WHAT DID JACOB SEE IN GENESIS 32-33?

 

                            Night Wrestling (10" x 10" collage)

This is a key passage in more than one way for Jacob. Here he returns to his native land after many years of absence; and, more importantly, it is in these chapters that the patriarch begins his process of changing from Jacob the schemer to Israel, the father of a country. As Fokkelman puts it, “Jacob...must now face what he has been able to evade for twenty years: his past as a fraud, his bad conscience toward his brother. The imminent confrontation with Esau puts him in a moral pressure cooker and forces him to pass through a process of maturation at an accelerated rate.”

I have already discussed this passage in two posts (“Genesis 32:22-32” and “Genesis 32-33: Jacob and Esau Reunite”). However, there is one recurring theme throughout these chapters which still needs emphasizing, namely, the repeated times in the text in which Jacob “saw” something or someone.

Genesis 32:1-2

Interestingly, this return trip to his homeland is first marked by a vision of angels, just as Jacob was treated to another angelic vision as he was leaving the land earlier. Both visions appear to be associated with God's assurance that He would be with him.

“The angels or heavenly host constituted God's army (Jos. 5.13-15; 2 Kg. 6.17).” (Dentan)

Kline states that “the two armies referred to by the name mahanaim are possibly the angels and Jacob's company. If 32:11ff belongs chronologically within the course of events described in vv. 3ff, the two armies might be the angels and Esau's force.”

Hamilton questions whether this is a dream, a vision, or a face-to-face encounter on Jacob's part. Whatever the case, he notes the similarities with Genesis 28 when Jacob was leaving the Holy Land in terms of the place being named God's abode, occurrence of the same naming formula, and the rare use of the plural 'angels of God.'

Genesis 32:20-21

Dentan points out that “Jacob had feared to see Esau's face (v. 20; 33:10), but instead he saw God face to face and was allowed to live (16:13; Ex. 33:20).” Carr and B.W. Anderson echo these words almost exactly in their separate writings.

“To 'see the face' is to gain acceptance to one's presence.” (Dictionary of Biblical Imagery)

Wenham: “Peniel means literally 'face of God' (32:31-32), and since Esau's face is compared to God's in 33:10, presumably 32:21 anticipates Peniel too.”

Averbeck offers this literal translation of Genesis 32:20 – “I will wipe [kippur] his [angry] face clean with the gifts that go before me.”

“He [i.e. Jacob] refers to that event by saying, I have seen God face-to-face, a statement all the more remarkable given that it happened during the night at the bottom of a dark gorge...The reference to the visual act also anticipates 33:10: 'I see your face as one sees the face of God.' The expression face-to-face need not be confined to literal visual perception. In an idiomatic fashion it refers 'to the direct, nonmediated (i.e. immediate) character of a manifestation of presence. It describes a 'person-to-person' encounter, without the help or hindrance of an intermediate.'” (Hamilton, quoting Terrien)

Ross says: “Seeing God was something no one survived (Gen 48:16; Exod. 19:21; 24:10; Judg. 6:11, 22; chap. 13). But this appearance of the man guaranteed deliverance for the patriarch. God has come as close to Jacob as was imaginable. Jacob explained, 'I have seen God face to face and I have been delivered.' His prayer for deliverance (Gen 32:10-13) was answered. Meeting God face to face meant that he could now look Esau directly in the eye.”

Genesis 32:30-31

Chisholm: “The narrator, assuming Jacob's initial perspective, identifies God as 'a man', but by the story's end Jacob was certain he had encountered God 'face to face'. However, a later tradition suggests Jacob wrestled with an angel (Hos. 12:4); the relationship between the two traditions is complex.” In another writing, Chisholm adds, “Perhaps Jacob's words in Gen 48:15-16, where he appears to refer to God as an 'angel,' influenced the tradition expressed in Hosea.”

Kline says that the man “was the captain of the Lord's host...The divine Adversary was also the electing-saving Lord who strengthened Jacob with grace.”

Foulkes: “Jacob...wrestles with a 'man,' but his struggle in the darkness proves to be with one more than human. The Hebrew elohim most frequently means God, but the interpretation of Hos 12:4 is possible, 'He struggled with the angel.' Yet, in effect it could be said to Jacob, 'You have struggled with God and with men and have overcome.'”

“Though the identity of this adversary is never revealed, he is more than a human opponent, exhibiting divine characteristics...Jacob apparently believed his opponent to be divine, since he named the place Peniel, on the rationale 'I have seen God face to face' (Gen 32:30 RSV). Most interpreters throughout the history of the church have therefore suggested that Jacob's opponent was an angelic emissary, an interpretation confirmed by the statement in Hosea that Jacob 'strove with God. He strove with the angel and prevailed' (Hos 12:3-4).” (DBI)

Kaiser attempts to settle the question by stating: “It thus appears that the 'man' or 'angel' with whom Jacob wrestled was Jesus himself, in a temporary incarnate form prior to his permanent enfleshment when he came to earth as a human baby. This is consistent with other places in the Old Testament where the 'angel of the Lord' can be identified as the second person of the Trinity.”

B.W. Anderson: “Jacob had feared to see Esau's face (v. 20; 33:10), but instead he saw God face to face and was allowed to live (16.13; Ex. 33.20).”

“Elsewhere (v 32; Judg 8:8-9, 17; 1 Kgs 12:25) Peniel is called Penuel. The form Peniel may be used here because it sound like 'face of God' [in Hebrew].” (Wenham)

And for a decidedly minority opinion, Wakely explains that “Westermann, however, argues strongly that Gen 32:30 does not constitute sufficient ground for understanding the narrative as a whole as an encounter between God and Jacob. The attacker, he continues, is not God but the hostile river demon who wants to stop Jacob from crossing.”

Similarly, Ross points out: “From the time of Jerome, many have understood the passage to portray long and earnest prayer...Jewish literature, however, recognizes that an actual fight is at the heart of the story,” identifying the man as a prince, chieftain, or angel of Esau. “The passage has proved problematic for critical analysis as well.”

Genesis 33:1,5

These two matched statements differ from others in this chapter in that they refer to a more mundane sort of seeing – purely human encounters. In both cases, the identical two Hebrew words for “looked up and saw” are utilized. In the first of these verses Jacob sees Esau's approaching company and recognizes only a hostile army of men. By contrast, Esau looks up to see Jacob's large retinue and recognizes only his own extended family. Esau comes off as the much more noble character in this encounter.

Genesis 33:10

Carr connects Jacob's words here with those in 32:30-31 since in both cases God “proved to be gracious” to him.

Ross says, “Having already contended with one is ('man'), Jacob now has to face four hundred of them.” But regarding his statement after meeting Esau, “Jacob ties together his meeting with God in ch. 32 with his meeting with Esau in ch. 33 by just to see your face is like seeing God's face...Of course, Jacob is not saying that Esau has undergone a metamorphosis, or that he exudes a divine luminescence. The surprise in ch. 32 is that Jacob saw God, and yet his life was spared. The surprise in ch. 33 is that Jacob has seen Esau, and yet his life is spared.”

“Jacob recognized through Esau's reconciled countenance that the God of Peniel was making His face shine upon him.” (Kline)

“The name Peniel / Penuel signifies 'the face of God', reminding Jacob that he had not need to fear Esau when he was in the place of God's presence...Ch. 33 is undoubtedly intended to mirror 32:22-38; it is no coincidence that Jacob describes Esau's face as like the face of God (10); cf. 32:30.” (D.F. Payne)

Wenham says, “The full and free forgiveness that Esau displays toward his deceitful brother is, as Jacob himself recognizes, a model of divine love, 'for I have seen your face, which is like seeing the face of God, and you have accepted me (v 10). Indeed Jesus seems to allude to this scene when he describes the father of the prodigal son greeting his return...(Luke 15:20).”

Conclusion

Without going to the trouble of attempting to plot all the intricate connections tying together the above key “seeing” passages in Genesis 32-33, I think that a brief consideration of all these cited comments will easily demonstrate that the whole concept of looking and perceiving is the common factor behind both chapters.