and his descendants. The expression describes ‘the hostility of a broken covenant relationship’.9 Such is the case here, as God rejected Esau (and consequently his descendants the Edomites) because Esau despised and rejected the tokens of covenant relationship with YHWH (cf. Gen. 25:34; 26:34–35). Esau was the ancestor of the Edomite nation, and the inheritance or territory of Edom was located on the south-eastern rim of the Dead Sea. The region of Edom extended from the Brook Zered in the north