Jacob - episode 3

In this post we conclude the story of the patriarch Jacob; we are in the Book of Genesis, chapter 32 and onward.

Laban comes back to his homeland and Jacob continues his journey to Canaan; he sends messengers of peace to his brother Esau, because he expects that, despite the past twenty years, he would still be angry with him. «The messengers returned to Jacob, saying, “We came to your brother Esau. Not only that, but he comes to meet you, and four hundred men with him.” Then Jacob was greatly afraid and was distressed. He divided the people who were with him, and the flocks, and the herds, and the camels, into two companies; and he said, “If Esau comes to the one company, and strikes it, then the company which is left will escape.” […] He lodged there that night, and took from that which he had with him, a present for Esau, his brother: two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams, thirty milk camels and their colts, forty cows, ten bulls, twenty female donkeys and ten foals. He delivered them into the hands of his servants, every herd by itself». Jacob is expecting the worst and is hoping to appease Esau with gifts taken from his cattle; he has also made a heartfelt prayer to the Lord so that he and his family may be saved from death. The next night the Lord will show to Jacob with great power that his prayer has been fulfilled: «[Jacob] rose up that night, and took his two wives, and his two handmaids, and his eleven sons, and passed over the ford of the Jabbok. He took them, and sent them over the stream, and sent over that which he had. Jacob was left alone, and wrestled with a man there until the breaking of the day. When he saw that he did not prevail against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh, and the hollow of Jacob’s thigh was strained, as he wrestled. The man said, “Let me go, for the day breaks.” Jacob said, “I won’t let you go, unless you bless me.” He said to him, “What is your name?” He said, “Jacob.” He said, “Your name will no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have fought with God and with men, and have prevailed.” Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” He said, “Why is it that you ask what my name is?” He blessed him there». The Lord’s angel started a healing process in Jacob: he invites Jacob to be himself with truth (asks him his name) and not to want to be another person (we can remember when Jacob lied to his father Isaac, saying his name was Esau to steal his brother’s blessing). Only this way Jacob can finally receive the blessing that the Lord had reserved for him, just for him, and change his name from “supplanter”, “cheater” (some of the meanings of the Hebrew root of the name “Jacob”) to winning wrestler, Israel, founder of the Lord’s people.

 

 

Jacob has been transformed by this sacred fight and is now ready for the meeting with his brother, which, against every catastrophic expectation, takes place in peace: «Esau ran to meet him, embraced him, fell on his neck, kissed him, and they wept. He lifted up his eyes, and saw the women and the children; and said, “Who are these with you?” He said, “The children whom God has graciously given your servant.” Then the handmaids came near with their children, and they bowed themselves. Leah also and her children came near, and bowed themselves. After them, Joseph came near with Rachel, and they bowed themselves. Esau said, “What do you mean by all this company which I met?” Jacob said, “To find favor in the sight of my lord.” Esau said, “I have enough, my brother; let that which you have be yours.”». Esau is also rich and does not need anything: despite the deceptions by Jacob, he has maintained the blessing that the Lord had reserved for him.

Cardinal Martini uses the text of the sacred fight by the Jabbok stream to describe the last of the five moments in which he ideally divides his life experience with Jesus; I take this quote from his Relazione agli Incontri “Fede e ricerca di Dio” per la Missione della Città di Roma, January 22, 1997. The first four moments are: the fascination (the love for Jesus and his Word aroused by the first meetings with Him), the questions that inevitably follow this meeting, the fury of a self-sacrificing and patient research in the original sources of Christian faith, the test of the most radical criticisms about the historical truth of Jesus’ character and his message. «The time of falling in love, the time of doubts and questions, the time of the fury and the time of the test are accompanied and followed by the time of the never ending fight with Jesus’ character. It is something similar to Jacob’s fight in the night by the river Jabbok, when “a man wrestled with him until daybreak dawn” (Gen 32,25). We fight against someone who is stronger, that does not leave the outlet, and the dawn of full and unveiled knowledge has not come yet. Despite the certainty of grasping a solid reality, - because we are grabbed and we grab - we remain in the night. [ ... ] Here is a leap that no historical investigation can jump over, a step that can be made only by each one’s personal conscience. A step that takes us […] to the mystery of Jesus, to his unique relationship with the Father, to his transcendence, to his meaning for every man’s history and for all humanity, to his ability of revealing God’s face. [ ... ] It is this whole series of questions and answers that makes the experience of faith, the Christian experience a continuous penetration of Jesus’ figure, with a widening of horizons that will have end - like for Jacob - only at the end of the night, at the rising of the dawn of full knowledge. It is an always new adventure, it is an experience that never leaves us in peace, it is a journey in which the glimpsed goal gives joy and anxiety together; joy because we can see it, anxiety because it is still far away. But what we already know of the mysterious man with whom we are fighting in the night, is his embrace that supports us, in a fight that, despite the effort, holds us standing, does not allow us to fall or to surrender to frustration and loneliness. It is in a fight, in a journey like this, in stops including questions that man and woman become authentic people, in the image of [the] authentic man who has attracted them behind him: Jesus Christ».

In the next post we will narrate the story of Jacob’s sons, who are the founders of the twelve tribes of Israel.