Komentaryong Sumisipi para sa Genesis 30:1

The Torah also alludes to the almost one hundred years that Sarah suffered either the anguish of childlessness or the animosity which developed between Ishmael and the son she finally bore at the age of ninety. We know from Rachel, (Genesis 30,1) that a woman's feeling of being unfulfilled when she has no children can cause her to consider her life as not worth living. The years in which Sarah "really lived," therefore, were only the last twenty seven years of her life during which she was able to enjoy Isaac's development in undisturbed tranquillity

In short, we could say that Yitzchak led an ivory-tower spiritual existence. Such a view helps answer a major question asked by Ramban: Why did Rivka have to deceive Yitzchak rather than explain to him the correctness of blessing Yaakov and not Esav? The implicit basis for this question was later elaborated on by the famous nineteenth century Rosh Yeshiva, Netziv (Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin). He says that Rivka behaves completely differently from the other mothers (i.e., Sarah and Rachel) when they disagreed with their husbands’ actions. We see that the other mothers felt it their prerogative to challenge their husbands’ views on a number of occasions.¹⁰Most pointedly in Bereshit 16:5, 21:10 and 30:1. When we consider Yitzchak’s unique character, however, a likely reason for Rivka’s equally unique behavior emerges: it could be that she sought to preserve Yitzchak’s ivory-tower existence, an existence he did not share with Avraham or Yaakov. Rivka thus wanted to shelter him from the more sordid facts about their son Esav.¹¹See Haamek Davar on Bereshit 27:46. In this, she seems to emulate God Himself Who, as explained earlier, also sheltered Yitzchak from too much exposure to the difficulties of life. While it was important to Rivka that Esav not get the blessing, she orchestrated it in such a way as to keep Yitzchak innocent and pure. Indeed, the rabbis refer to Yitzchak as an olah temimah – a pure (unblemished) sacrifice. This purity is invoked as the reason he could not go outside of Eretz Yisrael (Bereshit Rabba 54:3), and presumably it is also this purity that Rivka was trying to protect.

“He said to him: Why all of this.” One may ask, for Isaiah spoke in the name of God’s decree, so how could he say “Why all of this,” for God does not judge without justice. It seems to me, with Heaven’s help, that he did not challenge the decree but the wording, for Isaiah told him “You will die,” rather than “You shall die in the future,” thus calling him dead while alive. He therefore said “Why all this,” speaking as if I were already dead. He answered that because he did not engage in procreation he is called dead even while alive, as it is written “Give me children or I am dead,” so he too is regarded thus.