1Jacob went on his way, and the angels of God met him.
2When Jacob saw them, he said, "This is God's army." So he called the name of that place Mahanaim.
4He gave them orders: "Say this to my lord Esau: 'Your servant Jacob says, I have lived with Laban as a stranger, and I have stayed there until now."
5"I have oxen, donkeys, flocks, menservants and maidservants. I have sent to tell my lord, so that I may find grace in your sight.'"
6The messengers came back to Jacob and said, "We went to your brother Esau. He is coming to meet you, and four hundred men are with him."
7Then Jacob was very much afraid and troubled. He divided the people who were with him, and the flocks and herds and camels, into two groups.
8He said, "If Esau comes to one group and attacks it, then the other group that is left can escape."
9Then Jacob said, "O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, the LORD who said to me, 'Go back to your country and to your family, and I will treat you well':"
10I am not worthy of the least of all the mercy and all the faithfulness you have shown to your servant. I crossed this Jordan with only my staff, and now I have become two groups.
11Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau. I am afraid of him. He may come and strike me down, and the mothers with the children.
12"And you said, 'I will surely do you good, and make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted because there is so much of it.'"
13He stayed there that night. From what he had with him he took a gift for his brother Esau:
14two hundred female goats and twenty male goats, two hundred ewes and twenty rams,
15thirty milking camels with their young, forty cows and ten bulls, twenty female donkeys and ten foals.
16He handed them over to his servants, each herd by itself, and he said to his servants, "Go on ahead of me, and leave a space between one herd and the next."
17He gave orders to the first servant: "When my brother Esau meets you and asks you, 'Whose servant are you? Where are you going? And whose are these animals in front of you?'"
18"then you shall say, 'They belong to your servant Jacob. It is a gift sent to my lord Esau. And look, he is coming behind us.'"
19He gave the same orders to the second servant, and to the third, and to all who followed the herds: "Speak to Esau in this way when you find him."
20"And say as well, 'Look, your servant Jacob is behind us.'" For he said, "I will calm him with the gift that goes ahead of me. After that I will see his face. Perhaps he will welcome me."
21So the gift went on ahead of him, and he himself stayed that night in the camp.
22He got up that night and took his two wives, his two maidservants and his eleven sons, and crossed the ford of Jabbok.
23He took them and sent them across the stream, and he sent over everything he had.
24Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until daybreak.
25When the man saw that he could not win against him, he touched the socket of Jacob's thigh. Jacob's thigh was pulled out of joint as he wrestled with him.
26The man said, "Let me go, for the day is breaking." Jacob said, "I will not let you go unless you bless me."
27The man said to him, "What is your name?" He said, "Jacob."
28Then he said, "Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel. For like a prince you have had power with God and with men, and you have won."
29Jacob asked him, "Tell me your name, I pray you." And he said, "Why do you ask my name?" And he blessed him there.
30Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, for he said, "I have seen God face to face, and my life has been spared."
31As he passed Penuel the sun rose on him, and he limped because of his thigh.
32That is why to this day the children of Israel do not eat the tendon that shrank, which is on the socket of the thigh. For the man touched the socket of Jacob's thigh at the tendon that shrank.