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None of the Jewish patriarchs are natural firstborn. -----They're all consecrated as firstborn. ---- Abraham bore Ishmael before Isaac, and Esau came out before Jacob. Isaac and Jacob are considered firstborn though neither was born first.

According to Rashi, even though Esau came out of the womb first, Jacob was formed first. Rashi claims Jacob is the firstborn such that Esau usurped Jacob's status as firstborn by breaching the womb out of birth order (as Perez forced his way out ahead of Zarah, Gen. 38:28-29). ---- None of the Jewish Patriarchs are firstborn by coming out of the womb first. All of them are consecrated as firstborn by a particular ritual associated with all of them.

On Jacob grabbing Esau by the "heel" עקב Rashi says: “ONTO THE HEEL OF ESAU --- It is a sign --- that this one [this “heel”] will not have the chance to end his rule --- before the other arises --- and takes it from him.” The word "heel" is used in Jer. 13:22 to speak of genitalia. The "heel" is the back of the "foot." “Feet" are used as a euphemism for genitalia in numerous places throughout the Tanakh. Jacob grabs Esau by the organ that Abraham cut to consecrate himself and Isaac. Isaac is born as the consecrated offspring of Abraham's ritual cutting. Abraham cuts the serpent to signify that the end of his reign is nearing with the birth of Isaac. Jacob grabs the serpent on Esau signifying that by the strength of a Jewish hand the serpent's reign of terror will come to an end. The usurper’s ruse will be blighted. Jacob grabs Esau by the "heel" עקב as a "sign" (Rashi), concerning the fact that this one, this serpent, will not end the rule of the true firstborn before the Firstborn of all Creation is consecrated and ends the rule of the serpent.

Jacob's name is associated with his grabbing of Esau's serpent. And since the Hebrew word translated "heel" עקב is used in this context to speak of the serpentine organ (the phallus), it's fitting that the mark, or sign, of circumcision, the yod י , is added to the word-cover for the serpent עקב (“heel”) to form Jacob's name יעקב. Jacob's name signifies circumcision of the phallus. Later in the narrative Jacob wrestles with Esau's serpent-god, at which time Jacob defeats him, crushes his head, while the serpent-god wounds Jacob's "thigh" (which is another euphemism for the genitalia).

By breaching the womb out of order Esau stands to eliminate Jacob's seed from the line of the patriarchs  --- inserting his own (Esau's) in the place of the true firstborn (Jacob). In this way, Esau is striking at Jacob's "heel," that is to say Jacob's genitalia (i.e. his genetic/prophetic/Jewish line --- the line through which the Messianic King will come). When Jacob grabs Esau's "heel" (his genitalia), it's a sign that although Esau has struck out at Jacob's lineage and his posterity, as Isaac's true firstborn, Jacob, by the strength of a Jewish hand, will crush Esau's line of imposters. Jacob's seed will rule forever in the place Esau tried to steal by usurping the true birth order.

Like Jacob before him, Moses takes God’s rod into his hand in order to free God’s firstborn Israel from the power of the serpent-worshiping Egyptians. Moses, as stated in Jewish scripture, was more powerful than the angel of death. His hand controlled the strongest angel (represented by God's rod, the serpent, the angel of death). He used the power of that angel, that rod, that serpent, to free God’s firstborn, Israel, from the womb of Egypt. Moses’ hand grasped God’s heel, God’s rod, that serpent, while Israel was being prepared to exit the womb. Oddly though, Moses opened the Red Sea not with the serpent, God’s rod, the organ through which Egypt’s firstborn were cursed, but with his own hand. He lifts the rod in one hand and stretches out his other hand to open the sea.

Immediately after Israel crosses through the birthing waters of the Red Sea, Moses commands Israel to consecrate every firstborn who “opens the womb” in remembrance of the miraculous exodus out of Egypt. He throws in the significant point that “by strength of hand [not rod] the Lord brought you out” of the womb of Egypt:

And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Sanctify unto me all the firstborn, whatsoever openeth the womb among the children of Israel . . . Remember this day, in which ye came out from Egypt, out of the house of bondage; for by strength of hand the Lord brought you out from this place . . ..

Exodus 13:1-3.

The remembrance of the Exodus from Egypt is made a decree, or ordinance, in Exodus 12:42, which puts forth the ordinance (חקה), or law, of the Passover. And since the Passover is the preeminent event establishing the nation of Israel as God's chosen people – his firstborn among the nations --- almost nothing is as important as understanding the "Ordinance of the Passover”:

It is a night to be much observed [memorialized] unto the Lord for bringing them out from the land of Egypt: this is that night of the Lord to be observed of all the children of Israel in their generations. And the Lord said unto Moses and Aaron, This is the ordinance of the passover: There shall no stranger eat thereof: But every man’s servant that is bought for money, when thou hast circumcised him, then shall he eat thereof. A foreigner and an hired servant shall not eat thereof. In one house shall it be eaten; thou shalt not carry forth ought of the flesh abroad out of the house; neither shall ye break a bone thereof. All the congregation of Israel shall keep it. And when a stranger shall sojourn with thee, and will keep the passover to the Lord, let all his males be circumcised, and then let him come near and keep it; and he shall be as one that is born in the land: for no uncircumcised person shall eat thereof.

Exodus 12:42-48.

Mekhilta De-Rabbi Shimon Bar Yohai establishes an important point in understanding the meaning of the Ordinance of the Passover:

XVII:1

B. Why does Scripture state "law"?
C. To stress the applicability to the paschal sacrifice of the subsequent generations that which is stipulated for the paschal sacrifice of Egypt, as well [the applicability] to the paschal sacrifice of Egypt that which is stipulated for the paschal sacrifice of the subsequent generations, except for the things that Scripture specifically eliminates.
D. One might think [that] even the bunch of hyssop, lintel, and two doorposts [prescribed in Exod. 12:22 are also applicable to the paschal sacrifice of the subsequent generations].
e. Scripture states, [however,] "this (is the law of the passover offering)" (Exod. 12:43).

Mekhilta points out that many mitzvot are performed in relationship to Passover (to include placing the blood on the doorposts and lintels of the Jewish home [Yoma 2a]). ---- But the "law" of the Passover, which will be a law for subsequent generations, will not include placing the blood on the doorposts and lintel. All of that will be subsumed in what follows the statement in Exodus 12:43 about establishing the Ordinance (law) of the Passover.

And what is the Ordinance of the Passover? ----- That everyone taking part in the Passover meal must be circumcised. Circumcision is the primary law of the Passover. The blood of circumcision and the blood of the lamb are subsumed in one act of observation, remembrance, and memorial. In future generations the blood of the lamb needn't be placed on the doorposts and lintel. The circumcision blood will suffice to represent both bloods.

And thou shalt shew thy son [his circumcision] in that day [bar mitzvah], saying, This is done because of that which the Lord did unto me when I came forth out of Egypt [I was circumcised so that I could eat the Passover meal]. And it shall be for a sign unto thee upon thine yad, and for a memorial [zikkaron] between thine eyes, [so] that the Lord’s law may be in thy mouth [since you have the mark qualifying you to eat the Passover meal]. . . ..

Exodus 13:8-9.

The "strong hand" through which the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt is Moses' hand. And Moses' hand is on the rod of God, even as Jacob's hand was on the rod of Esau. The rod of God is God's divine Esau, the angel (Gevurah) who usurped his place and became the angel of death. He usurped his place by enslaving mankind in the Garden therein gaining the power of death over the sons of Adam. But in fact Adam was created before the angels ---- even though they came out of creation first. ---- Moses, as a type of Messiah, and thus a type of Jacob, is God's true firstborn. He grasps the rod of the usurper-firstborn (the angel of death) with his left hand, and with his right frees Israel from the womb of Egypt.

It's clear from Exodus 12:43, that the Ordinance of the Passover is that every man shall be circumcised so that he's not a "stranger" to the covenant. He’s part of the family of the circumcised. We know from the Talmud, and Jewish midrashim, that two bloods were placed on the lintel and doorposts: lamb's blood and circumcision blood. But only circumcision blood is part of the Ordinance, the decree חקה, i.e., the procedures directly associated with all but the prototype Passover.

Simple exegesis clarifies that in Exodus 13:7-9, the father is explaining the scar that keeps his son from being a stranger to the covenant. He explains to his son that it's a memorial to the Passover and the exodus from Egypt, and the very mark that allows him to participate in the Passover meal: "And it shall be for a sign unto thee upon thine yad, and for a memorial between thine eyes, that the Lord’s law may be in thy mouth: for with a strong hand hath the Lord brought thee out of Egypt."

The sign is on the organ of the covenant, the yad (the same Hebrew word is used for "hand" and "phallus"). It’s the "sign" and it's between the eyes --- it's the memorial between the eyes --- keeping in memory (a vigil) what God did to the Jewish males when they left Egypt (he had them circumcised).  ----- We're told that by the same strong hand through which Jacob was freed from subservience to Esau, Israel was freed from slavery to Egypt, the same hand enters Jewish males into the covenant on the eighth day.

Exodus 13:9 is directly related to the Ordinance of the Passover. So it must be assumed that when it speaks of the sign on the yad, and the memorial between the eyes, as the prerequisite for the Lord's law being in the mouth, then something about the sign on the yad, and the sign being registered by the eyes, relates directly to the "Lord's law" being in the mouth.

In the Ordinance of the Passover (Exodus 12:42-48) first comes circumcision, then the Passover meal. In Exodus 13:8-9, first comes the sign of Passover, the circumcision scar, then comes the Passover meal. At future Passovers the father must show his son (on his bar mitzvah) the sign signifying that the son is not a stranger to the Passover, but that he possesses the mark allowing him to eat the Passover. Once this mark (sign) is between the son's eyes, the son can eat the Passover, having been properly taught that eating the Passover is associated with circumcision.

But in Exodus 13:8-9 the Passover meal is called the Lord's "law" תורה "in thy mouth." When you observe the sign of Passover, then you’re fit to eat the Passover meal, which meal is the Lord's law: Torah תורה.

The Passover meal is being juxtaposed over and against the meal Adam and Eve ate in the Garden. ---- We know this for a number of reasons, one of which is the play on the words "yad" יד and  "eyes" עין taking place in Exodus 13:9. ---- The Hebrew letter ayin ע symbolizes the eyes: "The word ayin (עין) means "eye" . . ." (R. Ginsburgh, The Hebrew Letters). ---- Exodus 13:9 connects the yad יד with the "eyes" forming the word yada  ידע which is the word for "to know" or "knew," as in Adam knew his wife.

Eating the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil is a euphemism for sexual congress. Yada ידע is the word describing the sexual congress associated with "eating" the meal of the original sin.

To look on the sign of circumcision is "to know" God, since having the yad יד before the ayin ע is the source of "knowing" yada ידע. The Rabbis teach that a theophany occurs at every bris milah (every ritual circumcision). To look on the mark of circumcision is "to know" God in the biblical sense. . . Nevertheless, eating the Passover is diametrically opposed to eating the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. ----- When Adam ate from the Tree of Knowledge, he came "to know" ידע Eve, she bore the murderer Cain. When Israel ate the Passover sacrifice they came "to know" ידע God. They left Egypt pregnant with Messiah.

As the birthing approached, the doorways of the Israelites, through which they would leave their houses to begin the Exodus, were sprinkled with the blood of lambs. These doorways echo the bloody doorway of the womb through which all human beings must pass to begin their independent lives. Those who walked through this bloody passage on the night of the Exodus became newborns, God's "firstborn.". . The "breaking of the sea" (Exod. 14:21), as the Bible calls the moment when the Israelites crossed the Sea of Reeds that had divided for them, echos the breaking of the waters that precedes the birthing of a newborn.

Rabbi Arthur O. Waskow and Rabbi Phyllis O. Berman (Freedom Journeys, p.25).

The casual observer of Jewish ritual might think Rabbis Waskow and Berman are extrapolating beyond reason when they imagine the Passover rituals as birthing rituals. On the contrary, Jewish midrashim has long understood the Passover night to be a night of sacred intercourse:

The Zohar mentions that the deliverance occurred at night, the time reserved for the intimate union between husband and wife. Correspondingly, the redemption was the fruit of the union of God and Israel during the night of the fifteenth of Nissan, a union based on love.

Rabbi Elie Munk, The Call of the Torah, (Shemos), p. 150.

Then it is written "A night to be kept for the Lord" (Exodus 12:42), for sacred intercourse takes place then, and it is "kept" in every respect. Rabba Aha said: Therefore the adornment of the bride takes place on this day, 376 and in the evening the house is settled. 377 . . Rabbi Jose said: Why take so much trouble? 381 There is a whole verse [that indicates] that on this night celestial, holy intercourse is aroused and takes place, namely, "This is a night to be kept for the Lord." . . Therefore on the fourteenth day they prepare themselves, rid themselves of all leaven, and enter the domain of holiness.

376. The preparation of the Paschal offering and the mazzot, which are like adornment for the Shekhinah, the bride, takes place on Passover eve.
377. The bridegroom and the bride are united. "House" (bayit) is a symbol of the Shekhinah.
381. To find allusions to celestial intercourse on Passover eve.

The Zohar, III, 95a-95b (From Isaiah Tishby’s The Wisdom of the Zohar, vol. 3, p. 1315).

God's "firstborn" is conceived on the night of the Passover. A number of crucial things in this regard are pointed out by the Jewish sages and scholars. Note #376 on the Zohar passage states that the Paschal offering and the unleavened bread are like the adornment of the Bride (Shekinah) prior to the consummation of the union which will take place on the night of the Passover. Note #377 points out that the "house" adorned with the Paschal blood, and where the matzoh (unleavened bread) is baked, represents the Bride (Shekinah). Throughout Jewish scripture it’s taught that the “house” בית (bayit) is a man’s bride. The bride is represented by the “house.”

The blood on the doorposts and the unleavened bread are symbiotically related within the schematic of the symbolism employed:

There shall no strange god be in thee; Neither shalt thou worship any strange god. I am the Lord thy God, Which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.

Psalm 81:10-11.

The blood of the Paschal lamb (which nearly all midrashim equate with the blood of circumcision) is placed on the outside of the house, on the doorposts, signifying that "death" (in Hebrew "blood" is the primary symbol of death) shall not enter this house. It will be stopped at the very door: it shall not enter. ----- Secondarily we have the matzoh (unleavened bread) inside the house (and eventually in the mouth) drawing a direct parallel between the blood (death) kept outside the house, and the unleavened bread (bread of life) inside the house, and in the mouth.

The relationship between the two symbols is seen in the fact that the "death" stopped at the doorposts (marking the fact that death didn't enter this house) is the "leaven" that’s absent from the matzoh (the unleavened bread). And since the "house," where "death" cannot enter, is the Bride, who will consummate her relationship to the Groom on the very night that the blood is stopped at the door, and unleavened bread is baked in the "house," we have the establishment of a symbol which destabilizes Judaism's exegetical hermeneutic on the very night that the Bride and Groom meet in order that Israel might leave the "house" in the morning.

Suggesting that Judaism gets the interpretation of the symbolism wrong on the very morning when they come to be established from the union of the Bride and the Groom seems problematic but for the fact that this unfortunate state of affairs is stated candidly in the very verse that sets these things in motion:

There shall no strange god be in thee; Neither shalt thou worship any strange god. I am the Lord thy God, Which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it. But my people did not hearken to My voice, neither did Israel desire to follow Me. So I let them go after their heart's fantasies, let them follow their ill chosen traditions.

Psalm 81:10-12.

Blood is placed on the doorposts before the consummation of the union later that night. The blood is said to be the Bride's "ornament" worn to adorn her body in order to entice and give joy to the Groom. If the blood represents the consummation of phallic-sex, then the blood could not be on the doorposts until the morning when Israel left the "house" . . . after the consummation of the union in the middle of the night.

Furthermore, if the blood of the lamb is mingled with circumcision blood, as the Talmud, and most other Jewish scripture tells us is the case (such that the blood of the lamb represents Abraham's circumcision, as Midrash Rabbah implies) . . . then the blood stopped at the door, the blood that represents "death" (which is refused entrance to the house) is not the blood of a niddah (related to birth, or consummation of a normal sexual union), in which case the Groom could not even enter the house on the night of Passover (since the blood would have made the house niddah), but instead represents the blood of the Serpent-of-death.

Rabbi Waskow and Rabbi Berman, with the Zohar, and Rabbi Elie Munk (quoted earlier in this thread) point out something that’s undeniable to any serious student of the Jewish scripture: Passover night consummates a union between God and Shekinah, leading to the birth of Israel on the morrow. These Rabbi’s assume the blood on the doorposts represent the blood of a virgin Bride being generated by the natural consummation of the union of Bride and Groom. But the blood is placed on the doorpost prior to the union; and scripture/midrashim teaches that the blood plays the role of an "ornament" or enticement designed to titillate the Groom and make him rise to the occasion of consummating the union.

If the blood placed on the doorpost is the blood of the groom, per all the midrashim that teaches that the Paschal blood is mingled with, and represents, the blood of circumcision, then we know that the blood is associated not with birth, or even the act leading to birth, but an act that takes place prior to the consummation of the birth (circumcision). Since the matzoh and the blood on the doorpost are both "ornaments" and not directly related to the consummation (which consummation is subsumed in the matzoh being consumed) we have the problem that the matzoh dough is in the womb before the consummation of the Groom and the Bride later that night, and it's there in association with the blood on the doorposts.

The matzoh in the womb, and the blood on the doorpost occur before the consummation of the union, and the consummation of the union occurs before the wedding ceremony ---- which takes place at Horeb. . . In line with this we have a Jew conceived before his mother has consummated her relationship with his father saying that you must eat the dough of his body, that is the bread of life, if you want to be a part of the covenant. This is vouchsafed by the fact that his mother was pregnant with him before she had sex with his father, and long before her and his father were married.