38 Esau said to his father, "Have you but one blessing, my father? Bless me, even me also, my father." Esau lifted up his voice, and wept.
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Hast thou but one blessing? Esau seems to take courage; but he neglects the care of his soul, and turns, like a swine, to the pampering of his flesh. He had heard that his father had nothing left to grant; because, truly, the full and entire grace of God so rested upon Jacob, that out of his family there was no happiness. Wherefore, if Esau sought his own welfare, he ought to have drawn from that fountain, and rather to have subjected himself to his brother, than to have cut himself off from a happy connection with him. He chose, however, rather to be deprived of spiritual grace, provided he might but possess something of his own, and apart from his brother, than to be his inferior at home. He could not be ignorant, that there was one sole benediction by which his brother Jacob had been constituted the heir of the divine covenant: for Isaac would be daily discoursing with them concerning the singular privilege which God had vouchsafed to Abraham and his seed. Esau would not previously have complained so bitterly, unless he had felt that he had been deprived of an incomparable benefit. Therefore, by departing from this one source of blessing, he indirectly renounces God, and cuts himself off from the body of the Church, caring for nothing but this transitory life. But it would have been better for him, miserably to perish through the want of all things in this world, and with difficulty to draw his languishing breath, than to slumber amidst temporal delights. What afterwards follows, -- namely, that he wept with loud lamentations, -- is a sign of fierce and proud indignation, rather than of penitence; for he remitted nothing of his ferocity, but raged like a cruel beast of prey. So the wicked, when punishment overtakes them, bewail the salvation they have lost; but, meanwhile, do not cease to delight themselves in their vices; and instead of heartily seeking after the righteousness of God, they rather desire that his deity should be extinct. Of a similar character is that gnashing of teeth and weeping in hell which, instead of stimulating the reprobate to seek after God, only consumes them with unknown torments
And Esau said unto his father, hast thou but one blessing, my father?.... He seems to speak diminutively of what had been given to Jacob, calling it one blessing: whereas there were many, and of different sorts, both temporal and spiritual; but it may be Esau had not so clear and comprehensive a view of what was contained in Jacob's blessing; or at least was willing to think and hope that there was not so much given, but there might be some behind for him, and that his father had a greater stock than to be drained of all at once:
bless me, even me also, O my father: with another blessing, with one equal to what has been given my brother:
and Esau lift up his voice, and wept; in order to move the affections of his father, and to prevail upon him to reverse the blessing he had bestowed on Jacob, and give it to him; but he could not bring his father to repentance, to change his mind, and revoke the blessing, and give it him, with all his crying and tears, as the apostle observes, Hebrews 12:17.
*More commentary available at chapter level.