Genesis 32:11-32 ▼

11 Deliver me from my brother Esau's control, because I'm terrified of him, and I'm afraid that he's coming to attack me, the mothers, and their children.

12 Now, you promised me that 'I'm certainly going to cause things to go well with you, and I'm going to make your offspring as numerous as the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.'|

13 Jacob spent the night there. Out of everything that he had brought with him, he chose a gift for his brother Esau—

14 200 female goats, 20 male goats, 200 ewes, 20 rams,

15 30 milking camels with their young, 40 cows with ten bulls, and 20 female donkeys with ten male donkeys.

16 He entrusted them into the care of his servants, one herd at a time. Then he told his servants, |Go in front of me, making sure there's plenty of space between herds.|

17 To the first group he said, |When you meet my brother Esau, if he asks, 'To whom do you belong? Where are you going? And to whom do these herds belong?'

18 then you are to reply, 'We're from your servant Jacob. The herds are a gift. He's sending them to my master, Esau. Look! There he is, coming along behind us.'|

19 He issued similar instructions to the second and third group, as well as to all the others who drove the herds that followed: |This is how you are to speak to Esau when you find him.

20 You are to tell him, 'Look! Your servant Jacob is coming along behind us.'| Jacob was thinking, |I'll pacify him with the presents that are being sent ahead of me. Then, when I meet him, perhaps he'll accept me.|

21 So the presents went ahead of him, while he spent that night in the camp.

22 Later that night, he woke up, quickly took his two wives, his two women servants, and his eleven children, and forded the river at Jabbok.

23 He took them across the river, along with all his possessions.

24 And so Jacob was left alone, and he struggled with a man until daybreak.

25 When the man realized that he hadn't yet won the struggle, he injured the socket of Jacob's thigh, dislocating it as he wrestled with him,

26 and said, |Let me go, because the dawn has come.| |I won't let you go,| Jacob replied, |unless you bless me.|

27 Then the man asked him, |What's your name?| |Jacob,| he responded

28 |Your name won't be Jacob anymore,| the man replied, |but Israel, because you exerted yourself against both God and men, and you've emerged victorious.|

29 |Please,| Jacob inquired, |Tell me your name.| But he asked, |Why are you asking about my name?| And he blessed Jacob there.

30 Jacob would later call that place Peniel, because |I saw God face to face, but my life was spared.|

31 The sun was rising above Jacob as he crossed over from Peniel, limping due to his wounded thigh.

32 Therefore, to this day the Israelis do not eat the hip tendon that connects to the thigh socket, because he had injured the socket of the thigh where the tendon connected to Jacob's hip.