22 ᾿Αναστὰς δὲ τὴν νύκτα ἐκείνην ἔλαβε τὰς δύο γυναῖκας καὶ τὰς δύο παιδίσκας καὶ τὰ ἕνδεκα παιδία αὐτοῦ καὶ διέβη τὴν διάβασιν τοῦ ᾿Ιαβώκ· 23 καὶ ἔλαβεν αὐτοὺς καὶ διέβη τὸν χειμάρρουν καὶ διεβίβασε πάντα τὰ αὐτοῦ. 24 ὑπελείφθη δὲ ᾿Ιακὼβ μόνος, καὶ ἐπάλαιεν ἄνθρωπος μετ᾿ αὐτοῦ ἕως πρωΐ. 25 εἶδε δέ, ὅτι οὐ δύναται πρὸς αὐτόν, καὶ ἥψατο τοῦ πλάτους τοῦ μηροῦ αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἐνάρκησε τὸ πλάτος τοῦ μηροῦ ᾿Ιακὼβ ἐν τῷ παλαίειν αὐτὸν μετ᾿ αὐτοῦ. 26 καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ· ἀπόστειλόν με· ἀνέβη γὰρ ὁ ὄρθρος. ὁ δὲ εἶπεν· οὐ μή σε ἀποστείλω, ἐὰν μή με εὐλογήσῃς. 27 εἶπε δὲ αὐτῷ· τί τὸ ὄνομά σου ἐστίν, ὁ δὲ εἶπεν· ᾿Ιακώβ. 28 καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ· οὐ κληθήσεται ἔτι τὸ ὄνομά σου ᾿Ιακώβ, ἀλλ᾿ ᾿Ισραὴλ ἔσται τὸ ὄνομά σου, ὅτι ἐνίσχυσας μετὰ Θεοῦ, καὶ μετ᾿ ἀνθρώπων δυνατὸς ἔσῃ. 29 ἠρώτησε δὲ ᾿Ιακὼβ καὶ εἶπεν· ἀνάγγειλόν μοι τὸ ὄνομά σου. καὶ εἶπεν· ἱνατί τοῦτο ἐρωτᾶς σὺ τὸ ὄνομά μου; καὶ εὐλόγησεν αὐτὸν ἐκεῖ. 30 καὶ ἐκάλεσεν ᾿Ιακὼβ τὸ ὄνομα τοῦ τόπου ἐκείνου, Εἶδος Θεοῦ· εἶδον γὰρ Θεὸν πρόσωπον πρὸς πρόσωπον, καὶ ἐσώθη μου ἡ ψυχή. 31 ἀνέτειλε δὲ αὐτῷ ὁ ἥλιος, ἡνίκα παρῆλθε τὸ εἶδος τοῦ Θεοῦ· αὐτὸς δέ ἐπέσκαζε τῷ μηρῷ αὐτοῦ·
Genesis 32:22-31 NRSV (updated edn)
The same night he got up and took his two wives, his two maids, and his eleven children, and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. He took them and sent them across the stream, and likewise everything that he had. Jacob was left alone; and a man wrestled with him until daybreak. When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he struck him on the hip socket; and Jacob’s hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. Then he said, “Let me go, for the day is breaking.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go, unless you bless me.” So he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” Then the man said, “You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with humans, and have prevailed.” Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And there he blessed him. So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved.” The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip.
Comments
The vocabulary of the LXX text above is almost entirely classical Attic.
[22] Ἀναστὰς: masc. sing. nom. participle, 2nd aorist < ἀνίσταμαι = ‘I rise’, ‘I wake up’. Jacob was lodging in a camp, so he awakened and physically rose; ‘got up’ in the RSV allows for this ambiguity.
τὴν νύκτα ἐκείνην: acc. of time
παιδίσκας: < παιδίσκη, fem., 1st decl., diminutive of ἡ παῖς= ‘young female servant’.
παιδία: < τὸ παιδίον, diminutive of παῖς (masc., fem.) = ‘child’ (boy or girl) ‘up to seven years old’ (Montanari Dict. [henceforth ‘M.’]). Perhaps here π. simply means ‘young children’ (and we mustn’t bother over their age).
διέβη τὴν διάβασιν: διέβη, 2nd aorist < διαβαίνω, here with acc. (object) = ‘I pass over, cross’ (a body of water or land).
διάβασιν < ἡ διάβασις, 3rd decl., ‘crossing’, ‘passage’; ‘bridge’.
Note the etymological relation of διαβαίνω & διάβασις:
τὴν διάβασιν, the object of διέβη, is a cognate acc. , which repeats the idea of the verb. This phenomenon is commoner in Greek than in English.
[22-23] διέβη τὸν χειμάρρουν καὶ διεβίβασε πάντα τὰ αὐτοῦ: note the verb διεβίβασε (‘he carried over’, ‘he transported’) and again its related διέβη. δια-compounds occur four times in a space of two verses. Rather repetitious by our modern standards.
τὸν χειμάρρουν: < χειμάρρους, contracted from χειμάρροος; the later form is χείμαρρος. Ιn Attic (classical) Greek the noun usually means ‘torrent’; in LXX the meaning has changed to ‘river’ (e.g. Numbers 34.5) according to M.
NRSV’s ‘ford’, sensibly suggests crossing shallow water. But was it a smooth passage? ‘River’ (LXX) does not rule out a rougher crossing.
πάντα τὰ αὐτοῦ: πάντα (‘all’) has the predicate position; πράγματα (‘things’) is understood, and the genitive αὐτοῦ (personal pronoun) is added: πάντα τὰ [sc. πράγματα] αὐτοῦ = ‘all the things of his’.
Cf. the English ‘all his possessions’ (‘all’ has the predicate position as in Greek).
[24] ἄνθρωπος: ‘ human being, man’ (in the general or individual sense); in ancient Greek ἄνθρωπος can be masculine or feminine depending on the context (we sometimes forget this!). It can also mean ‘person’ (in the individual sense), as here; in effect, ‘a person, someone’.
ἕως πρωΐ: the article (here τό) can be omitted in expressions of time or place.
[25] εἶδε δέ, ὅτι οὐ δύναται πρὸς αὐτόν: δύναμαι = ‘be strong’, ‘have power’. Cf. the English ‘dynamic’. We would expect from the main verb εἶδε (‘he saw’, ‘he realised’) that δύναται would also be in a past tense (e.g. ἐδύνατο/ ἠδύνατο). But the present tense δύναται conveys vividness. This is common in indirect discourse in Greek.
πρὸς αὐτόν: ‘over him’.
ἥψατο τοῦ πλάτους τοῦ μηροῦ αὐτοῦ: ἥψατο, aor. < ἅπτομαι, ‘grasp’, ‘attack’ usually with a genitive object. The verb connotes a violent motion.
τοῦ πλάτους τοῦ μηροῦ αὐτοῦ: lit., ‘the breadth of his thigh’. τὸ πλάτος = ‘breadth’; ὁ μηρός = ‘thigh usually of a man’ (M.).
The divine wrestler grasped the level part of Jacob’s thigh, presumably his upper thigh or hip. The LXX text is less medically explicit than the RSV, ‘he struck him on the hip socket’.
ἐνάρκησε τὸ πλάτος τοῦ μηροῦ᾿Ιακὼβ : repeats the phrase ‘breadth of his thigh’; τὸ πλάτος is the subject of the verb ἐνάρκησε < ναρκῶ (άω), ‘I grow numb’, ‘I am paralysed’. Cf. ‘narcotic’.
Ἰακὼβ: ‘of Jacob’. Hebrew names are usually not declined in Greek.
Jacob’s upper thigh grew numb. Cf. the more anatomical ‘Jacob’s hip was put out of joint’ in RSV.
ἐν τῷ παλαίειν αὐτὸν: as in NT Greek, ἐν τῷ + infinitive denotes a simultaneous action or state. αὐτὸν (‘him’), referring to Jacob, is the subject of the infinitive.
[26] οὐ μή σε ἀποστείλω: the combined negatives οὐ μή + aorist subjunctive or + future indicative are used to express an emphatic negative statement about the future to the effect ‘By no means will…’ Thus: ‘In no way shall I release you.’ ‘I will not let you go’ (RSV) lacks the negative punch of the LXX.
ἀποστείλω, aor. subj. < ἀποστέλλω, lit. ‘send forth’. Cf. ‘Apostle’.
εὐλογήσῃς: aor. subj. <εὐλογῶ (έω). A fine case of ‘semantic shift’: in classical Greek it means ‘I praise, I celebrate’ (εὖ + λόγος); in LXX & NT Greek it means ‘ I bless’. Cf. ‘eulogy’, which reflects the classical significance.
The sentence in v. 26 is a ‘future more vivid supposition’.
[27-30] τὸ ὄνομά σου/ μου: ‘name’ (ὄνομα) recurs six times. Perhaps tedious but an important theme.
[28] καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ·: LXX reads ‘and (implied) he (sc. the divine wrestler) said to him’. We are in the dark as to who ‘he’ is.
* RSV concretises (demystifies) the implied ‘he’: ‘Then the man said’.
[29] ἀνάγγειλόν μοι τὸ ὄνομά σου: the Greek reads ‘announce/ tell/ reveal to me your name’. RSV prefaces the imperative ‘tell’ with ‘Please’. The study of polite discourse is a new field in ancient Greek; for now it seems that only the context will help us decide (or guess) between ‘Tell’ and ‘Please tell’.
[30] Εἶδος Θεοῦ· εἶδον γὰρ Θεὸν: the wordplay produced by the noun Εἶδος and verb εἶδον, ‘I saw’, ‘I have seen’ is also an aetiology of the toponym.
Εἶδος Θεοῦ seems to mean ‘appearance of God’, ‘form of God’, ‘outward look of God’.
καὶ ἐσώθη μου ἡ ψυχή: here the conjunction καὶ has an adverbial, concessive force (‘and yet’). Throughout the pericope, sentences are coordinated by δέ and καί.
[31] παρῆλθε τὸ εἶδος τοῦ Θεοῦ· αὐτὸς δέ ἐπέσκαζε τῷ μηρῷ αὐτοῦ: παρῆλθε, 2nd aor. < παρέρχομαι, ‘I pass beyond’ + acc. of place.
τῷ μηρῷ αὐτοῦ: dative of cause or instrument.
Insights into Biblical Greek Grammar and Syntax 