Genesis 32:22

The ford Jabbok] i.e. 'wrestler.' Read, 'the ford of the Jabbok,' a stream which flows from the neighbourhood of Rabbath Amnion into the Jordan opposite Shechem.

24-32. The writer of this passage, it can hardly be doubted, was thinking of a physical wrestling. Like the men of his day, he had not reached the idea of the purely spiritual nature of God, and could only conceive of Him in a materialistic way. Practically, it is thus God is still thought and spoken of, as pure spirit is a condition of being which it is hardly possible for us to understand. In the narrative there is portrayed a spiritual experience through which Jacob passed at a critical moment of his life, and in which he received the final lesson that humbled and broke down his self-will, and convinced him that he could not snatch the blessing from God's hand, but must accept it as a gift of grace.