Hosea 12:4

Yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed: he wept, and made supplication unto him. As Jacob's position at birth symbolized the pre-eminence which God's electing love had in store for him, and as in his manhood's prime he put forth such earnestness and energy to obtain the blessing, so Israel, by the example of their forefather, are encouraged to like strenuous exertion with like certainty of success. The example is more fully described and dwelt on in this verse for the purpose of more powerfully stimulating the Israelites of the prophet's day to imitate it. From this verse we learn the following facts:

This verse "is," according to Aben Ezra, "an explanation how he put forth prowess with God." Kimchi regards it as "the repetition of the same thought for the put. pose of intensifying, for it was a great wonder for a man to wrestle with an angel." כָבָה

The fruit of Jacob's victory was that

(a) the third person, Ewald reads it

(b) as the first plural, and consequently so renders the word that the clause implies, not a narrative of the past, but a prophecy of the future; thus:

(a) with us —Hosea and the other prophets, to reprove the idolatry rampant in Bethel;

(b) rather with the prophet and the people descended from the patriarch. On the words, "there he spake with us," Kimchi comments as follows: "These are the words of the prophet. He says, ' There in Bethel he (Jehovah) speaks with me and with Amos to reprove Israel for the worship of the calf in Bethel,' as Amos ( Amos 5:4 ) says, 'Seek ye me, and ye shall live: but seek not Bethel.' But my lord my father, of blessed memory, explained 'And there he will speak with us' as the words of the angel. He (the angel) says to him (Jacob), 'The blessed God will find us in Bethel, and there he will speak

(c) with us, with me and with thee, in order to confirm to thee my blessing, and to call thy name Israel, saying, For as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.'" But others, as Saadia Gaon, explain the word, not in the sense of "with us," but

(d) "on account of us," or "about us."