A lot of commentators think that Jacob was so scared that he made his women and children go before him. I do not think that is the case. What I see happening here is not cowardice. Remember, we are talking about Jacob. He was a canny man. Before it was deviousness; now it was just plain smarts. He was being wise here. And he was doing the same thing with his family that he had done with the animals—he had made a succession of waves of people so Esau could see and be impressed by the family of Jacob (“Wow, this is large!”). First wave: Zilpah. Then there is Bilhah and her kids. And then there is Leah and her kids. Finally, there is Rachel and her kid. Jacob has really been blessed. He has done well for himself in these last twenty years.
But I also think there has been an element of submission here because we see it in Jacob bowing to his brother seven times. It is also a succession of things where you could see Jacob a couple of hundred yards off and he is bowing to Esau, and then he comes off several more yards and he bows again to Esau. And he does this seven times until he is finally in front of his brother. In the same way, what we can see—in both the putting his children and wives out in these successive waves and his own bowing seven times—is that he is essentially saying, “Okay brother, I am bearing my neck and the neck of all of my family. You can do with them with your four hundred men as you please.”
Of course, his bowing before his brother really shows that he is coming before him, not as the patriarch or the heir of the patriarchy of the clan; he is coming before him as his stupid younger brother who made a great mistake. And he is allowing Esau to make a judgment of how he would react. So he is putting himself totally out on the line there—all of his livestock, his wealth, all of his family, and himself also. He is saying, “I have done you wrong. Please have mercy on me.”
Keep in mind that this was before Benjamin was born.
There is an order there. You cannot miss the difference. The way Jacob arranged the family with the maidservants and their children, then Leah and her children, then Rachel and Joseph. And Joseph is at the very end. Now, when they stepped forward to meet Esau, it is reversed. It is Joseph and Rachel.
Why a change in that order? It is so easy to miss unless you are analyzing it as we are right now. Why would Joseph step out of the order in which Jacob had placed him? Joseph stepped forward to protect his mom, most likely. He was worried that Esau might not receive them peacefully. He was a young man at this point, and so the message was “Look, but don’t touch.” He wanted to protect her. Joseph is exhibiting, right from the beginning there, leadership qualities.
