Wrasslin' - Genesis 32:9-32

32:9-12 - After dealing with Laban, Jacob sent messengers to his brother Esau asking for peace, and Esau answered in a way that didn’t make peace look likely, by coming to personally meet him… with 400 men. Jacob split up his family, assuming Leah and all went one way and Rachel and all went another way, I would imagine that he found himself alone, hoping that when Esau got to him, he would be satisfied with only killing Jacob and not destroying his whole family. Being alone, there wasn’t a lot that Jacob could do except pray and he words the prayer in a clever way, calling on “the Lord which sadist unto me, Return unto thy country, and to thy kindred, and I will deal well with thee.” That’s a pretty ingenious way of saying, “I’m doing what you told me to do and have been plagued with the threat of constant death the whole time, help me out here.”

Back about 13 years ago, I was having a really hard time at my job, the manager was just awful and I know that it was bad. I had taken all the “complaints” about me that he said I had and had really worked to fix them, to be less overwhelmed, be better with patients and coworkers, etc. I actually really learned a lot, but it got to the point that I couldn’t do anything else, I worked on everything that he said was wrong with me, and I felt that I had done everything possible to make the situation better. I remember praying one night asking for help with whatever and I realized that there was nothing left for me to pray for, I had already maxed out my own ability to fix the situation. The only thing that I could legitimately ask for was for God’s help softening this man’s heart toward me, that was the only thing left to ask for, I couldn’t do anything else. I’d imagine that this is the point that Jacob is at right about now, he literally can not do anything about whatever his brother wants to do, and the options for outcomes seem slim with Esau coming directly to him with 400 men.

It's interesting how different the spiritual experiences are coming back to Beersheba now with his family compared to what it was leaving Beersheba 20 years earlier. Coming out of the land, Jacob was taught basic truths and he’s had 20 years to reflect and grow those but this way back is painful, not happy and hopeful and enlightening like before, now it’s purification time. Jacob prays for the only thing he can, protection from God, “Deliver me, I pray thee, from the hand of my brother.” Interestingly, I can see that Jacob has become much more focused on his family’s wellbeing that I had previously imagined, he separates and hides his family so that at least some of them will survive, and it doesn’t say that he put Rachel in a special place because he loved her more, and in his prayer he not only prays out of fear for himself but also “the mother with the children.”

32:13-21 - I don’t know if it was his plan before praying or afterward, but when Jacob woke up in the morning, he send “a present for Esau his brother,” and a big one, 200 female goats, 20 male goats, 200 female sheep, 20 male sheep, 30 “milch camels with their colts, forty kine, and ten bulls, twenty she assess, and ten foals.” I don’t know what most of the last bit of animals listed there are, but that is a TON of animals, which begs the question 1. How many animals did Jacob have to start with and 2. Is this enough to change what he thought was Esau’s death wish against him?

All these animals are divided up into groups and sent with different servants, paced out from each other, so that when they encounter Esau, it is like a slow drip, one at a time, accumulatively. Jacob tells the servants what to say when they find Esau, they should say that these animals belong to “thy servant Jacob; it is a present sent unto my lord Esau: and, behold, also he is behind us.” This plan had multiple purposes, first to show Esau that Jacob is returning very wealthy so won’t need to defraud him further, second that Jacob fully recognizes Esau’s authority over him in the new land, there won’t be a pissing contest on Jacob’s side. Third, he says specifically to tell Esau that he is coming right behind these groups of gifts, which shows that Jacob isn’t hiding or shirking this encounter, but also might make Esau stop his advance. If Esau is coming to see Jacob, naturally he would keep moving forward until he found him, but if Jacob can laden Esau with high maintenance gifts (which animals are, food and water and all that), and assure Esau that Jacob is coming, maybe he can get Esau to stop where he is and wait for him there which would get Esau’s little army further away from Jacob’s hidden family so that if the worst happened and Esau’s desire was to kill Jacob and take his stuff, he would be that much further away from Rachel, Leah, and the rest of his family, giving them more opportunity to escape. Jacob only admits to the first reason, to buy Esau’s peaceful acceptance of Jacob with gifts and deference.

32:22-32 - It seems like Jacob went and saw that his family was safely hidden “over the brook” then spent the night alone. It’s a very strange night for him (and us) because as Jacob spent the night alone, he “wrestled a man with him until the breaking of the day.” This is very strange because in the English version of the Bible, it just says it was a “man” which to me would mean a robber or a wanderer or something, then hearing that they “wrestled” in the which Jacob got hurt, that all to me means a bad guy who intended Jacob harm. The rest of the story doesn’t support that though because apparently Jacob got a hold of this guy and wouldn’t let him go “except thou bless me.”

So this guy who is doing violence to Jacob also has the power of God from which Jacob could be blessed? That sounds like an angel or messenger from God or something. In the blessing, this guy says “Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and has prevailed.” There are multiple footnotes for this verse and after reading all of them, what I can deduce is that the angel changed Jacob’s name to Israel because he had persisted with God and gained favor with God and man.

During this encounter, at some point Jacob’s leg is hurt, it says that it was hurt during the wrestling because the messenger touched the hollow of Jacob’s thigh and pushed it out of place, causing injury and that’s why the Israelites don’t eat thigh meat. Interesting, I don’t think that I’ll understand exactly what that means in my lifetime. Was any actual, physical pushing and grabbing going on between these two men that night? Almost certainly not. But we can remember that Enos in the Book of Mormon told us about his “wrestle” with God on the night that he prayed for forgiveness and changed his life.

Also Joseph Smith and others who had great spiritual experiences would become physically drained, so even though it is a spiritual experience, the physical body is exhausted as well, so it’s possible that Jacob was physically drained from conversing with this messenger or having a vision or whatever and then injured himself in his weakened physical condition. Finally, as the sun came up, Jacob named the place where all this happened “Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.” I don’t know if that means that his life wasn’t taken by God or if God told Jacob that he would survive his encounter with Esau, either way, I bet Jacob was relived.