28:1-5
Isaac sends Jacob on his way. He seems to have accepted Rebekah’s explanation about avoiding a Hittite wife, no doubt also remembering Abraham’s concerns about the wife that he would take for himself. So Isaac instructs Jacob not to take a wife from the Canaanite women. Instead he is told to take a wife from among Laban’s daughters. Hittites were a subset of the Canaanites. Isaac also prays that God will give the blessing of Abraham to Jacob. This assumes that Jacob will come back to Canaan. So Jacob went on his way to Laban, the son of Bethuel.
28:6-9
Esau saw that Isaac did not want Jacob to marry a Canaanite. So Esau went to Ishmael and took one of his daughters as a wife. So it seems that Esau is trying to gain favour with Isaac. There are two problems here. One is that he already has a couple of Hittite wives. This is only going to compound the problem. The second is that it is not addressing the real problem, his disdain for his birthright, which he sold some time ago.
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