The Reunion of Jacob and Esau: At last Jacob meets Esau face to face. The character of their meeting catches the audience off guard.

33:1–3 Finally Jacob saw his brother Esau coming with his four hundred men. Wounded from the wrestling bout, he was powerless before Esau’s entourage. To welcome Esau, Jacob had arranged his family, placing the mothers with their children and then ordering them according to their standing: first the maidservants and their children, next Leah and her children, and last Rachel and Joseph. This arrangement was not for self-protection as previously Jacob had done (32:7–8), but for receiving Esau as a prince. Emboldened by his victory with God, Jacob moved past his family to greet Esau, bowing down to the ground seven times. Ordinarily bowing once was sufficient, b…