Why Jewish People Don’t Eat the Sinew of the Hip -- Genesis 32:31-32

Now the sun rose upon him just as he crossed over Penuel, and he was limping on his thigh. Therefore, to this day the sons of Israel do not eat the sinew of the hip which is on the socket of the thigh, because he touched the socket of Jacob's thigh in the sinew of the hip.

The night of Jacob’s wrestling with God was over. He had gotten up before the sun rose and started to cross over the river Jabbok at Penuel. Scripture uses both Peniel and Penuel to depict the same place with a common meaning of ‘God’s face’. So Jacob was crossing from the north of the stream to the south side to join his family and entourage. The actual location is approximately forty miles from Jerusalem.

And from that day on, Jacob walked with a limp, favoring his thigh. That would be the lasting reminder to him of his battle with God and how God spared him. I cannot speak for everybody, but I know that many Christians have had a similar experience, myself included. We may not have wrestled with God physically as Jacob did, but we certainly have done battle with Him. On all accounts, we should no longer have been in existence, certainly not in the place and situation of service and blessing we are in today. But in the process, we have been left with an everlasting experience or memory, and in some situations, perhaps even a physical scare (depending on what God had allowed us to go through during our ‘battle’). That experience, memory, or condition, will be with us all our lives. And its main purpose is that we remember God’s grace extended to us in that fight.

As he heads back to his family’s camp, he could well be wondering, “what will Rachel and Leah, and the children, and everybody else say when they see me?” Yes, what would they say? More importantly, what would he tell them? What would he dare tell them? And would they believe him? There is no record at this point of the story as to what he thought, was asked, or replied. We can only imagine.

What would you be thinking if you had a night like that; a night where you fought, either physically or in a dream that might as well have been the real thing, with God? You had fought so hard that ultimately your body was changed to the point of being recognizably different.

I can only share a little of my personal experience. Many years ago I had such a battle in the middle of the night. A force (for I do not know what else to call it) at the foot of my bed, was holding my ankles down in such a way that my entire body could not move. I was paralyzed in my bed, unable to talk although I tried desperately, unable to flitch so I could not wake my wife up. I could see our whole bedroom around me. All I could do is know or recognize that the figure behind the grip was indeed an evil demon or worse still. Unable to make a sound, I was able to silently repeat the name of Jesus, asking Him to come to my help, and then informing the demon that he was been dismissed in the name of Jesus. It worked, but the experience left me shaking for several minutes afterward.

At this point my wife awoke and seeing me physically distraught, asked what had happened. I told her everything. She did not laugh at me or trivialize the event. She suggested we pray and then try to get back to sleep, both of which we did. But its memory will last my entire life.

Based solely on my experience, my guess is that Jacob, when asked ‘what happened to you’ by Rachel and possibly Leah (as all good wives would notice the difference in his walk and thus enquire of him as to what had happened), would indeed tell them the truth. What he said to the children and others beyond that I cannot begin to surmise. Nor do I know how anyone reacted, although again by my personal experience, I believe those close to Jacob would have taken him at this word.

What we do know for sure, however, is that the story somehow got out. It was eventually written down, and it was passed on from generation to generation, right to this day. But there’s more.

The verse says that “to this day” the sons of Israel do not eat the sinew of the hip that is on the socket of the thigh. Orthodox Jews today still do not eat that part of the animal. They are particularly concerned about the “sinew that shrank” and according to Bible commentator Robert Jamieson, “The sinew is carefully extracted; and where there are no persons skilled enough for that operation, they do not make use of the hind legs at all.”
I dug into this a little deeper from the Judaic point of view and came up with the following: In the Jewish scripture this verse is translated “therefore the members of Israel do not eat the sinew of the thigh-vein” (Breshit 32:33). Jewish tradition recognizes that this is in the story of Jacob but it considers it to be part and parcel of the Judaic laws that were handed down later on by Moses at Mount Sinai. This is one of their many mitzvahs (a Jewish religious duty or obligation). This particular duty or obligation belongs to the mitzvoth of kashrut, a set of duties that may or may not make a lot of sense but are required in order to help the Jewish believer tame his/her ego, or to help them set boundaries or limits in life. Each one has a particular message.
Striving to rebuild the Jewish people after the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple, this mitzvah is used to deliver a message of hope and faith against the powers that may oppose it. In centuries gone by, it was the Roman Empire that was considered to have descended from Esau. The Jewish people believe that the ‘man’ that fought Jacob that night was Esau’s guardian angel and by Jacob’s very survival, he defeated Esau’s guardian indicating that Israel would not perish, but outlast and overcome not only Rome, but also all its future enemies.
The only possible link in scripture to this kind of thinking is found in the last phrase of our text here and that is, “because he touched the socket of Jacob’s thigh in the sinew of the hip.” If indeed, the ‘man’ Jacob wrestled with was Esau’s guardian angel, we can see that the sons of Israel would not want to have anything to do with, let alone eat or absorb internally, anything that he may have touched. As interesting a possibility as that sounds, the rest of the text does not support the Jewish interpretation.
I also discovered that this mitzvah is the first to apply to both genders, and in all times and places. Most Jewish communities refrain from eating any part of the hindquarters, where the inner and outer sinews are located. In places where meat is rare, the sinews are removed and then the meat can be eaten.

As we read our Bibles, we would do well to be very familiar with what is recorded for us. We should also gain understanding of how its contents may relate to various cultures today, especially the Jewish culture. Finally we need to be aware of how such cultures translate or interpret the scriptures differently than we do in order to better understand them and to be better equipped in our discussions with them about our faith.

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