The Relationship Between the New Covenant and God’s Favoritism Abbey Crowley College

In Jeremiah 31, The Lord declares that “The days are coming,... when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant…This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time… No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” (31-34). The new covenant of acceptance of all peoples comes to fruition in the New Testament and supersedes His old covenant of exclusive faith in the Israelites. This transition of new-over-old is predestined and paralleled by the continued biblical trend of the younger son superseding the older son as God’s favorite, as seen through His favoritism of Abel over Cain, Isaac over Ishmael, Joseph over his many brothers, and Jacob over Esau.

In Genesis 4, Eve bears two sons: Cain and Abel and “Abel became a herder of sheep while Cain was a tiller of the soil” (4:2). When it came time to offer sacrifices to the Lord, Cain brought fruit of the soil while Abel brought the choice firstlings of his flock, and “The...