He Contended with God
1 Ephraim feeds on wind, and chases the east wind. He continually multiplies lies and desolation. They make a covenant with Assyria, and oil is carried into Egypt. 2 Yahweh also has a controversy with Judah, and will punish Jacob according to his ways; according to his deeds he will repay him. 3 In the womb he took his brother by the heel, and in his manhood he contended with God. 4 Indeed, he struggled with the angel, and prevailed; he wept, and made supplication to him. He found him at Bethel, and there he spoke with us— 5 even Yahweh, the God of Armies. Yahweh is his name of renown! 6 Therefore turn to your God. Keep kindness and justice, and wait continually for your God.
The nation's ancestor is used as both accusation and hope, and the summons that follows asks for the two things the book has asked for throughout.
Verse 1 gives the foreign policy as diet: Ephraim feeds on wind, and chases the east wind — the wind sown in chapter 8 now eaten Hosea 8:7 — while they make a covenant with Assyria, and oil is carried into Egypt. Both empires courted at once, paid in produce.
Then verse 2 turns to Jacob, and the name is doing double duty: the nation, and the man.
What verse 3 recalls is not flattering. In the womb he took his brother by the heel — the grasping that gave him his name — and in his manhood he contended with God. The ancestor is introduced by his two most characteristic acts, and the first is a swindle.
Verse 4 keeps the ambiguity that the Genesis account keeps. He struggled with the angel, and prevailed — and then, immediately, he wept, and made supplication to him. Prevailing and weeping in one line. Whatever winning meant at the Jabbok, it looked like a man begging.
And the location is named: he found him at Bethel, and there he spoke with us. Bethel — which this book has spent four chapters calling Beth Aven, house of iniquity Hosea 4:15 Hosea 10:5. The place where the ancestor met God is the shrine the descendants ruined, and the book puts both facts in one verse.
Verse 5 names him in full: Yahweh, the God of Armies. Yahweh is his name of renown.
And verse 6 is the summons the whole book has been making: turn to your God. Keep kindness and justice, and wait continually for your God. Kindness is chesed — the sixth and final occurrence, and the last time the book asks for it.
settled What this mark means