And God said to him, Thy name is Jacob thy name shall not henceforth be called Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name. And he called his name Israel.
At Bethel God appears to Jacob a second time and names him Israel. But Jacob already had that name from Peniel, years earlier — so why give it again here, as if for the first time?
The two names carry two histories. One came to Jacob at birth; God gives the other. Notice how God speaks here:
His name is not to be called Jacob any more, the supplanter, but Israel, the wrestler or prince of God. The manner is striking. For God speaks of it as if it were given then, and not merely confirmed. That suited a man who had come back to the land, and was not a fugitive from his father's house.
Some read Genesis 32 and Genesis 35 as two versions of one story. The two scenes differ in character:
God confirms the name of Israel to Jacob; but there is no double account of its origin. On the first occasion God had a controversy with Jacob. Yet He blesses him, strengthens him to prevail in the conflict, and gives him the name of Israel — "a prince who prevailed with God." Still He chastises him, and does not reveal Himself to him (Genesis 32:28). After this Jacob goes up to the place of his real meeting with God in blessing. He puts away idols out of his house, knowing he is going to meet Him. Then God begins by freely revealing His name, and confirms to Jacob the title He had given him before.
Between Peniel and Bethel, people still called him Jacob. Where God met him mattered:
Here at Bethel God appears to Jacob again to bless him. He confirms that His servant's name was Jacob — which was not to be forgotten — and yet he was to be called Israel. This name was to have its full significance in God's place for him. It speaks of the dignity to which God had raised him by grace, "a prince with God." God had changed his name before (Genesis 32:28), yet people still spoke of him only as Jacob until he came to Bethel. In fact, even after this he is sometimes called Israel, but more often Jacob.
At Peniel God asked Jacob his name, and Jacob held on for the blessing. Here God asks for nothing, and Jacob drags nothing out of Him:
He appeared to Jacob, and there was no wrestling. He appeared to him and blessed him. It is all coming from God — God speaking freely and fully, not asking, "What is your name?" He had called his name Israel before. That was part of the discipline and exercise, though it gave him strength. He is now taking it into His own hands and giving it of Himself. It is not Jacob wrestling for the blessing; he does not even have to ask God His name.
The verse does not stop at the announcement. The last clause carries the weight:
The same grace that refused to call him Jacob any more declares that from now on his name is Israel. He loves to roll away every reproach from off His people. So He writes this new name upon him, sealing it as His own act, for "He called his name Israel."
Speaking the name as if for the first time also passes over the years since Peniel. That is not a comfortable thought:
"He called his name Israel" — blotting out in one sense all the history from the day when that name was first given to him. It is a sorrowful reflection for the heart when time past is, so to speak, time lost.
Jacob reached Bethel only after telling his household to put away their foreign gods. One writer turns this on the reader:
There has been inconsistency. Perhaps you have been away from God, and you have had chastening to remind you of it. God must have you with Himself to bring out what is there. He will bring your own name up. You won't get Israel without being Jacob with God.
- Name one. Jacob means the supplanter — the name he carried from birth, and the name God makes him own before anything changes.
- Name two. Israel means prince of God — a dignity Jacob never earned, and here he does not even wrestle for it.
- Named twice. Peniel gave the name under chastening. Bethel gives it in open blessing. This is confirmation, not a rival account.
- Named by God. The verse ends with God Himself doing the calling, sealing the new name as His own act.
- Named where you stand. The name took hold only when Jacob reached God's place and left the idols behind. No one gets Israel without first being Jacob with God.
And God said to him, I am the Almighty God be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee; and kings shall come out of thy loins.
At Bethel, Jacob buries the household idols. God then appears to him again and tells him His name. What follows is a promise of children, nations and kings — tied not to the schemer Jacob, but to the man God has just renamed Israel.
The command to go up to Bethel exposed what Jacob had been carrying for years. One writer follows the order of events.
God says, "Arise, go up to Bethel and dwell there." The moment God says so, out comes what Jacob knew all along he had never finished with. There was a pile of idols in the house, and now he thinks about it. He knew about them all along; but there is no real putting away of idols until we come into the presence of God. Notice: once the idols were buried, the first thing God did was to tell him His name. He had not done so before, but now it is the first thing. God appeared to him and said, "I am God Almighty" — the name He had given Himself to Abraham.
God had held that name back until now. One writer explains the delay as God's own reserve:
God was faithful to Jacob, but Jacob was not yet faithful to God. God still kept up reserve, and could not yet reveal His name as He did to Abraham and Isaac, and would in due time to Jacob (Gen. 35:11). There was not the self-judgment that made the way for it.
The title is El Shaddai. Writers read its two parts in more than one way.
Writers say the word El means strength, or omnipotence. Some think Shaddai means the same. Others prefer to render it all-sufficient, or self-sufficiency. Either way, the two words together carry divine attributes. Only God has omnipotence and all-sufficiency.
Of the three fathers given this title, Jacob needed it most.
Still God reveals Himself to Jacob, truly and unasked, as He did to Abraham and Isaac, by the title that belonged to the fathers: El-Shaddai, God Almighty. No one of the fathers needed that assurance of protecting might as much as that "worm" Jacob.
The renaming in verse 10 is spoken as if it had never happened before. One writer hears God dropping the old name entirely:
Jacob has got rid of all his strange gods, and he is meeting God where God can reveal Himself, and give him the new name of "Israel." He does it now as if He had never done it before. 'I know nothing,' He says, 'of the supplanter, you are now strong with God.'
That change of name carries weight for everything promised in verse 11. The blessing is not hung on the man who bought a birthright with a bowl of stew.
Unbelief drove God back on Himself. He fixes Jacob in his place on earth as Jacob the supplanter — "Your name is Jacob." And He hangs His purposes on the new man, Israel: even Jacob's own promises, the birthright bought with a bowl of stew.
The same might that brought Jacob home stands behind what God now promises.
He had shown His sovereign might in keeping His promise to greatly bless Jacob and bring him back to the land. Now He will show that power again. He will multiply Jacob's descendants, make him into a nation and a company of nations, and decide that kings would come from him. His promise in Genesis 28:13-15 had been absolute, with no conditions attached. This promise is also unconditional, but adds the words about "a nation and a company of nations" and kings.
Who is the "company of nations"? One writer answers from Israel's own history.
Some say this refers to the great nations of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and so on. But note that Jacob was the father of the twelve tribes. Why should this promise be limited to ten of them? Kings certainly came from Jacob's body, as we see in the long line from David to Zedekiah. The children of Israel did become a nation, and the twelve tribes were like twelve nations making up the nation.
Each name God reveals sets the terms for those who receive it.
"Jehovah" is the name of relationship taken with Israel, as "Shaddai" with the patriarchs. God revealed Himself to the fathers as "El Shaddai," and they were to walk in the faith of that name. He revealed Himself as Jehovah to Moses and Israel, and they were to walk in the faith of that. He has revealed Himself to us as Father, and so we are to walk.
- Bury — The idols only came out when Jacob came into God's presence. Nothing else brings hidden things to light.
- Name — The moment Jacob buried them, God gave the name He had held back: El Shaddai, the omnipotent and all-sufficient One.
- Rename — God does not build on Jacob the supplanter. He hangs His purposes on the new man, Israel.
- Promise — A nation, a company of nations and kings hang on that new name, with no conditions. Israel's own history met it: twelve tribes, and kings from David to Zedekiah.
- Walk — Each name God gives is meant to be lived on. The fathers walked by Shaddai, Israel by Jehovah, and we by Father.
And the land that I gave Abraham and Isaac, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed after thee will I give the land.
God meets Jacob again at Bethel, the place where He first made Himself known to him years before. This time God comes unasked, and gives him the land He had already promised to Abraham and Isaac — two men who died owning none of it.
Jacob did not ask for this meeting. God takes the initiative, and speaks to him as He once spoke to Abraham:
God Himself appeared to him now, though Jacob had not asked Him to. We read in Genesis 35:9, "God appeared to Jacob again, when he came from Paddan-aram, and blessed him." He gave him the name of Israel, as if He had not given it to him before. And He reveals His own name to him, though Jacob never asked for it. He talks with him as He once did with Abraham. He renews the promises, and confirms them to him — at least those which relate to Israel. And when He had finished speaking with him, God went up from him, for He had visited him.
God had already set the terms at this same place, years before:
At Bethel, in Genesis 28, God declared what He would be for Jacob and to Jacob. He raised no question about Jacob's response or behaviour. Now God is always true to Himself and to His word. Before God gave the law through Moses, He was dealing with these patriarchs on the basis of His promises in grace, and those promises stand.
In the same breath God calls Himself "God Almighty". That name carried a guarantee long before Jacob heard it:
As the Almighty, God promised to be a God to Abraham and to his descendants after him (Gen. 17:7)... The Name of the Almighty assured Abraham that God would do all He had promised. Isaac blessed Jacob in the Name of the Almighty (Gen. 28:3). And when God changed Jacob's name to Israel, He said, "I am God Almighty… The land that I gave to Abraham and Isaac I will give to you" (Gen. 35:9–12). Jacob uses the Name of the Almighty in Genesis 43:14, 48:3 and 49:25. He knew the almighty power of the One who had blessed him despite all his failures.
The verse gives the land twice over — to Jacob, and to his descendants. Commentators place this in a line of promises that carry no strings:
In Genesis 15 the promise rests on a covenant God made with Abraham, again without condition. It is an absolute gift of the country... In Genesis 17:7-8, the promise of the earth is renewed. These are confirmed to Isaac (Gen. 26:3-4), and to Jacob (Gen. 35:10, 12). These are "the promises made to the fathers," and to Israel, "beloved for the sake of the fathers." God made them to Abraham without any condition, whether spiritual or earthly.
God speaks as if the land were already handed over, yet Abraham and Isaac died owning none of it. That gap carries a startling conclusion:
God never gave Abraham, Isaac or Jacob actual possession of the land of Israel while they were alive in their natural bodies. Yet He did promise them the land — not just to their children, but to themselves. So they must rise again to have that land promised to them. God gave them the land in promise, but they never owned it. They must therefore own it another day. And they cannot own it while they are dead, so they must live again to actually have the promised land.
Jacob receives the same promise of nations and kings that Abraham had. But this promise has a border:
He has, like Abraham in Gen. 17, the promise of nations and kings from his line; but nothing here goes beyond the bounds and glory of Israel and the land.
Jacob answers with a stone pillar — his third. The first two show what has changed:
His first had been one of confidence in the flesh (Gen. 28:18-22); his second was the pillar of broken confidence (Gen. 31:45), showing how untrustworthy the flesh is. This third is the pillar of confidence in God. This time he makes no vow. Instead he pours a drink offering and oil on the pillar, showing his genuine appreciation of God's faithfulness and grace.
- Grace first. God appears unasked and says nothing about Jacob's failures; the promises rest on God's word, not on Jacob's behaviour.
- Almighty backs it. God gives the land as "God Almighty" — the name that assured Abraham He would do all He promised.
- Given, not offered. God attaches no conditions, and the same unconditional promise runs from Abraham through Isaac to Jacob.
- Resurrection implied. Abraham and Isaac died without owning a foot of it, so they must live again to receive what God promised.
- Bounded but sure. God's promise here reaches no further than Israel and the land, and within those borders it stands.