“Brothers don’t shake hands. Brothers gotta hug!” – Chris Farley, “Tommy Boy”

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“[They] were like brothers to me. And when I say brother, I don't mean, like, an actual brother, but I mean it like the way black people use it. Which is more meaningful, I think.”

--Derek Zoolander (Ben Stiller)



“And Esau ran to meet him and embraced him, and fell on his neck and kissed him and they wept.”
-- (Gen. 33:4)

“And Esau said, ‘I have enough, my brother, keep what thou hast unto thyself.’ And Jacob said... "Receive my present at my hand, for therefore I have seen thy face as though I had seen the face of God and thou wast pleased with me.'”
-- (Gen. 33:8-10)

The first act of true brotherly love in the Bible… is done by the big hairy hunter, Esau.

Forgiveness.

Yeah, So what?

Was it really THAT impressive, what Esau said and did?

Well… Yeah!

First, here’s a quick recap of siblings mentioned in Genesis:

The first kids born… EVER… in the world—
Two brothers, Cain and Abel.

Cain kills Abel. (4:8)

(Just for the record, Cain and Abel are born in verses 1 and 2… Cain kills Abel in verse 8… It took about 7 verses before Cain thought, “I can’t take this crap anymore! One of us HAS to go!” Now THAT is a short fuse.)

(ahem)

Moving on…!


Noah has three sons, one of whom (Ham) spies on Noah getting drunk in the buff. Ham tells his brothers, and Noah (once he sobers up) curses his Ham, condemning his offspring to be slaves to his brothers’ offspring (Gen. 9:22, 24-25).

Bummer.

Then along comes Abraham.
He has two sons: Ishmael, his eldest, gets kicked to the curb once Isaac is born (Gen. 16). Then Abe takes Isaac (that little bundle of joy he begged God for), drags him up a mountain and nearly slices his head off! (Gen. 22)

Those are Abe’s sons!
Those lucky S.O.B.s!

Then Isaac grows up, probably emotionally scarred for life
(He could open a newsstand, he’s got so many issues… Damn, Isaac! You just got served!).

But Izzy raises two twin boys, Esau and Jacob, who don’t exactly get along—

Jacob lies, deceives his dad and snatches Esau’s inheritance, then Jake hits the road, fearing for his life because he must’ve read about Cain and Abel, too…
“And Esau hated Jacob…and Esau said in his heart ‘… Then I will slay my brother Jacob.’” (Gen. 27:41).

Sibling Rivalry… to put it mildly.

So it’s hard to get along with people… especially those who share your DNA.

I also grew up with a twin brother.

My brother is fond of saying we’ve known each other since the “Placenta Years.”
Ha ha!

… I suppose that is when the problems began.


Keep in mind, in Biblical times, the eldest son got EVERYTHING!

When Isaac blesses Jacob, THINKING he was his eldest son Esau, Isaac sheepishly tells Esau, “I have made him thy lord, and all his brethren have I given to him for servants; … and [thou] shalt serve thy brother…”
(Gen. 27:37, 40)

Damn! That’s not the same as getting to stay up an extra half-hour!
And besides, they were TWINS! They were virtually the same age!

Like Esau, I was the older twin.


I’m older… like Esau.

I was born 15 minutes before my brother… Fifteen minutes! And it doesn’t make any difference!
I didn’t anything constructive with the time (I didn’t have my Sudoku book with me). I came out—BAM!
I chatted with the nurse:
“How YOU doin’?... Wow, good to be here. You wouldn’t BELIEVE who I came here with!
Good-lookin’ guy, don’t get me wrong… but boy! He was totally crowding my personal space… he was all up in my fetus grill.”

Actually I was born first because of complications with my brother. He was coming out backwards… out my mom’s ass.
Ha!
No, actually it was a C-section, it was kind of serious… The umbilical chord was wrapped around my brother’s neck… I have no idea how THAT happened.

(wink)

But my brother and I were very different, despite looking exactly alike.
Not quite as different as Jake and Esau:

“And the boys grew: and Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field; and Jacob was a plain man, dwelling in tents.”
(Gen. 25:27)

Freshman year of high school, I was on the baseball team.
My twin brother was singing and dancing in the big, school-wide production of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor DreamGay—um, I meant coat! Dreamcoat!”

I heard all about the musical for months, and I mocked my brother mercilessly, skeptical of the whole thing
… until that May
… when I saw the production.

Damn!

I was SO jealous!

It... was… AWESOME!!!

I never went back to the baseball team.
The next year I auditioned for the musical, got a part, and there was no turning back! I couldn’t be happier!


My brother, on the other hand…



“Why can’t you stay on the baseball team?" he pleaded. "Things were great before— we were individuals! We were in our separate worlds! I was the ‘Acting’ twin, you were the ‘Sporty’ twin!”

Despite my brother’s desire to label us like the Spice Girls, I wanted to be in the musical too!

And soon we resolved our differences. We came to respect each other as actors and as people.
Once we started performing onstage together, just like it had with Jacob and Esau, the tension melted away…


“And Esau ran to meet him and embraced him, and fell on his neck and kissed him and they wept.”
-- (Gen. 33:4)



Well, it wasn’t quite as gay as that… but we learned to get along.

(I know, my second gay joke… But come on: man-on-man embrace, kissing… neck… crying. That’s pretty gay)


Decades after he stole Esau’s birthright, Jacob was still terrified that his brother would kill him and all his family (Gen. 32:12).

After all, so far in the Bible, siblings had killed each other for a lot less.

But Esau surprises his brother… and totally forgives him!

The burly, meat-eating, grudge-holding hunter… is actually full of decency and has the heart of a righteous man (like Gandhi, Jackie Robinson or a Tom Hanks character)!

Because that’s what family does.
Forgive.

A friend of mine often says, “You can forgive and forget… Or you can just forgive… But if you want to stay close with someone, forgiveness is not an option.”

And my brother has forgiven me many-a time.

About ten years ago I was involved with "Amnesty International" and researching the genocide in Rwanda, as the Hutu militia massacred the Tutsi people. It had drawn many parallels to the Holocaust. One day, my family was gathered together in the T.V. room watching “Schindler’s List” on HBO. In the middle, I ran upstairs to my bedroom. I was so upset that a similar tragedy was still going on in the world.
My twin brother came upstairs, sat down next to me, put his arm around me and said, “It’s okay, Aaron. It’s okay.”

And I did what anyone else would do…


I punched him in the face!


Yes, I did.

Because the only way to stop genocide… is to bash your twin brother in the nose.

I was angry and frustrated and … I took it out on him.


Once I collected myself and realized I had been a complete dick... I apologized.

And my brother, in a truly magnanimous, Esau-esque gesture, forgave me… Because that’s what brothers do.

Thanks, bro.
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