For those of us who understand our call to love even our enemies, this is perhaps one of the most difficult parts of Scripture. I believe the full answer, while clear, is not a simple one. God’s love for Jacob and His hatred for Esau (Malachi 1:2-3; Romans 9:13) must be understood within the broader biblical themes of God’s sovereign election, justice, and mercy. These are weighty topics.
It may be helpful to first remind ourselves that God is not a fallen human that He would sin. God is perfectly good. God also owns everything and has no need to do any evil. So even when Scripture says God “hates” evil it is not with the same kind of fallen human hate that we have. We have to look at that word in a different way when used to describe an action of God. When God hates, He hates with a good and holy hatred that we don’t fully comprehend. (Psalm 5:4-5 Proverbs 6:16-19 Psalm 11:5) It is the same with anger. Even the best human anger does not produce the godly righteousness that God’s anger produces (James 1:20)
Secondly, the biblical understanding of the word “hate” overall is a little more nuanced than our everyday definition of this word. Jesus said, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14:26) Yet we’re told by Jesus that the greatest commandments are to love God and love our neighbor and even our enemies. (Matthew 22:34-40) How can we love everyone if we hate our mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters? Apparently this hatred is hyperbolic (exaggerated) language meant to get our attention. We should love God so much more than anyone or anything that our love and worship of Him could look like hatred in comparison. In my estimation, this hatred we’re talking about has more to do with a loving choice, and a preferring or favoring, like I’ve preferred my wife over all other women, even if I do endeavor to show love and care for all. My love for all the other women in the world could look like hatred compared to the love and preference I have for my own wife.
Lastly, while I could stop here, I feel like I would not do this question justice without talking through Romans 9:10-16, where the Apostle Paul, who Jesus sent to us, actually explicitly explains these words in Malachi for us. He says, “…when Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born and had done nothing either good or bad—in order that God’s purpose of election might continue…” We’re told this was “in order that..” or in other words, “this is because” or “this is so that” … “God’s purpose of election might continue.”
“Election” is our English translation from God’s Word from the original Greek word here “eklogē” which means God’s sovereign choosing. The Apostle Paul continues that this choosing is “...not because of works” that is, not because of anything we are or do, “but because of him who calls— she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” As it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”
At this point, these words do give us a little jolt. After all, we’re told by Jesus that the greatest commandments are to love God and love our neighbor and even our enemies. And so the Apostle Paul anticipates this objection when he continues: “What shall we say then? Is there injustice on God’s part?”
This is the question we were just asking. How can God say he “hated” anyone? Or even “preferred”? Isn’t favoring just favoritism? It shows we are following the Apostle Paul’s train of thought. We say to ourselves, “Isn’t that unjust?” And he answers the question this way:
“By no means!” In other words, “No, it’s not wrong.” Why?: “‘For he says to Moses, “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.” So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy.”
The answer we are given, though we might not like it all the time, is that God gets to decide who He has mercy on. The “it” again refers to God’s election we’ve been discussing. It refers to God’s choice of Jacob to be a child of the promise, and every other person who has ever been a child of the promise. This is why he just said previously in verse 7-8 about these children of the promise, that “not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring” and “it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring.”
We know this is about salvation because he continues, and quotes Isaiah, “Though the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved.” And he gives another example from Isaiah, speaking again of offspring like Jacob, who are saved, or spared: “If the Lord of hosts had not left us offspring, we would have been like Sodom and become like Gomorrah.” That is, we would all be dead, destroyed, if not for God’s gracious saving election.
He concludes the chapter with this: “What shall we say, then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained it, that is, a righteousness that is by faith … whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.“
So the point of these verses is to show that if we have faith, if we believe, like Abraham who believed, like Isaac and Jacob who believed, if we are saved, we have attained righteousness by faith in Christ, and it is because God has graciously elected (ekloge) us. We’re not saved because we’re born into the right family, (like Esau was a son of Abraham) but because we’re born again by God through faith.
This usually opens all sorts of other questions about human responsibility. But in the Bible, these things are laid out side by side without raising a controversy. In other words, according to the Bible, while we may not fully grasp it here and now, people are also truly responsible for their sin, and truly responsible to repent and turn to God in faith. And at the same time Scripture is clear that “salvation belongs to the Lord.” God get’s all the glory and credit for the salvation of each individual. He gets all the praise for the undeserved favor He gives (grace) for all who repent, believe and are saved. Our personal individual repentance and faith in God is truly a gift given to us by God (Ephesians 2:8-9; Philippians 1:29; Acts 18:27; Romans 12:3; Acts 11:18; 2 Timothy 2:25). He has loved those of us who believe today so much, with so much undeserved favor and blessing, it could look like hatred compared to His love for everyone else, who He also truly loves, but who do not yet believe or experience the spiritual blessings we do. Only God knows what each person will choose. As for our part, we can continue to offer the message of the gospel and pray for all those who have not yet believed. I think we can also trust that even God’s holy “hatred” of any part of His own creation is more loving than our flimsy attempts at loving perfectly.
Adorn the Gospel 