, and all things that come forth of it. 2 For the indignation of the LORD is upon all nations, and his fury upon all their armies: he hath utterly destroyed them, he hath delivered them to the slaughter. 3 Their slain also shall be cast out, and their stink shall come up out of their carcases, and the mountains shall be melted with their blood. 4 And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll: and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree. 5 For my sword shall be bathed in heaven: behold, it shall come down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my curse, to judgment. 6 The sword of the LORD is filled with blood, it is made fat with fatness, and with the blood of lambs and goats, with the fat of the kidneys of rams: for the LORD hath a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Idumea. 7 And the unicorns shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls; and their land shall be soaked with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness. 8 For it is the day of the LORD'S vengeance, and the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion.”

We must note that the indignation of Yahweh in that prophecy is upon all nations, while Edom is singled out as being at the center of that indignation. We will discuss this at length when we discuss the prophecy concerning Edom found in Obadiah a little later on. First, we will present a similar prophecy found later in Isaiah:

Isaiah 63:1-4: “1 Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah? this that is glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength? I that speak in righteousness, mighty to save. 2 Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel, and thy garments like him that treadeth in the winefat? 3 I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the people there was none with me: for I will tread them in mine anger, and trample them in my fury; and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my raiment. 4 For the day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of my redeemed is come.”

Here in these visions, Edom is pictured as the center of attention on the day of the wrath of Yahweh, when He executes vengeance upon all of His enemies. The garments are dyed red with the blood of the Edomites. The language is figurative. Bozrah is one of the chief cities of Edom first mentioned in the lists of Edomite princes in Genesis chapter 36. It is not that the Edomites will still dwell there, since they have not dwelt there in many centuries, but rather the use of the name Bozrah here is an allegory which informs us of whom it is that Yahweh shall avenge Himself.

The prophecy in Isaiah chapter 34 will be fulfilled on “the day of the LORD'S vengeance, and the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion.” The prophecy in Isaiah chapter 63 is said to come to pass when “… the day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of my redeemed is come.”

In a synagogue in Nazareth, as it is recorded in Luke chapter 4, Yahshua Christ stood to read from the Book of Isaiah, a prophecy which also served as an announcement of His very purpose, as He read a passage found in Isaiah chapter 61 and said: “18 The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, 19 To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.” When we refer back to that passage in Isaiah, Christ read what we now have in chapter 61 verse 1, but He read only half of verse 2, which says in its entirety: “2 To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn”, and evidently in his first advent He came to fulfill the first part of verse 2, but stopped short because it was not His time to fulfill the second part. Then the next verse, verse 3 of the same chapter, declares: “3 To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.”

This last clause evokes the words of Christ as He had spoken to His adversaries in Jerusalem, as it is recorded in Matthew chapter 15, and warned them that “13… Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up.” The word Zion in Scripture was used prophetically to describe the mountain, or people, of Yahweh, in spite of the fact that it is also the name of one of the geographical mountains in Jerusalem. So note that in these prophecies, the day of vengeance is to “appoint them that mourn in Zion” (Isaiah 61:3), to execute “the day of the LORD'S vengeance, and the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion” (Isaiah 34:8), and because “the day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of my redeemed is come” (Isaiah 63:4). So Edom is at the center of the controversy of Zion, and will be destroyed in order to settle that controversy. Therefore the controversy must be the fact that it is the Edomites who have claimed to be Zion and the people of God ever since their forced conversion during the decades leading up to the time of Christ. From that time, they have pretended to be the recipients of the promises inherited by Jacob, those which Esau had taken lightly and given up.

The controversy of Zion is also manifest in the books of the prophets in Ezekiel chapter 35 where we read once again that Edom had a hand in the destruction of Jerusalem: “1 Moreover the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, 2 Son of man, set thy face against mount Seir, and prophesy against it, 3 And say unto it, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, O mount Seir, I am against thee, and I will stretch out mine hand against thee, and I will make thee most desolate. 4 I will lay thy cities waste, and thou shalt be desolate, and thou shalt know that I am the LORD. 5 Because thou hast had a perpetual hatred, and hast shed the blood of the children of Israel by the force of the sword in the time of their calamity, in the time that their iniquity had an end.” While the cities of Edom were ultimately laid to waste, as it also says in Malachi, the Edomites themselves were never yet judged, as they had moved north into Israel and Judah.

So we still await the fulfillment of aspects of Ezekiel chapter 35, as it continues and says: “6 Therefore, as I live, saith the Lord GOD, I will prepare thee unto blood, and blood shall pursue thee: sith thou hast not hated blood, even blood shall pursue thee.” Esau was prophesied to live by the sword as we read in Isaac’s blessing for him in Genesis chapter 27. This passage is at least partly fulfilled as Christ was speaking of His enemies and the coming destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans and He said, as it is recorded in Luke chapter 21: “24 And they shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the [Nations], until the times of the [Nations] be fulfilled.”

But the next part of the prophecy in Ezekiel is not yet entirely fulfilled, so it is evident that Seir may be an allegory for the Edomites themselves: “7 Thus will I make mount Seir most desolate, and cut off from it him that passeth out and him that returneth. 8 And I will fill his mountains with his slain men: in thy hills, and in thy valleys, and in all thy rivers, shall they fall that are slain with the sword. 9 I will make thee perpetual desolations, and thy cities shall not return: and ye shall know that I am the LORD.”

Then the next part of the prophecy gives a reason for Esau’s punishment, and clearly shows that it has not yet been fulfilled, and it also helps to explain what Yahweh had meant in Isaiah when He referred to the “controversy of Zion”: “10 Because thou hast said, These two nations and these two countries shall be mine, and we will possess it; whereas the LORD was there: 11 Therefore, as I live, saith the Lord GOD, I will even do according to thine anger, and according to thine envy which thou hast used out of thy hatred against them; and I will make myself known among them, when I have judged thee.” We still await that judgment, which must follow the time when Esau said that “These two nations and these two countries shall be mine, and we will possess it”, and that is a reference to the time following the deportations of Israel and Judah, when the Edomites moved into their lands, and they ultimately became Judaeans, whereby they are known today as Jews. Except for the Jews who were slain in the rebellions against Rome, the Edomites have not been destroyed since then, and today they number in the tens of millions, so it is apparent that their destruction still awaits them.

This leads us to another prophecy of the destruction of the Edomites which is found in Obadiah. While Obadiah is difficult to date, he clearly wrote when Jerusalem was already destroyed, and therefore he should be placed much later among the books of the minor prophets than he is, but certainly before those from the second temple period, which are Haggai, Zechariah and then Malachi. The entire prophecy of Obadiah is an oracle against Esau, and we shall read it in large part while offering some commentary on various aspects:

Obadiah 1:1: “1 The vision of Obadiah. Thus saith the Lord GOD concerning Edom; We have heard a rumour from the LORD, and an ambassador is sent among the heathen [nations], Arise ye, and let us rise up against her in battle. 2 Behold, I have made thee small among the heathen: thou art greatly despised. 3 The pride of thine heart hath deceived thee, thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, whose habitation is high; that saith in his heart, Who shall bring me down to the ground? 4 Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and though thou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring thee down, saith the LORD.”

Only the wealthiest of men could dwell in the “clefts of the rock” while having the pride of heart to say “Who shall bring me down to the ground?” That predicament certainly also seems to aptly describe the Edomite Jews of today.

Continuing with Obadiah 6-7: “6 How are the things of Esau searched out! how are his hidden things sought up! 7 All the men of thy confederacy have brought thee even to the border: the men that were at peace with thee have deceived thee, and prevailed against thee; they that eat thy bread have laid a wound under thee: there is none understanding in him.”

The hidden things of Esau seem to be the intentions of the Edomites, the Jews who have always advanced their agenda secretly, although today they are confident and open about their intentions. But here it seems that their allies shall turn on them in the end, and that contributes to their undoing. But since Esau is in a confederacy, it seems to be that Esau is sending ambassadors to the nations to “rise up against her in battle”, and we may interpret the her in that opening verse of Obadiah to be the children of Israel, which is revealed in verses 10 and 11.

However while this prophecy of Obadiah’s is a direct reference to the destruction of Jerusalem in 585 BC, it is certainly also a type which is prophesying a future event. The Babylonians, who were Chaldaeans and not Edomites, were the leading nation in the destruction of ancient Jerusalem, and the Edomites were subject to them. But here Esau is described as playing a leading role, so it is evident that the description of the Edomite role in the destruction of ancient Israel is also a prophecy of something which is to happen in the future, for which Edom will finally be completely destroyed at the Day of the Wrath of Yahweh, as it is prophesied also in the passages of Isaiah which we have already cited here.

So before proceeding with this prophecy of Obadiah we may correlate another prophecy, found in Revelation chapter 20. There is an interpolation in the text there which concerns resurrection which has prevented many men from understanding this prophecy, but we shall omit that and begin with verse 7: “7 And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, 8 And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea. 9 And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.” While a full explanation is too much for this presentation, it is found in Christreich, our commentary on the Revelation. The Edomites, who say they are Judaeans but are liars, being the Synagogue of Satan as Christ describes them in Revelation chapters 2 and 3, are the Jews of today. The Jews were let out of the pit after Christianity dominated most of the White nations of Christian Europe for a thousand years, when they were emancipated in the days of Napoleon. Now, after 200 years which they have spent building their financial and political dominance over Christians, it is Jews who are at the vanguard of the waves of immigration into White nations which are rapidly causing White Europeans to become marginalized minorities in their own countries. The Edomite Jews certainly are Satan who has gathered all nations against the Camp of the Saints, the nations of Christian Europe.

So with this in mind, we shall continue with Obadiah 8-14: “8 Shall I not in that day, saith the LORD, even destroy the wise men out of Edom, and understanding out of the mount of Esau? 9 And thy mighty men, O Teman, shall be dismayed, to the end that every one of the mount of Esau may be cut off by slaughter. 10 For thy violence against thy brother Jacob shame shall cover thee, and thou shalt be cut off for ever. 11 In the day that thou stoodest on the other side, in the day that the strangers carried away captive his forces, and foreigners entered into his gates, and cast lots upon Jerusalem, even thou wast as one of them. 12 But thou shouldest not have looked on the day of thy brother in the day that he became a stranger; neither shouldest thou have rejoiced over the children of Judah in the day of their destruction; neither shouldest thou have spoken proudly in the day of distress. 13 Thou shouldest not have entered into the gate of my people in the day of their calamity; yea, thou shouldest not have looked on their affliction in the day of their calamity, nor have laid hands on their substance in the day of their calamity; 14 Neither shouldest thou have stood in the crossway, to cut off those of his that did escape; neither shouldest thou have delivered up those of his that did remain in the day of distress.”

There is a lot going on here, as Esau was in league with the Babylonians when Jerusalem was destroyed in 585 BC, but the Edomites also seem to have taken a proactive role in the amount of destruction brought on the inhabitants of Judah at the time. And while the Edomites were not true brothers to the Israelites, as they were all bastards, they are nevertheless blamed for their sins against the Israelites, just as the bastard Cain was guilty of the murder of his brother, or half-brother, Abel. But there is no word for half-brother in Hebrew. But once again today, Edomite Jews are overseeing the waves of non-White immigration into White Christian nations, and non-Whites are increasingly gaining financial wealth, ownership rights and political dominance in formerly White nations. It may be done by different means, but the end result is the same as it was in Judah in 585 BC.

Now there is more, and we shall once again see a correlation to Revelation chapter 20. Just as the Edomites had destroyed Jerusalem “in the day that the strangers carried away captive his forces, and foreigners entered into his gates”, it is Satan who gathers the nations from the four corners of the earth to make war against the Camp of the Saints. So as it says in Isaiah, on the Day of Vengeance Yahweh has indignation against all nations, but Esau is the central focus of that indignation. So Jerusalem here is also a type for the capital cities of Israel in the future, as none of this prophecy of Obadiah has yet been fulfilled, and only recently in the Christian era have the Edomite Jews had the ability to gather all of the world’s nations against Israel, even if in earlier history they tried and failed to destroy White Christian Europe by employing the Arabs and Turks. So throughout history the Jews have plotted against Christians while they were in Africa, Arabia, China, Khazaria, India, and elsewhere, and they have brought all of those nations against Christendom in this very day. For taking part in this Edomite plot to destroy true Israel, all these other nations will suffer for it.

So once again, continuing with Obadiah 15-17: “15 For the day of the LORD is near upon all the heathen [nations]: as thou hast done, it shall be done unto thee: thy reward shall return upon thine own head. 16 For as ye have drunk upon my holy mountain [Zion, which is the collective people of Israel], so shall all the heathen drink continually, yea, they shall drink, and they shall swallow down, and they shall be as though they had not been. 17 But upon mount Zion shall be deliverance, and there shall be holiness; and the house of Jacob shall possess their possessions.”

A set of prophecies which is also parallel to these are found in Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39, which are themselves a Hebrew parallelism, where the same prophecy is given consecutively in slightly different ways, so that it could be better understood. But although Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39 do not mention Esau, they can also be connected to the prophesy of Satan gathering the nations in Revelation chapter 20, through the references to Gog and Magog which indicates that the prophecies are parallels.

Now continuing with Obadiah 18-21: “18 And the house of Jacob shall be a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble, and they shall kindle in them, and devour them; and there shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau; for the LORD hath spoken it…. 21 And saviours shall come up on mount Zion to judge the mount of Esau; and the kingdom shall be the LORD'S.”

Mount Zion and the mount of Esau are allegories for the respective peoples, and not mere references to mountains in Judah and Idumea. Today we await the fulfillment of Obadiah, the destruction of world Jewry, and the destruction of all of the aliens in Israel, all of the strangers who are feeding themselves upon Zion, the mountain of Yahweh, all of whom “shall be as thought they had not been”. Exactly as it also described in related prophecies are also found in Isaiah, and in Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39 and elsewhere.

When the Edomites are completely destroyed, that is when the Camp of the Saints prophecy is also fulfilled, where it says in Revelation chapter 20: “10 And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.” The Jews, who have controlled most of the world’s media for the past century, are also the devil which has deceived the entire world by means of that control, and has gathered all of the world’s heathen nations against Israel, the Camp of the Saints.

Addendum: Thou shalt not abhor an Edomite:

There are many denominational Bible students who would protest that it says in the law in Deuteronomy 23:7 that “thou shalt not abhor an Edomite”, so when they read Malachi, or Paul’s citation of Malachi in Romans chapter 9, they usually mince or twist words where the Word of Yahweh says “yet I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau”. That word for hate, whether in Greek or Hebrew, is the same word employed where Yahweh says that He hates His enemies, or He hates the wicked, and shall therefore destroy them. In Romans chapter 9 Paul of Tarsus quoted that very passage in Malachi, that Yahweh loves Jacob and hated Esau, to distinguish the Israelites from the Edomites of his own time, where Paul also professed care only for his “kinsmen according to the flesh”, and specifies them further by saying: “who are Israelites; to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises”, none of which things were ever extended to the children of Esau.

So it is evident that the prophet Malachi, the apostle Paul, and even Yahweh God Himself do not interpret Deuteronomy 23:7 in the same manner as those who would dispute with the fact that Yahweh God hates Esau, and that hatred for Esau is demonstrated in all of these other prophecies which foretell of the utter destruction of Esau. The truth is that we cannot force an interpretation of Deuteronomy 23:7 which conflicts with all of these other passages – Yahweh our God does not contradict Himself, and He does not change, as Malachi also attests. To assume that God can change or contradict Himself is the height of arrogance and blasphemy.

So if there is another possible interpretation of Deuteronomy 23:7 that does not conflict with these other Scriptures, that is the interpretation which we must adopt. But looking elsewhere for verification of the reading of this passage, in the oldest extant copies of Scripture, which are among the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Hexapla of Origen, the entire passage is wanting. However the possibility, or even the probability, of an alternate reading of Deuteronomy 23:7 is certainly manifest in other ways.

The Syrians, or Aramaeans, have a long history of kindred relations with the Israelites. In the Hebrew alphabet, the letters Daleth, ד or D and Resh, ר or R, were often confused. Such confusion is found in many places in Scripture, where between the Hebrew and the Greek texts Riphath and Diphath or Dodanim and Rodanim, or Obededom and Abeddaram are all at times confused for one another (Genesis 10, 1 Chronicles 13). In other places, the D and R were confused in common words, such as at Jeremiah 2:20, where the King James version reads "I will not transgress", the verb being from the Hebrew word 'abar, Strong's # 5674, where newer translations such as the New American Standard Bible or the American Standard Version, as well as the Septuagint and other versions read "I will not serve", the verb being from the Hebrew word 'abad, Strong's # 5647.

The Daleth and Resh were confused in the accounts of David’s conquest of Edom, where in 2 Samuel chapter 8 we read “ 13 And David gat him a name when he returned from smiting of the Syrians in the valley of salt, being eighteen thousand men.” but in 1 Chronicles chapter 18 we read: “12 Moreover Abishai the son of Zeruiah slew of the Edomites in the valley of salt eighteen thousand. 13 And he put garrisons in Edom; and all the Edomites became David's servants. Thus the LORD preserved David whithersoever he went.” The version in 1 Chronicles is upheld in 2 Kings chapter 14 and in the 60th Psalm. It was Edomites and not Syrians who were killed in the Valley of Salt, which is also clear in the wider context of 2 Samuel chapter 8, but the error remains in the King James Version.

So reading a D instead of an R in Deuteronomy 23:7 may lead one to believe that “thou shalt not abhor an Edomite” rather than the much more Scripturally accurate “thou shalt not abhor an Aramaean”, or Syrian, since the words אדןם (Edomite) and ארןם (Aramaean) are very nearly indistinguishable in written Hebrew letters. Further support that the word should read Syrian in Deuteronomy 23:7 is found in Deuteronomy 26:5 where we read “ 5 And thou shalt speak and say before the LORD thy God, A Syrian ready to perish was my father, and he went down into Egypt, and sojourned there with a few, and became there a nation, great, mighty, and populous.” This, of course, was a reference to Jacob. The brother of Rebekah was called “Laban the Syrian”, and the Syrians were also close family to Israel. The Syrians were not abhorred by Israel in the subsequent history of the kingdom, but the Edomites had always proven themselves to be enemies.