Let people serve thee, and nations bow down to thee: be lord over thy brethren, and let thy mother's sons bow down to thee: cursed be every one that curseth thee, and blessed be he that blesseth thee.
Let people serve thee - fulfilled in the discomfiture of the hostile tribes that opposed the Israelites in the wilderness, and in the pre-eminence and power they attained after their national establishment in the promised land. This blessing was not realized to Jacob, but to his descendants; and the temporal blessings promised were but a shadow of those spiritual ones which formed the grand distinction of Jacob's posterity. Be lord over thy brethren. This did not take effect in the person of Jacob; but it was amply verified in the experience of his posterity in the time of David. х Hªweey (H1933), be, the imperative of the obsolete form, haawaah, for haayaah (H1961), to be, is used only in poetry, which delights in archaic modes of expression].
Cursed be everyone that curseth thee ... This was a repetition of the general expression used at first in the call to Abraham, and did not convey the definite and far higher idea unfolded in subsequent revelations to that patriarch, that through the medium of his posterity the blessings of salvation should be imparted to the nations. Earthly blessings alone are promised-the possession of a fertile country, the enjoyment of national prosperity, and an extensive dominion. Isaac's view seems to have been mainly occupied with the relative position of the heir to his brother; and hence, with a mind governed by the undue and blinding influence of strong natural feeling, his spiritual perceptions were obscured, and he lost sight of that which was the most distinguished and invaluable privilege of the Abrahamic family-namely, "that through their seed all the families of the earth should be blessed."