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Parshat Vayishlach
2006
We Can Work it Out
“Heenay ma tov oomah na’eem – shevet achim gam yachad.”
“How good and how pleasant it is – when brothers sit together.”
These words of King David in the famous psalm present one view of the relationship of siblings: They often do dwell together in harmony. On the other side of the coin, however, sibling harmony is often hard to find -- particularly in the book of Genesis.
This week as we read Parshat Vayishlach we learn of the reunion of Jacob and Esau, who have not seen each other since Esau vowed to kill Jacob for swindling him out of his birthright 20 years before. The reunion is incomplete; the brothers hug, kiss, reconcile, but ultimately go their separate ways. Yet Jacob’s anxiety and his preparation for the reunion speak volumes about his character, and the character he will become in the ensuing encounter with his ever-so-slightly older brother.
The account of his evening before the encounter takes up just 11 terse verses in the Torah:
That same night he arose, and taking his two wives, his two maidservants, and his eleven children, he crossed the ford of the Jabbok. After taking them across the stream, he sent across all his possessions. Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the break of dawn. When he saw that he had not prevailed against him, he wrenched Jacob's hip at its socket, so that the socket of his hip was strained as he wrestled with him. Then he said, "Let me go, for dawn is breaking." But he answered, "I will not let you go, unless you bless me." Said the other, "What is your name?" He replied, "Jacob." Said he, "Your name shall no longer be Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with beings divine and human, and have prevailed." Jacob asked, "Pray tell me your name." But he said, "You must not ask my name!" And he took leave of him there. So Jacob named the place Peniel, meaning, "I have seen a divine being face to face, yet my life has been preserved." The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping on his hip. That is why the children of Israel to this day do not eat the thigh muscle that is on the socket of the hip, since Jacob's hip socket was wrenched at the thigh muscle.
(Chapter 32:23-33, JPS Translation)
The identity of this man with whom Jacob wrestles is a tantalizing mystery. Many midrashim, interpretive commentators, identify it as an angel, sent to do its mission during the night. That explanation would justify the being’s request to “let me go, for dawn is breaking.” It would also explain the being’s power to bestow a name change as blessing. This would also elucidate the phrase that Jacob has “seen a divine being face to face.”
But two other modern midrashim suggest more specific identities for “the man.” One intriguing possibility put forth by my teacher Ruth Fagin is that Esau, either figuring out Jacob’s location or guessing it with the intuition of a twin, is, himself, “the man.” When they meet the next morning, Jacob describes seeing Esau’s face as “seeing the face of God.” They each needed to work out their sibling rivalry in a nocturnal, intense struggle so that they could accept each other in the light of day. In this reading, Esau must go before daybreak to maintain either the secrecy or the sanctity of their battle. His blessing of Jacob corrects the injustice of the blessing stolen two decades before. The wounding of Jacob is a permanent mark by the elder sibling, but it obviates the need for further revenge.
The other possibility, suggested by Rabbi Harold Kushner among others, is that the man is Jacob himself. Jacob must wrestle out the “heal-sneak” (Everett Fox’s translation of Ya’akov) elements of himself in order to achieve his destiny and finally face his brother as Israel (Yisra-El: God wrestler). If you read the account of the duel carefully, you will notice that the pronouns float ambiguously through the middle of the tale. Jacob’s injury is now symbolic: in the teachings of Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, Jacob could only be complete if he knew that he was incomplete, i.e., broken. Jacob’s blessing is now as powerful as it is hopeful: He blesses himself with the power to aspire to his highest hopes, and to no longer cater to his basest traits.
One of the wonderful qualities of elusive passages like this from the Torah is their ability to evade our attempts to make them conform to one single meaning or interpretation. Whether it was an angel, Esau, Jacob, or some other manifestation, the nighttime encounter changed our ancestor from a frightened family man to an empowered leader of a clan, and ultimately a nation, the nation of Israel.
Written by Rabbi Ben Lanckton, MIT Hillel
Learn More
Additional commentaries and text studies on Parshat Vayishlach at MyJewishLearning.com.
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