This week’s lectionary, from both Genesis 32:22-31 and Romans 9:1-5, will tempt us to read it in a Zionist way, as in Genesis we see Jacob being renamed ‘Israel’ and in Romans Paul mentions God’s election of ‘Israel.’ As Christians interpreting these texts in the 21st century, we need much caution and care in engaging with them, for the Spirit of God invites us to disassociate Biblical Israel from today’s political Israel, for they are not one and the same. The Spirit invites us to engage in a de-Zionising reading: one that neither erases God’s enduring covenant with the Jewish people nor employs Scripture to justify nationalism, occupation, dispossession or violence against Palestinians. These lectionary texts test our Christian discipleship, calling us to resist every attempt to confine God to one political state, geography, ethnicity or people. The God of the Bible cannot be possessed by any nation; God’s justice, mercy and blessing overflow every human boundary.
In Genesis 32:22–31, Jacob is returning to meet his brother Esau, whom he has deceived and from whom he has taken the blessing. After sending his household and possessions across the River Jabbok, Jacob remains alone on the other side. There, in the darkness, an unknown stranger wrestles with him until daybreak. Unable to overcome Jacob, the stranger strikes his hip socket, leaving him with a lifelong limp. Following this mysterious encounter, Jacob names the place Peniel, “the face of God,” saying, “I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved.”
A Zionist reading may emphasise Jacob being renamed “Israel” because he has “striven with God and with humans” and prevailed. It may then wrongly correlate biblical Israel with the modern State of Israel, portraying its continuing conflict with neighbouring peoples as divinely sanctioned striving and prevailing. Such an interpretation must be contested, particularly when it is used to legitimise nationalism, occupation, dispossession or violence. A de-zionised reading, by contrast, recognises that Jacob does not leave Peniel triumphant and untouched. He leaves wounded, limping and dependent upon the blessing of an unknown stranger. Peniel is therefore not a theology of conquest but an encounter of vulnerability and transformation. Jacob discovers the face of God in the stranger who confronts him, wounds his self-sufficiency and blesses him with a new identity. Such a reading contests both Zionism and xenophobia today by inviting us to recognise the face of the divine in those whom we do not know, fear or regard as “other.”
Allow me to share four signposts from this text, which are relevant to our context today.
1. Peniel comes alive in the unknown stranger:
The text does not initially name Jacob’s opponent as God, an angel or even an enemy. It simply says, “a man wrestled with him until daybreak.” The divine approaches Jacob in disguise without a recognised name, familiar face or authorised religious identity. A colonial imagination often divides the world into the familiar and the foreign, the civilised and the uncivilised, those who belong and those who do not. It then teaches us to fear, control or exclude the unknown stranger. But the beauty of this Biblical text as we notice it at Peniel is that the stranger becomes the bearer of divine presence. Jacob does not first recognise God in a sanctuary, priest or sacred institution. He encounters God in an unfamiliar body beside the river, under the cover of darkness. A decolonial reading therefore asks: What if the stranger whom society fears is carrying an encounter with God? The refugee, migrant, Palestinian, racialised neighbour or person of another faith must not be reduced to a threat. Peniel invites the Church to move beyond xenophobia and recognise that the unknown stranger may reveal the face of God to us. God has been revealing God-self to us in many unknown and unexpected ways; it is we who are missing it day in and day out because of our preconceived and prejudiced notions of the divine.
2. Peniel comes alive in the one wrestling with us:
The stranger does not offer Jacob comfort without confrontation and solace without struggle. He wrestles with him. This bodily struggle forces Jacob to face the tensions he has been avoiding: his deception of Esau, his fear of returning home and the consequences of the blessing he acquired through manipulation. A colonial theology often imagines God as supporting the powerful, guaranteeing victory and silencing resistance. But the God encountered at Peniel does not simply confirm Jacob’s power. God appears in the one who resists him, who wrestles with him. The strength of this text, as I read it, is not that the divine who appears as a stranger overpowers Jacob and wins over him; rather the stranger divine or the divine stranger did not prevail against Jacob; the divine chose not to be a winner in this wrestling. At Peniel, divine power is not demonstrated by defeating or eliminating the other. God enters the struggle, remains in relationship and refuses to turn the encounter into domination. The divine does not win over Jacob but works within the wrestling to transform him.
This offers a powerful de-zionised reading. Jacob’s new name, “Israel,” cannot be used to support a theology of perpetual military victory or political supremacy. His identity arises from a struggle in which even the divine refuses the position of conqueror. Israel is born not through the defeat of the stranger, but through wrestling with the stranger and receiving a blessing from them. Peniel therefore reveals a God who relinquishes domination, a divine stranger who does not need to win to be God. This is divine power expressed through vulnerability, mutuality and transformative relationship.
The person wrestling with us may be exposing the injustice we have normalised. Therefore, Christian discipleship requires us not merely to welcome agreeable strangers but to listen to those who challenge our power, unsettle our theology and demand justice.
3. Peniel comes alive in (un)knowing the stranger as divine:
Jacob begins the night wrestling with an unnamed stranger, but he ends it declaring, “I have seen God face to face.” His perception changes through the encounter. The one whom he might initially have regarded as an enemy becomes, in retrospect, the face of God. This recognition does not mean that Jacob possesses or fully understands the stranger. When Jacob asks, “Please tell me your name,” the stranger refuses to be named.
The silence of the divine stranger is one of the most powerful features of this wrestling. When Jacob asks, “Please tell me your name,” the stranger responds, “Why is it that you ask my name?” The divine offers no name and refuses to be defined, possessed or controlled by Jacob.
Jacob, as the heir of Abraham and Isaac’s blessing, may have assumed that he already knew God. He possessed the family story, the covenantal memory and the inherited blessing. Perhaps he thought that the blessing gave him privileged access to the divine. Yet, at Jabbok, God comes to him in an unfamiliar form, as an unknown stranger whom Jacob neither recognises nor controls.
The God who later reveals to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM,” remains unnamed here. Even that revelation to Moses does not provide a name that human beings can master; it affirms God’s freedom to be who God will be. At Jabbok, the refusal to give a name teaches Jacob that the divine exceeds every inherited description, religious tradition and claim of election. There is also an important reversal. Jacob asks for the stranger’s name, but the stranger asks Jacob, “What is your name?” Jacob cannot name the divine, but he must name himself. He must confess, “Jacob”, a name carrying his history as the heel-grasper, deceiver and taker of his brother’s blessing. The divine remains mysterious while Jacob is brought into truth.
From a decolonial perspective, naming can be an act of power. Colonisers renamed peoples, places and lands to classify, possess and control them. The divine stranger resists this colonial act of naming. God will not become Jacob’s possession, nor will divine mystery be confined within Jacob’s inherited theology. This is also significant for a de-zionised interpretation. Election and blessing do not amount to complete knowledge, exclusive possession or political ownership of God. No people, nation, Church or state can say, “We know God fully; God belongs to us; therefore, God sanctions everything we do.” The unnamed God remains free to appear in the stranger, beyond the boundaries of inherited privilege.
4. Peniel comes alive through the stranger’s blessing:
Jacob enters the story as someone who has stolen a blessing from Esau. At Peniel, however, he cannot seize the blessing through deception. He must ask for it: “I will not let you go, unless you bless me.” This is an important transformation. The man who once acquired blessing by manipulation now receives it through vulnerability and dependence upon another. The unknown stranger, whom Jacob might have treated as an adversary, becomes the one capable of blessing him.
Colonial systems imagine blessing as wealth, territory, dominance and victory over others. They turn divine election into entitlement and use blessing to justify possession. A de-zionised reading rejects any theology that interprets another people’s dispossession as evidence of God’s blessing. At Peniel, blessing is not possession of land or victory over an enemy. It is the grace to become different. Jacob receives a new identity, but that identity is accompanied by a wound. True blessing does not authorise domination; it dismantles self-sufficiency and redirects us towards reconciliation. The stranger’s blessing prepares Jacob to meet Esau, not as a triumphant conqueror, but as a limping brother seeking peace.
Conclusion:
Jacob’s transformation is tested immediately afterwards when he meets Esau. Remarkably, Jacob says to his brother, “Truly, to see your face is like seeing the face of God” (Genesis 33:10). The face of God discovered in the unknown stranger at Peniel is recognised again in the face of the brother he has wronged. Therefore, de-zionising Peniel means releasing this story from interpretations that sanctify conquest, territorial entitlement or political domination. Jacob does not cross the Jabbok waving the flag of victory. He crosses it limping.
Peniel teaches us that:
God’s face appears in the unknown stranger.
God confronts us through those who resist injustice.
God refuses to be possessed or confined by our identities.
Blessing is transformation, not domination.
Reconciliation begins with truth-telling.
Jacob sees God’s face beside the river, but he must learn to recognise that same face in Esau. Likewise, our encounters with God cannot be separated from how we receive the stranger, respond to the wounded and seek reconciliation with those who have been wronged. The face of God comes alive not through conquering the other, but through wrestling truthfully, receiving one another’s blessing and crossing together towards justice. In the present context of Israel–Palestine, a de-zionised reading of Peniel contests the use of Jacob’s renaming as “Israel” to justify military supremacy, occupation or territorial entitlement. Peniel therefore calls us to recognise God’s face in the dispossessed Palestinian, without denying the dignity and security of Jewish people, and reminds us that divine election is a responsibility to practise justice, not a licence to dispossess others. True blessing comes not through defeating the stranger but through truth-telling, transformation and a just reconciliation in which both Palestinians and Israelis can live with freedom, dignity and peace.
Therefore, in the current climate of xenophobia, we the Church are called to:
challenge language that portrays migrants and refugees as threats;
create sanctuaries of welcome and belonging;
listen to strangers rather than speaking about them;
receive their leadership, gifts and blessings;
confront racism within the Church and society;
advocate for humane immigration and asylum policies; and
recognise the image and presence of God across every border.
Peniel proclaims that the stranger is not a problem to be solved, a threat to be defeated or an outsider to be controlled. The stranger can become the place where God’s face comes alive. We overcome xenophobia not by winning over strangers but by encountering them, wrestling honestly with our fears and allowing ourselves to be blessed and transformed by them. May the God of Peniel help us to overcome our fears and transform us as sanctuaries of grace and love to all. Amen.
@rajpatta,
30.07.2026
Pic courtesy: Grace Bomer https://gracebomer.wordpress.com/2013/01/15/jacob-wrestles-with-god/
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