At the urging of my spiritual director, I have been reading, marking and inwardly digesting the story in which Jacob struggles with the angel throughout the night (Genesis 32:24-31). She was responding to my describing myself as wrestling with God. So here are some initial thoughts on the Biblical story.
I have a hard time identifying with Jacob, and a brief scan of the preceding chapters reminds me why. You may remember Jacob and his twin brother Esau wrestled in their mother’s womb, but Jacob was born second. As a young man Jacob bought Esau’s birthright for some stew, then deceived his father Isaac to receive the blessing meant for his first-born brother. After Jacob fled fearing recrimination, he is deceived by his father-in-law-to-be into marrying the Leah, the older sister before being allowed to marry her more desirable younger sister Rachel. (I will skip over any discussion of polygamy being the norm for parts of scripture, and ignore the role of Leah’s and Rachel’s maids as fore-mothers of
At the time we pick up the story, Jacob was facing an encounter with Esau who he had fled some twenty years earlier. The story in Genesis doesn’t say where the man came from who wrestled with Jacob, or even specifically who he was. However, they fought throughout the night with Jacob stubbornly continuing to wrestle, unwilling to give up even though the man put Jacob’s hip out of joint.
I may be stubborn, but not that stubborn. While I recognize some similarity between my life and Jacob, I don’t want to believe I am as deeply as flawed as him. Yes, I deceived my family about my sexuality until I was in my mid twenties, and I tried to be someone I wasn’t to make them and everyone else like me more. Yes, I fled from my parent’s home, attempting to use physical distance from them to establish my own, separate life path. Yes, I hid my relationships from my parents because I was quite sure they would never accept my same sex partners.
Alright, I’ll admit maybe I have done some of the same things and may be a little bit more like Jacob than I want to admit. But I don’t expect to become the father of an entire religious faith, either. Having no children of my own would seem to end that similarity.
So, to see if there are things not visible in the English translation, I read a few scripture commentaries and learned that there are many identities that have been seen in the angel. A common one is the angel is God or at least representing God, but others see Satan or an internal battle of Jacob wrestling with his own internal demons. In my own reading of the story, my wrestling is with God, my will against God’s will, with God trying to make me submit and acknowledge God’s overpowering strength.
I am not willing to submit, though. I find myself going against all of the spiritual masters who say I must submit to God. While there have been times during the wrestling that I will do that briefly, I also know that I am not going to give up. I refuse to lay down my claim to pursue what I deeply believe I have been called to be and to do.
What gets me angry is that this is a very different God than the one who I have known. I have seen God as a companion on my journey, who encouraged my creativity and effectiveness, walking beside me to provide support and encouragement.
What caused the wrestling? What has changed?
