And Rachel said, With great wrestlings have I wrestled with my sister, and I have prevailed: and she called his name Naphtali.
8. mighty wrestlings ] Heb. wrestlings of God. The “wrestlings of God” may mean either “mighty wrestlings,” “of God” being added as an intensive or superlative (cf. Gen 23:6, “a mighty prince”); or “wrestlings,” i.e. “strugglings in prayer for God’s blessing” of children. The original meaning has probably been lost.
wrestled ] Lit. “twisted myself.” The participle niphtl means “crooked” (Pro 8:8).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Gen 30:8
With great wrestlings have I wrestled
Great wrestlings
Thus speaks Rachel; and this womans experience, multiplied as it is a thousand-fold in hearts that never told their struggles, shows us that life is not so calm as it seems.
Beneath many a placid stream there are deep and dangerous under-currents. Often a quiet face hides the deep things, which even the dearest intimacies cannot draw out, and which constitute the tragedies of the hearts history. It is well that we learn the need of wrestling; for life, especially Christian life, has flesh and blood to battle with. Paul says, we wrestle; and goodness, even at its best, is dearly bought and hardly won.
I. THIS IS TRUE OF THOSE WHO ARE OUTWARDLY THE WEAKEST. Nothing betokens the warrior; there is no mailed breast, no gauntleted hand. The character seems like the face perhaps, to be common-place and dull. But what a world there is within the humblest forms that move to and fro amongst us! That plain face that we mark no loveliness in, is beautiful perhaps in the eyes of angels–that unillustrious life is associated with paths where some Goliath has been laid low, and where the Philistine host has been dispersed.
II. THIS IS TO BE THE LOT OF OUR CHILDREN. Listen, and you may hear a sigh as of a distant storm, in the spring breeze of childhoods morning, which may break into a weird tempest over their heads before the evening comes. These children of ours cannot do without religion, without Christ–the Brother and the Saviour of men. Do these little ones look made forthe endurance of hard wrestlings? Perhaps not. But these little hands will be stretched out in the dark night; these little feet will have to climb in loneliness the toilsome way, when you and I are gone. Who can wonder that we wish to see them before we die in the covert of the great rock?
III. THIS IS THE ONLY PATH TO VICTORY. God sees that it is best. The oak that struggles with the tempest strikes deeper root in the soil; and the faith that has struggled with doubt is the firmest of beliefs. The love which has learnt human insincerity, learns to prize beyond all price the less demonstrative love of true natures. We gain conquest through hardship, defeat, and peril. We wrestle with great wrestlings over inborn tastes and desires, over habits that have steadily risen to dominance, over affections that are carnal and corrupt, and over enemies visible and invisible. For ease is death. When we cease to wrestle, the enemy binds us with fetters of iron. Conquer we may and can–through the faith that looks upward all through the wrestling years. To him that overcometh the glorious promise of victory is vouchsafed. But the struggle will be severe; we shall have not only ordinary sorrows, superficial anxieties, but great wrestlings; and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. These wrestlings are not mere matters of mental energy; they are connected with moral pain. Dispositions natural to us have to be overcome; human nature, like a child, likes to be spoiled and petted–it can ill-endure rebuke and resistance I Consequently the battle is hard, and there is no plaudit of honour, no noise of conquest, no palm-wreath on the brow.
IV. THIS IS THE ANCIENT WAY. It leads us back to Moses, to Abraham, and to Jacob who was left alone–and there wrestled a man with him till the break of day (Gen 32:24). And that we have a Divine nature is proven by mans spiritual wrestlings from the earliest dawn of history. And the rendering of this text, as you will see in the margin of your Bibles, leads us to think of God. With great God-wrestlings have I wrestled. And this ancient way will be our way too. (W. M. Statham, M. A.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 8. She called his name Naphtali] naphtali, my wrestling, according to the common mode of interpretation; but it is more likely that the root pathal signifies to twist or entwine. Hence Mr. Parkhurst translates the verse, “By the twistings-agency or operation, of God, I am entwisted with my sister; that is, my family is now entwined or interwoven with my sister’s family, and has a chance of producing the promised Seed.” The Septuagint, Aquila, and the Vulgate, have nearly the same meaning. It is, however, difficult to fix the true meaning of the original.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
With great wrestlings, Heb. With wrestlings of God; either with great and hard wrestlings or strivings, or by wrestling with God in fervent prayer, and by Gods grace and strength. Cir. 1747
I have prevailed; which was not true; for her sister exceeded her both in the number of her children, and in her propriety in them, being the fruit of her own womb, not of her handmaids, as Rachels were. Here is an instance how partial judges most persons are in their own causes and concernments.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
And Rachel said, with great wrestlings have I wrestled with my sister,…. Or, “with the wrestlings of God” a, wrestling and striving in prayer with God; being vehement and importunate in her petitions to him, that she might have children as well as her sister: some render it, “I used the craftinesses of God”, or “great craftiness with my sisters” b; by giving her maid Bilhah to her husband, and having children by her:
and I have prevailed; as she strove in her desires and prayers to have another child before her sister had; in that she prevailed, or she was succeeded in her desires, she had children as she wished to have:
and she called his name Naphtali; which signifies “my wrestling”, being a child she had been striving and wrestling for: these two sons of Bilhah were born, as say the Jews, Dan on the twenty ninth day of Elul or August, and lived one hundred and twenty seven years; Naphtali on the fifth of Tisri or September, and lived one hundred and thirty three years.
a “luctationibus Dei”, Montanus, Vatablus, Drusius, Cartwright. b “Calliditatibus Dei, Oleaster, astutiis Dei”, Schmidt.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
8. With great wrestlings (74) Others translate it, “I am joined with the joinings of God;” (75) as if she exulted in having recovered what she had lost; or, certainly, in having obtained an equal degree of honor with her sister. Others render it, I am doubled with the duplications of God. But both derive the noun and the verb from the root פתל ( patal,) which signifies a twisted thread. The former of these senses comes to this; that since Rachel has attained a condition equal to that of her sister, there is no reason why her sister should claim any superiority over her. But the latter sense expresses more confident boasting, since she proclaims herself a conqueror, and doubly superior. But a more simple meaning is (in my opinion) adduced by others, namely, that she “wrestled with divine or excellent wrestlings.” For the Hebrews indicate all excellence by adding the name of God; because the more excellent anything is, the more does the glory of God shine in it. But perverse is that boasting with which she glories over her sister, when she ought rather suppliantly to have implored forgiveness. In Rachel the pride of the human mind is depicted; because they whom God has endowed with his benefits, for the most part are so elated, that they rage contumeliously against their neighbors. Besides, she foolishly prefers herself to her sister in fruitfulness, in which she is still manifestly inferior. But they who are puffed up with pride have also the habit of malignantly depreciating those gifts which the Lord has bestowed on others, in comparison with their own smaller gifts. Perhaps, also, she expected a numerous progeny, as if God were under obligation to her. She did not, as pious persons are wont to do, conceive hope from benefits received; but, by a confident presumption of the flesh, made herself sure of everything she wished. Hitherto, then, she gave no sign of pious modesty. Whence is this, but because her temporary barrenness had not yet thoroughly subdued her? Therefore we ought the more to beware, lest if God relaxes our punishments, we, being inflated by his kindness, should perish.
(74) Luctationibus divinis. Margin of English Bible, “with wrestlings of God.”
(75) Conjunctionibus Dei conjuncta sum.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(8) With great wrestlings.Heb., wrestlings of God, but the Authorised Version undoubtedly gives the right sense. (See Note on Gen. 23:6.) By wrestling, some commentators understand prayer, but the connection of the two ideas of wrestling and prayer is taken from Gen. 32:24, where an entirely different verb is used. Rachels was a discreditable victory, won by making use of a bad custom, and it consisted in weaning her husband still more completely from the unloved Leah. Now that Bilhah and children were added to the attractiveness of her tent, her sister, she boasts, will be thought of no more.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
8. Naphtali Which means, my wrestling, in allusion to the struggle of rivalry between herself and Leah . Her words are, literally: wrestlings of God have I wrestled with my sister; also I have prevailed . The words, perhaps, have some allusion to Jacob’s reproof, Gen 30:2, “Am I in God’s stead?” She assumes to have struggled as with God for this victory, and glories in a seeming victory over her sister . But what a vain boasting!
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Gen 30:8. With great wrestlings That is, according to the Hebrew, with wrestlings of God; either with great and hard wrestlings or strivings, or by wrestling with God in fervent prayer; and by God’s grace and strength.
Naphtali Rachel, like Leah, denominated her children from the occasion: Dan, i.e.. Judging, was so called, because God had judged her cause: and Naphtali, i.e.. My wrestling, is so named, because she had wrestled or strove, and prevailed. Others think, that the word (patal) whence comes Naphtali, signifying to contrive or counterplot, the beginning of the verse should be rendered, by an excellent artifice or contrivance, &c. But Mr. Parkhurst, who enters deeper into the word patal, (the original sense of which, according to him, is to wreath, entwist, intwine,) renders it, By the agency of God I am intwined with my sister, i.e.. My family is now interwoven with my sister’s, and has a chance of producing the promised Seed. To this purpose the LXX render it, God hath taken me into partnership, (viz. with Leah,) and I am intwined ( ) with my sister: and Aquila still plainer, God hath intwined me, and I am intwined, , . The Vulgate also preserves nearly the true sense, though not the idea of the word; comparavit me Deus cum forore mea, God hath made me equal with my sister.
REFLECTIONS.From connections like Jacob’s, little domestic happiness could be expected. Accordingly we find, 1. Rachel’s envy at her sister, and her perverse demand from her husband: she speaks as one at the point of death, Note; (1.) Envious discontent and disappointed pride have the most fatal effects. A broken heart is not a death so uncommon, perhaps, as it is thought to be. (2.) Inordinate desire after creature-comforts, makes almost all our miseries.
2. Jacob’s reproof. It was impiety to quarrel with God’s dispensations. He therefore corrected warmly, as he loved. Note; (1.) Our love to the person must not suffer us to connive at sin. (2.) In all our trials God must be applied to. (3.) It is folly as well as sin to expect that happiness from the creature, which only God can bestow.
3. The wrong expedient Rachel took to relieve herself. Though none surely could be so near as her sister’s children, she thought she could not nurse them and rule them as she could those of her servant, and therefore Jacob must take her maid to wife; and when she bore two sons, they have names of contention, Dan and Naphtali, given them, as if she had now prevailed. Note; It is wickedness in parents to transmit their quarrels in their children.
4. The same expedient used by Leah. Jacob consented perhaps at Rachel’s importunity, and now he cannot refuse Leah pleading the precedent. Note; When men are once overcome by temptation, they in general the more easily yield to it a second time.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Great wrestlings. Hebrews wrestlings of God. Naphtali signifies my wrestlings.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Gen 30:8 And Rachel said, With great wrestlings have I wrestled with my sister, and I have prevailed: and she called his name Naphtali.
Ver. 8. With great wrestlings. ] Heb., With wrestlings of God; that is, with excellent and most earnest wrestlings and endeavours; by storms of sighs, and showers of tears. a Stupidity is the low extreme, like the dull earth. Despair is as much too high, as it were in the element of fire, which scorches up the spirit. The middle region of air and water, sighs and tears, is the best.
a Magno desiderio, precibus, suspiriis luctata est adversus sororem . – Pareus, in loc .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
great wrestlings have I wrestled. Hebrew with wrestlings of El (= GOD) i.e. mighty wrestlings. Figure of speech Polyptoton, and Paronomasia. App-6.
Naphtali. Hebrew my wrestling.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
great wrestlings: Heb. wrestlings of God, Gen 23:6, Gen 32:24, Exo 9:28, 1Sa 14:15, *marg.
and she: Gen 35:25, Gen 46:24, Gen 49:21, Deu 33:23
Naphtali: that is, My wrestling, Gen 32:24, Gen 32:25, Mat 4:13, Nephthalim
Reciprocal: Gen 29:33 – Because Num 1:42 – Naphtali 1Ch 2:2 – Naphtali Isa 7:14 – shall call Eze 48:3 – Naphtali Jon 3:3 – So Col 2:1 – what
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
30:8 And Rachel said, With great wrestlings have I wrestled with my sister, {c} and I have prevailed: and she called his name Naphtali.
(c) The arrogancy of man’s nature appears in that she condemns her sister, after she has received this benefit from God to bear children.