Kommentar zu Bereschit 32:3

מחנים means two camps — the one consisting of the angels ministering outside the Holy Land who had come with him thus far, the other, of those ministering in the Land of Israel who had come to meet him (Midrash Tanchuma, Vayishlach 3).

מחנה אלוקים זה. Now that the angels have seen fit to join me there can be no doubt that mine is a godly camp. Just as Yaakov had called the place where he had had the dream of the ladder Bet El, so he now referred to his camp as machaneh elokim. In either instance the reason was that he had been found worthy of a divine revelation.

ויאמר...כאשר ראם, Yaakov’s reaction to these angels (inhuman garb) was similar to that of Avraham, his grandfather, in Genesis 18,20, when the latter is described as running to welcome them as soon as he saw them.

Two camps—from outside Eretz Yisrael... Question: Rashi explained on, “Ascending and descending” (v. 28:12), that the two [groups of angels] were not together. Rather, one ascended and only then the other descended. [Why were both groups together here?] The answer is: Rashi explains at the beginning of Parshas Vayishlach that Yaakov sent actual angels [to Eisov]. Accordingly, it means as follows: Here too, the angels of outside Eretz Yisrael wanted to ascend before the angels of Eretz Yisrael would descend. But Yaakov forced them to stay because he wanted to send them to Eisov. If so, this implies that [the messengers sent by Yaakov] were actual angels.

מחנה heisst durchaus nicht eine bleibende Niederlassung, sondern nur ein zeitweiliger Ruhepunkt eines einem Ziele zuwandernden Vereins von Wesen. Ein solches מחנה war Jakob mit seinen Frauen, Kindern, Knechten, Mägden, Herden: sie waren auf der Wanderung, eine Heimat zu suchen, von welcher ihnen Gott verheißen hatte, dort bei ihnen sein zu wollen; sie waren also ein מחנה, das Gott in der Heimat suchte. Und ein solches מחנה waren die Engel, die Menschen suchen, irdische, menschliche Kreise für den Einzug Gottes auf Erden. Beide מחנות begegnen sich und er nannte den Ort: Machnajim, מחנה ישראל und ׳חנה — .מחנה אלקי wandernder Ruhepunkt; aus der Lautverwandtschaft von אנה fügen; etwas irgendwo hin versetzen, אני, das Ich in der Bewegung (während אנכי, von אנך verwandt mit ענג das Ich in der Ruhe], הנה das sich, oder anderes, bereitstellende Ich. חנה, das in Bewegung zu einem Ziele begriffene Ruhen. (Vergl. S. 139).

מחנים, “camps;” a reference to two camps of angels meeting at this place; the ones who had protected him thus far, and the ones assigned to so while he would be in the Holy Land.

מחנים, two camps; the camp of G’d (angels) and his own. The grammatical formulation with the plural ending following the vowel patach, the stress is on the penultimate syllable as this indicated the number 2. Parallel examples are paamayim, shevuayim, shenatayim, etc. .[the kametz here substitutes for the patach as it is the end of the sentence. Ed.]

מחנים, two camps. One camp consisted of angels, the other of Yaakov and his entourage. This is why he named this location מחנים. The name stuck, as we find it mentioned at that location in Samuel II 2,8. We also find again in Joshua 13,30. The local people agreed to the name change by Yaakov. The same applies to all locations of which the Torah tells us that one of the patriarchs had name, as we pointed out in or commentary at the beginning of this portion. (28,18)