Esau Sells His Birthright for Pottage of Lentils, a 1728 engraving by Gerard Hoet.
A mess of pottage is something immediately attractive but of little value taken foolishly and carelessly in exchange for something more distant and perhaps less tangible but immensely more valuable. The phrase alludes to Esau's sale of his birthright for a meal ("mess") of lentil stew ("pottage") in Genesis 25:29–34 and connotes shortsightedness and misplaced priorities.
The mess of pottage motif is a common theme in art, appearing for example in Mattia Bortoloni's Esau selling his birthright (1716) and Mattias Stomer's painting of the same title (c. 1640).[1]
^See Old Testament figures in art, by Chiara de Capoa, ed. by Stefano Zuffi, tr. by Thomas Michael Hartmann (Los Angeles : Getty Museum, 2003), pp. 111–112.
A messofpottage is something immediately attractive but of little value taken foolishly and carelessly in exchange for something more distant and perhaps...
cooked or liquid dishes in particular, as in the "messofpottage" (porridge or soup) or Eton mess. Messing in the Canadian Forces generally follows the British...
exchange for a meal of "bread and pottageof lentils" (Gen 25:29-34). This incident is the origin of the phrase a "messofpottage" (which is not in any...
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to give him some "red pottage" (paralleling his nickname, Hebrew: אדום, adom, meaning "red"). Jacob offered to give Esau a bowl of stew in exchange for...
dilgerunt. Nicholas Leigh of Addington claimed the right to make a messofpottage at the coronations of Edward VI in 1547 and Mary I of England in 1553, and...
by the poor, reputed to be a derivative of the "messofpottage" Jacob used to buy Esau's birthright. Because of its importance in the diet, a saying in...
Eton mess is a traditional English dessert consisting of a mixture of strawberries or other berries, meringue, and whipped cream. First mentioned in print...
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(bekhorah בְּכוֹרָה), but he sold the right to Jacob for a messofpottage, i. e. a small amount of lentil stew. This passage demonstrates that primogeniture...
sale to the Biblical story of Esau selling his birthright for the messofpottage. Novell tried to use the fact that UnixWare combined both TCP/IP and...
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would not be worth a messofpottage. — Caleb Cutwell, letter to the Galveston Tri-Weekly (February 22, 1865). Following the election of Abraham Lincoln in...
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Alien in Our Midst; Or, "Selling Our Birthright for a MessofPottage"; the Written Views of a Number of Americans (Present and Former) on Immigration and...
"make a messofpottage in a pot of clay" or "degeront" at the coronations of Edward VI in 1547 and Mary I of England in 1553. The Chancellor of the Exchequer...
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