“Profane Like Esau”: Sexual Immorality, Bitterness, and Community Abandonment in Hebrews 12:14–17
The author of Hebrews accuses Esau of sexual immorality in Heb 12:16. This essay argues Esau’s sexual immorality is his marriage to foreign women, which sowed seeds of discord in the family and led ultimately to his unredeemable exclusion from the community. Esau’s exogamous marriage, as such, is no...
| Published in: | Novum Testamentum |
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| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Brill
2024
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| In: |
Novum Testamentum
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| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Esau, Biblical person
/ Bible. Hebräerbrief 12,16
/ Bible. Numeri 13-14
/ Exogamy
/ Apostasy
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| RelBib Classification: | HB Old Testament HC New Testament ZA Social sciences |
| Further subjects: | B
Hebrews
B Esau B warning passages B sexual immorality B Apostasy B Conversion |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | The author of Hebrews accuses Esau of sexual immorality in Heb 12:16. This essay argues Esau’s sexual immorality is his marriage to foreign women, which sowed seeds of discord in the family and led ultimately to his unredeemable exclusion from the community. Esau’s exogamous marriage, as such, is not the concern in Hebrews, but rather how his mixed marriage introduced bitterness into the family and led ultimately to him abandoning the group. Like the wilderness generation in Num 13–14, Esau lost his inheritance by failing to persevere with the community. Tested against recent studies of conversion and deconversion, we see how Esau becomes a paradigmatic community-abandoning apostate and a warning against similar abandonment. |
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| ISSN: | 1568-5365 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Novum Testamentum
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/15685365-bja10055 |