August 3 Gen. 32
To me this story of Jacob just begs for a psychological reading. In a way it is a dramatic rendering of a therapy session or the inner turmoil of a conversion experience. At night, Jacob wrestles with a mysterious stranger before he is to face Esau and his new chapter in life. He fled home after cheating esau, and now after being cheated and cheating, he is to return home.I read it, in part, as Jacob wrestling with different versions of himself. he is wrestling with the Jacob he could be in the future and wrestling with his old self in maintaining himself.from the past. Who will Jacob become? It is no accident that he receives a new name and that rabbinic interpreters read it as wrestling/contending/ striving with God for Israel.
I suppose one could read it as a test betwen the Jacob of the past and the possibility that the future could be different.the creek Jabbok sound like his own name a bit, perhaps it is a boundary place, a liminal experience for Jacob. After all, in his planning for meeting Esau, he is all alone while different grouping of the family precede him. What will he maintain of his identity as the grasping, scheming younger brother? How will he face the consequences of it? Will Esau hold on to his grudge and anger all these years?
Christians can and should wrestle with all sorts of issues. Often we speak of sanctification as a sort of automatic process of growing in the life of the spirit. here it is a much more demanding task, not an easy ladder of ascent as much as a real fight. Sanctification, becoming more christ like is a lifelong process and a lifelong struggle. it always seems easier to drop down a step or two on the ladder toward God than to find the energy to climb one more rung.that’s why the Spirit is not only our impetus but provides the energy and virtues we need for that ascent where the air gets thin.
In part, he is struggling with forgiveness. Will he be attacked or forgiven? The competitive side of his nature knows that esau should kill him, but could there be other options. Would Esau keep his revenge alive for all these years?
Jacob demands a blessing. he had stolen a blessing from his father and has a tense parting of the ways from his father-in-law, but he had blessed the children of jacob (and perhaps his s daughters) . Still he wants a blessing.
Without going too much into here the story is filled with sound alike words to Jacob. the name of the stream means to empty. the hip dislocation is another word. the struggle itself sounds like his name.The wrestling is related to the word for dust, as in thou art dust, as wrestling is to get down and dusty in the struggle.Israel means literally may god rule, but it is changed in the tradition to striving with god and prevailing. God is turned from subject to the recipient of the sentence name itself.All of these words reflect the struggle within jacob. his very name means grabby, pushy, a heel. He is a cheat who has been cheated. He is dislocated from the best parts of himself as surely as he is dislcoated from his home.At the Jabbok he empties pours out himself of at least some of his past.At its best christian education allows us to wrestle with the questions of the faith. When you take a step back, worship wrestles with, struggles with different sides of ourselves in our relationship with God.
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