The idea seems “logical” because it confers an immediate, almost practical meaning on the contest, even though it does reduce it to a training exercise.

Once the idea that it was an angel had been accepted, the Midrash tried to identify him. There are so many angels, each with his own duties and specific missions that one must take care not to confuse them. Said one sage: It was Esau’s angel, the very one who in the higher spheres had been assigned to him—his good spirit, his inspiration and protector. Said another: Quite the contrary, it was Jacob’s own angel.

I prefer this last hypothesis: Jacob attacked by his own guardian angel. The mysterious aggressor? The other half of Jacob’s split self. The side of him that harbored doubts about his mission, his future, his raison d’être; the voice in him that said: I deserve nothing, I am less than nothing, I am unworthy of celestial blessing, unworthy of my ancestors as much as of my descendants, unworthy to transmit God’s message to man.

Here the episode’s dimensions shift: we witness a confrontation between Jacob and Jacob. Says the Midrash: God created the world so that day would be day and night would be night; then came Jacob and he changed day into night. Explanation: At Peniel, for the first time, Jacob behaved in the same way at night and during the day. That night the two Jacobs came together. The heroic dreamer and the inveterate fugitive, the unassuming man and the founder of a nation clashed at Peniel in a fierce and decisive battle. To kill or be killed. It was a turning point for Jacob. He had a choice: to die before dying, or to take hold of himself and fight. And win.

And win he did. Angel, other self or man, one thing is sure: the adversary was defeated. Now Jacob was ready to face his enemy brother. Or rather: he should have been. According to the Midrash, he was not. He continued to be afraid; worse, his fear now was twofold, one revealing text tells us. Jacob was afraid both of being killed and . . . of killing. He knew that one does not kill with impunity; whosoever kills man, kills God in man. And so he first had to convince himself that it would be possible to obtain a pure victory—pure of death, pure of guilt—a victory that would not imply the opponent’s defeat or humiliation. A victory over himself. Such, then, is the prime meaning of this episode: Israel’s history teaches us that man’s true victory is the one he achieves over himself.

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And yet it would be equally acceptable to give a more literal interpretation to the text and suggest that at Peniel, Jacob was forced into battle not with a human being or an angel, or even a self-image, but with Him who encompasses us all. Though almost unanimously rejected by Talmudic tradition, this hypothesis deserves close scrutiny. After all, Jacob himself lent it veracity: he himself never spoke of man or angel, or self-reflection. He spoke of God.