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As I said a little ago, Jacob was also called Israel, the name
which was most prevalent among the people descended from him. Now this
name was given him by the angel who wrestled with him on the way back
from Mesopotamia, and who was most evidently a type of Christ. For
when Jacob overcame him, doubtless with his own consent, that the
mystery might be represented, it signified Christ's passion, in
which the Jews are seen overcoming Him. And yet he besought a
blessing from the very angel he had overcome; and so the imposition of
this name was the blessing. For Israel means seeing God, which will
at last be the reward of alI the saints. The angel also touched him
on the breadth of the thigh when he was overcoming him, and in that way
made him lame. So that Jacob was at one and the same time blessed and
lame: blessed in those among that people who believed in Christ, and
lame in the unbelieving. For the breadth of the thigh is the multitude
of the family. For there are many of that race of whom it was
prophetically said beforehand, "And they have halted in their
paths."
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