Posted by Linnea...

Jacob and Esau: Which Twin is Older? Have you ever noticed that we always say “Jacob and Esau”? Why not the other way around? Esau was born first so was older, and he was also Isaac’s favored son. But we know how the story came out: against the odds, Jacob became the more important one with all the rights of the firstborn. Now bring this story to the Nyarafolo context. None of the above makes any sense. Eleven years ago, when Dave and Karen DeGraaf (SIL) were our partners in the Nyarafolo Translation Project, they had a set of twins. Christopher exited first, Philip second. According to the birth certificates and our understanding of the world, Chris is oldest. Not so, our Nyarafolo friends said, Philip is older! The reasoning behind this is that the older is more important, so the younger one preceded him to prepare the way (this is what happens, after all, at Nyarafolo events—the most important people come later than everyone else). Or, as some say, the older one is higher/deeper in the womb so has been there longer. Either way, first one born is younger and second born is older. The entire Jacob and Esau story hinges on the Hebrew view (which happens to match ours in the West) that the first twin to exit the womb is older, and therefore automatically gets the “rights of the firstborn” and the inheritance. When Rebekah, pregnant at long last, felt the babies struggling inside her womb, she went to ask the LORD what was going on. The oracle that she received said: "Two nations are in your womb, and two peoples from within you will be separated; one people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger." (Gen. 25:23) Hearing this, a Nyarafolo would assume that whoever would be born second would have to serve the one born first, which would really be backwards: the older would be serving the younger! Then, as the story unfolds, they would find that Esau (“younger”) had somehow gotten the rights of the eldest son, but his “older” brother Jacob got him to trade them back to him for stew . . . and then Jacob (the “older”) had to deceive his father to get the blessing due him as oldest . . . confusion, confusion. It would sure look like the prophecy had NOT come true. (Are you following this?) Several weeks ago our translation of Genesis came to chapter 23, and I began working through the language and interpretation issues before meeting with my Nyarafolo translator, Moise. Having discovered this mismatch in worldviews along with the DeGraafs all those years ago, I looked for the traps. And when I began working through the passage with Moise I carefully (I thought) explained what we were facing, finally proposing ways to deal with it. He seemed to think that I was making it all harder than it needed to be (I’m sure I come across that way often enough!), but I kept at it. Our initial translation of the oracle went something like this: “Two nations are there inside you, and two peoples will come out from you and they will separate from each other; one of those will be greater than the other, and the one born first will serve the one born last.” I thought that would at least take care of the issue of the prophecy being fulfilled. It does not, however, astonish any Nyarafolo; there is no shock value to it of the ordinary order being reversed. In the Nyarafolo mind, this is to be expected, i.e. the younger—born first—will serve the older. We added a footnote to explain the Hebrew view, but be honest: do you read all the footnotes? In the next verses the twins’ birth is described. Esau is born first, ruddy and furry. Then we came to the description of Jacob’s entry into the world: “After this, his brother came out, with his hand grasping Esau's heel . . .” In Nyarafolo, there isn’t a word for “brother” – you have to be explicit, “older brother” or “younger sibling” – different words for each. So Moise asked which one it would be here, and when I said “younger brother,” he looked at me in astonishment: “You mean Jacob was the younger brother?” If one ever needed proof that each of us understands the Scriptures according to the presuppositions held, here it is. Moise is one of the most intelligent people I know, and we had just discussed the Hebrew custom. He is also thoroughly Nyarafolo (we first brought him on our team as a cultural resource person). This story was just extremely complicated when viewed through his Nyarafolo lenses. His astonished question was, “So why did the Hebrews think the first one born was older, of all things?” I explained that most of the world (as far as I know!) looks at it that way; the Nyarafolos seem once again to be “special”.* And Moise admitted that now he finally understood what was going on in the story. It seems likely that we will have to test at least a couple of ways of rendering this passage, with more cues in the text so that the listener can follow the story. Maybe something like this will work for the last lines of verse 23: “. . . one of those will be greater than the other, and the one born first, the oldest and greatest by custom, will serve the one born last, the younger one.” After all, it is likely that many Nyarafolos will hear the passage read rather than read it for themselves (few are literate, yet), and footnotes are not accessible to that audience. How would you translate it? *Informal surveys of other people groups in this area are indicating that this view of twins’ birth order is more widespread than we knew.