Weekly portion — וַיִּשְׁלַח — Vayishlach — “And he sent” Genesis 32:4–36:43 ; Obadiah 1:1–21
“No longer shall your name be called Jacob, but Israel.”
There are moments in life when our name suddenly feels too tight. Not because it isn’t beautiful, but because it no longer contains us. Because we feel that we have become someone else. It is the moment when a person faces their own story and recognises: the time for change has come.
That is how Jacob stands there — alone, on the bank of the Jabbok. He has already sent his family across the river. A moment in which his life will turn.
The nocturnal struggle is not only a fight with an angel. It is a fight for identity. Jacob realises that his whole life until now has been shaped by flight — from Esau, from Laban, and above all from his own inner truth. And yet, precisely in the darkness, in the hour of fear, he discovers a strength within himself that he did not know. He fights. He holds on. He is wounded,...
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