Genesis 32:2 - Exposition

And when Jacob saw them, he said, This is God's host :— Mahaneh Elohim ; i . e . the army (cf. Genesis 1:9 ; Exodus 14:24 ) or camp ( 1 Samuel 14:15 ; Psalms 27:3 ) of God, as opposed to the Mahanoth, or bands of Jacob himself ( vide Genesis 32:7 , Genesis 32:10 )— and he called the name of that place Manahan. — i . e . Two armies or camps, from the root חָנַה decline or bend, and hence to fix oneself down or encamp; meaning either a multitudinous host, reading the dual for a plural (Malvenda), or two bands of angels, one before, welcoming him to Canaan, and another behind, conducting him from Mesopotamia (Jarchi and others), or one on either side to typify the completeness of his protection, as in Psalms 34:8 (Calvin, Bush, Gerlach, 'Speaker's Commentary'), or, as the best expositors interpret, his own company and the heavenly host (Abort Ezra, Clericus, Dathe, Keil, Lange, Rosenmüller, Kalisch, Murphy). Mahanaim, afterwards a distinguished city in the territory of Gad ( Joshua 13:26 ), and frequently referred to in subsequent Scripture ( 2 Samuel 2:8 ; 2 Samuel 17:24 ; 27; 2 Samuel 19:32 ; 1 Kings 4:14 ), as well as mentioned by Josephus ('Ant.' 7. 9, 8), as a strong and beautiful city, has been identified with Mahneh, a deserted ruin six or seven miles north-west by north of Ajlun (Mount Gilead), and about twenty miles from the Jabbok; but the narrative appears to say that Mahanaim lay not north of Ga-leed, but between that place and Jabbok. Hence Porter suggests Gerasa, the most splendid ruin east of the Jordan, and bordering on the Jabbok, as occupying the site of Mahanaim.