Yakev was holding the angel and wouldn’t let him go. Also, when the angel pleaded: “Send me away because dawn is breaking,” Yakev answered him: “Are you a thief of money or souls that you fear the light of the morning star?” The angel replied: “I am an angel, and since the day of my creation, my time has not yet come to extoll Hashem until this very day, because every day Hashem calls another group of angels to extoll him. And this time, it is my turn, therefore I beg you, give me permission to ascend to heaven.” Yakev said, “I will not send you away! Today the angels will have to extoll without you.” The angel replied: “If I don’t extoll today, tomorrow my fellows will say ‘as you did not extoll yesterday, neither will you extoll today’.” But Yakev persisted, saying: “I will not send you off until you bless me, as angels also appeared to my grandfather, Abraham, and they did not depart from him until they blessed him.” He said to him: “The angels who came to your grandfather, Abraham, were sent to him in order to bless him, but I have have not come on that account.”
And indeed at that very moment, groups of angels descended from heaven and flew to the angel who was standing with Yakev and they said to him: “It’s time to sing, come quickly away to heaven, if you delay the time will have passed.” When the angel saw that Yakev was not going to let him up, he started to sing to Gd. The angels from heaven heard the singing from the earth and they also joined in. Yakev heard the voices of the singing and his spirit was awakened and he was gladdened.
The Oybershter (Gd) said to the angel: “Have you done good, turning my priest (Yakev) into a cripple?” The angel said to him: “Master of the Universe, I am yet your priest.” He said to him: ”You are my priest in heaven and he is my priest on the earth.” The angel immediately called the angel Refoyl [Raphael, the angel of healing] and said to him: “My friend, I beg you, help me to heal Yakev, you are yet the appointed healer.” Refoyl came down and healed Yakev from his deformity.
And thus the sun shone for him healed his deformity, yet his children were chagrinned and said: “We are guilty, because we left the elder alone at night and that brought about what happened to him.” Therefore they made a vow that Children of Israel would never eat the gid hanasheh (a vein in the body that must be taken out and not eaten). ["sinew of the thigh," sciatic nerve]
But the angel was stilling standing by Yakev asking him to let him depart and Yakev said: “I will not send you off before you have blessed me. My father blessed me with the blessings he meant for my brother, Esav, and I don’t know if you agree or oppose this.” The angel answered: “I approve and I agree to the blessings, that they belong to you and are yours, not with cunning and falsehood have you taken them, and all of heaven and earth acknowledge you thus.” And the angel blessed him saying: “May your Gd grant that all your children be tsadiks (righteous people) and as good to Gd as you.”
The angel said to Yakev: “Hashem Yisboroch will appear to you in the future at Beis-El and change your name and I will be there. And from then on, your name will not be Yakev but Yisroel. Blessed are you that although you were born of a woman you will nevertheless enter a palace on high, and you will be saved. You have wrestled with an angel, with Esav and with Laban and you have defeated them.”
The end.
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Digital Maggid
