The Angel of the LORD · Featured Study
ASVChristophany
A figure walks through the Old Testament who is called the angel of Jehovah, and then called Jehovah in the next breath. He swears the oath only God can swear. He takes worship and does not refuse it. He is still spoken of as sent. The oldest Christian reading of that figure is that he is the Son of God appearing before He was born at Bethlehem. This page walks the appearances, gives Daniel 3 and the fourth man in the fire its own case, and names every reading with the men who hold it.
Summary
A figure called the angel of Jehovah appears through the Old Testament who speaks as God in the first person, is addressed as God by the people who meet him, and is still described as sent by God. The oldest Christian reading identifies him as the Son before the incarnation, and this site reads the fourth man in Daniel's furnace that way.
- He swears the oath only God can swear (Genesis 22:16), carries a name that is wonderful (Judges 13:18), and takes Joshua's worship without refusing it (Joshua 5:14)
- Hosea 12:3-4 calls the wrestler at Peniel both God and the angel, the clearest identification Scripture makes of its own scene
- In Daniel 3 the fourth man walks inside the fire with the three rather than pulling them out of it, which is Isaiah 43:2 acted out in front of a pagan king
- The two real objections to that reading are the Aramaic of 3:25 and the king's own word at 3:28, and both are stated here in full rather than answered around
- Calvin read the fourth man as a created angel for a serious reason, and his reason is given in his own words
The Figure in the Text
the three marks that make this a question at all
Scripture uses one Hebrew phrase, mal’ak Yahweh, the messenger of Jehovah, for a great many errands. Most of them raise no question at all. A handful do, and they raise it in the same way every time: the narrator says angel, and then says God, about one speaker in one unbroken conversation, without a seam between them. Three marks turn up in those scenes and nowhere else.
He speaks as God, in the first personGenesis 16:10 · Genesis 22:16 · Exodus 3:6
At the well he says “I will greatly multiply thy seed.” At the altar he says the promise was kept “from me.” At the bush he says “I am the God of thy father.” A herald can repeat a king’s words in the king’s voice, which is the honest counter, and it is why this mark alone settles nothing.
He receives worship and does not send it awayJoshua 5:14, against Revelation 22:8-9
Joshua falls on his face and worships, and the man with the drawn sword lets him. When John does the same thing to an angel at the end of Revelation, the angel stops him at once and tells him to worship God. That contrast is the single hardest datum in the whole question.
And I John am he that heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw, I fell down to worship before the feet of the angel that showed me these things. And he saith unto me, See thou do it not: I am a fellow-servant with thee and with thy brethren the prophets, and with them that keep the words of this book: worship God.What a created angel does when a man worships him.
He is still spoken of as sentNumbers 22:31-32 · Zechariah 1:12 · Daniel 3:28
The same title belongs to a figure who blocks Balaam’s road as an adversary and then relays a word he is given, and to a figure in Zechariah who asks Jehovah how long He will withhold mercy from Jerusalem. That is not a difficulty to be hidden. It is why serious readers land in different places, and why the site’s Angel of YHWH page sets out five positions rather than one.
Then Jehovah opened the eyes of Balaam, and he saw the angel of Jehovah standing in the way, with his sword drawn in his hand; and he bowed his head, and fell on his face. And the angel of Jehovah said unto him, Wherefore hast thou smitten thine ass these three times? behold, I am come forth for an adversary, because thy way is perverse before me:Balaam bows to him, and he speaks of being sent forth.
By his acceptance of adoration here, which a created angel durst not admit of, Rev. xxii, 8, 9. Because the place was made holy by his presence, ver. 15, which was God's prerogative, Exod. iii, 5. Because he is called the Lord, Hebrew.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament, 1765Wesleyan
Joshua 5:14
The Appearances
eight scenes, each with its own page for the story itself
These are the scenes the question actually rests on. Each one is told in full on its own page. What follows is only the identity question inside it: what the text says about who is speaking.
And the angel of Jehovah said unto her, I will greatly multiply thy seed, that it shall not be numbered for multitude.Hagar at the well: the angel promises what only God can promise.
And she called the name of Jehovah that spake unto her, Thou art a God that seeth: for she said, Have I even here looked after him that seeth me?She names him, not his message: Thou art a God that seeth.
I will multiply thy seed exceedingly - Who says this? The person who is called the Angel of the Lord; and he certainly speaks with all the authority which is proper to God.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832Methodist
Genesis 16:10
And the angel of Jehovah called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I. And he said, Lay not thy hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him; for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me.The angel stops the knife, and says the son was not withheld from me.
And the angel of Jehovah called unto Abraham a second time out of heaven, and said, By myself have I sworn, saith Jehovah, because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son,By myself have I sworn: the oath Hebrews 6:13 says only God can swear.
The angel of the Lord - The very person who was represented by this offering; the Lord Jesus, who calls himself Jehovah, Gen 22:16, and on his own authority renews the promises of the covenant. He was ever the great Mediator between God and man. See this point proved, Gen 15:7 (note).
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832Methodist
Genesis 22:11
And he said, Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for thou hast striven with God and with men, and hast prevailed. And Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy name. And he said, Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name? And he blessed him there. And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: for, said he, I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.Jacob names the place Peniel: I have seen God face to face.
In the womb he took his brother by the heel; and in his manhood he had power with God: yea, he had power over the angel, and prevailed; he wept, and made supplication unto him: he found him at Beth-el, and there he spake with us,Hosea retells the same night and calls the wrestler the angel.
This pair is the strongest link in the catalogue, because Scripture makes it itself. Genesis says Jacob wrestled God. Hosea, writing centuries later under inspiration, says he had power over the angel. No outside argument is needed to put those two words on one figure. The night itself is told at Jacob Wrestles the Angel.
The angel - Called ver. 3, God; and ver. 5, Jehovah, Lord of hosts. He was no created angel, but the Messiah; eternal God by nature and essence, angel by office, and voluntary undertaking. He wept - He prayed with tears from a sense of his own unworthiness, and with earnestness for the mercy he desired.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament, 1765Wesleyan
Hosea 12:4
And the angel of Jehovah appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will turn aside now, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when Jehovah saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. Moreover he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was afraid to look upon God.The angel appears in verse 2; God speaks out of the same bush in verse 4.
The angel of the Lord - Not a created angel certainly; for he is called יהוה Jehovah, Exo 3:4, etc., and has the most expressive attributes of the Godhead applied to him, Exo 3:14, etc. Yet he is an angel, מלאך malach, a messenger, in whom was the name of God, Exo 23:21; and in whom dwelt all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, Col 2:9; and who, in all these primitive times, was the Messenger of the covenant, Mal 3:1. And who was this but Jesus, the Leader, Redeemer, and Savior of mankind? See Clarke’s note on Gen 16:
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832Methodist
Exodus 3:2
It was an angel of the Lord that appeared to him; some think, a created angel, who speaks in the language of him that sent him; others, the second person, the angel of the covenant, who is himself Jehovah. It was an extraordinary manifestation of the divine presence and glory; what was visible was produced by the ministry of an angel, but he heard God in it speaking to him.
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710Nonconformist
Exodus 3:2
Henry is worth reading twice. He states both readings, names who holds each, and does not pretend the question is closed. That is the register this whole page keeps.
And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries? And he said, Nay; but as prince of the host of Jehovah am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my lord unto his servant? And the prince of Jehovah’s host said unto Joshua, Put off thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so.Joshua worships, is not corrected, and hears the burning bush command word for word.
A man - See Gen 12:7, note; Gen 18:2, note. The appearance was that of God manifested in the Person of His Word. Hence, the command of Jos 5:15. That the appearance was not in a vision merely is clear from the fact that Joshua “went unto Him” and addressed Him.
Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments, 1832-1869Evangelical
Joshua 5:13
What is it that Jesus [Joshua] teaches us through this? That, doubtless, which the apostle says: "Do not believe every spirit, but test if it is from God." Therefore, Jesus [Joshua] recognized not only something from God but that which is God; for certainly he would not have worshiped unless he had recognized God. For who else is chief of the army of the powers of God except our Lord Jesus Christ?
Origen of Alexandria· Homilies on Joshua 6.2, 253Early Church
Joshua 5:14
And the angel of Jehovah appeared unto him, and said unto him, Jehovah is with thee, thou mighty man of valor. And Gideon said unto him, Oh, my lord, if Jehovah is with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where are all his wondrous works which our fathers told us of, saying, Did not Jehovah bring us up from Egypt? but now Jehovah hath cast us off, and delivered us into the hand of Midian. And Jehovah looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might, and save Israel from the hand of Midian: have not I sent thee?The angel speaks in verse 12; Jehovah answers Gideon in verse 14, one conversation.
And Gideon saw that he was the angel of Jehovah; and Gideon said, Alas, O Lord Jehovah! forasmuch as I have seen the angel of Jehovah face to face.Gideon expects to die for having seen him, the fear of Exodus 33:20.
Alas, O Lord God! for because I have seen - This is an elliptical sentence, a natural expression of the distressed state of Gideon’s mind: as if he had said, Have mercy on me, O Lord God! else I shall die; because I have seen an angel of Jehovah face to face. We have frequently seen that it was a prevalent sentiment, as well before as under the law, that if any man saw God, or his representative angel he must surely die. On this account Gideon is alarmed, and prays for his life.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832Methodist
Judges 6:22
And Manoah said unto the angel of Jehovah, What is thy name, that, when thy words come to pass, we may do thee honor? And the angel of Jehovah said unto him, Wherefore askest thou after my name, seeing it is wonderful?Asked his name, he answers that it is wonderful, the word behind Isaiah 9:6.
For it came to pass, when the flame went up toward heaven from off the altar, that the angel of Jehovah ascended in the flame of the altar: and Manoah and his wife looked on; and they fell on their faces to the ground. But the angel of Jehovah did no more appear to Manoah or to his wife. Then Manoah knew that he was the angel of Jehovah. And Manoah said unto his wife, We shall surely die, because we have seen God.He goes up in the altar flame, and Manoah says the same thing Gideon said.
Seeing it is secret? - It was because it was secret that they wished to know it. The angel does not say that it was secret, but הוא פלאי hu peli it is Wonderful; the very character that is given to Jesus Christ, Isa 9:6: His name shall be called, פלא Wonderful; and it is supposed by some that the angel gives this as his name, and consequently that he was our blessed Lord.
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible, 1832Methodist
Judges 13:18
Clarke says “it is supposed by some,” and that is the right weight. The Hebrew of Judges 13:18 and the Hebrew of Isaiah 9:6 share a root, which is an echo worth hearing. It is not a grammatical proof, and this page does not present it as one.
The Fourth Man
Daniel 3:24-28: the scene this site reads as the Son in the fire
Then Nebuchadnezzar the king was astonished, and rose up in haste: he spake and said unto his counsellors, Did not we cast three men bound into the midst of the fire? They answered and said unto the king, True, O king. He answered and said, Lo, I see four men loose, walking in the midst of the fire, and they have no hurt; and the aspect of the fourth is like a son of the gods.Three men were thrown in bound. The king counts four, loose, and unhurt.
And the satraps, the deputies, and the governors, and the king’s counsellors, being gathered together, saw these men, that the fire had no power upon their bodies, nor was the hair of their head singed, neither were their hosen changed, nor had the smell of fire passed on them. Nebuchadnezzar spake and said, Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego, who hath sent his angel, and delivered his servants that trusted in him, and have changed the king’s word, and have yielded their bodies, that they might not serve nor worship any god, except their own God.Not a hair singed, not a smell of fire, and the king's own account of who did it.
Read the scene for what happens in it. The fire is hot enough to kill the soldiers who carried the three men to the mouth of it (3:22). The ropes burn off and the men do not. Then a fourth figure is there, walking with them, inside the furnace. He does not put the fire out. He does not reach in and pull them free. He is found in it with them, and they come out with no smell of smoke on their clothes.
That is the heart of the case, and it is a case about the scene rather than about a noun. Every other rescue in Scripture is run from outside the danger. In the lions’ den, an angel shuts the lions’ mouths (Daniel 6:22) and Daniel is untouched. Here the deliverer stands in the flames alongside the men he came for. This site reads that fourth man as the pre-incarnate Christ, the same figure who spoke at the bush and stood at Jericho, and teaches it as the plain sense of the scene.
When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle upon thee.Spoken to Israel before the exile: not kept out of the fire, kept in it.
Isaiah promised presence in the fire, not exemption from it, and in Daniel 3 the promise is acted out where a pagan king can count the figures. Matthew Henry saw the same thing and said so in one line.
Now was fulfilled in the letter gracious promise ( Isa. xliii. 2 ), When thou walkest through the fire thou shalt not be burnt, neither shall the flame kindle upon thee. By faith they quench the violence of the fire, quench the fiery darts of the wicked.
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710Nonconformist
Daniel 3:25
The Son of God - Probably he had heard David speak of him. Jesus Christ, the Angel of the covenant, did sometimes appear before his incarnation. Those who suffer for Christ, have his gracious presence with them in their sufferings, even in the fiery furnace, even in the valley of the shadow of death, and therefore need fear no evil.
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament, 1765Wesleyan
Daniel 3:25
Ps 34:7, 8; and the probably heathen centurion's exclamation (Mt 27:54). The Chaldeans believed in families of gods: Bel, the supreme god, accompanied by the goddess Mylitta, being the father of the gods; thus the expression he meant: one sprung from and sent by the gods. Really it was the "messenger of the covenant," who herein gave a prelude to His incarnation.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
Daniel 3:25
Then, Nebuchadnezzar the king was astonied - The word “astonied,” which occurs several times in our translation Ezr 9:3; Job 17:8; Job 18:20; Eze 4:17; Dan 3:24; Dan 4:19; Dan 5:9, is but another form for “astonished,” and expresses wonder or amazement. The reasons of the wonder here were that the men who were bound when cast into the furnace were seen alive, and walking unbound; that to them a fourth person was added, walking with them; and that the fourth had the appearance of a Divine personage.
Albert Barnes· Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments, 1832-1869Evangelical
Daniel 3:24
The Two Objections
the Aramaic of 3:25, and the king's own word at 3:28
A reading held at full strength has to carry its own hard questions. There are two here, both real, and neither is answered by raising the volume.
The Aramaic says a son of the gods, not the Son of GodDaniel 3:25 · bar elahin
The King James and New King James render the phrase “the Son of God.” The ASV, ESV, NIV and NASB render it “a son of the gods.” The newer rendering has the better of the grammar. Aramaic elahin is a plural, and the phrase carries no article, so it reads as a class rather than a title. Nebuchadnezzar was a Babylonian polytheist. He is reaching for the nearest word he has for something more than human, not stating a doctrine of the Trinity.
The christophany reading does not need to win that translation argument, and this page does not try to. What the king could put into words is not the same question as who was standing in the fire. The case rests on the scene, on the pattern the other appearances set, and on what the fourth man does.
At 3:28 the same king says his angelDaniel 3:28 · Jerome saw this and said so
Four verses later Nebuchadnezzar blesses the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, “who hath sent his angel.” A reader who wants the fourth man to be Christ has to face that sentence honestly. Jerome, who is no enemy of the doctrine, states the difficulty plainly.
Verse 28. " 'Blessed be God (the Vulgate has "their God, namely") of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, Who hath sent His angel and rescued His servants who believed in Him...'" The person whom he had previously called a son of God he here calls an angel, even though he had in the preceding passage described him as similar to a son of God rather than to God Himself.
Jerome· Commentary on Daniel, 407Early Church
Daniel 3:28
Two things are worth saying back, and both are ordinary. The first is that the king is a pagan describing what he saw, and angel is simply his word for a heavenly being sent by a god. The second is that angelis exactly the word Scripture itself uses for the figure at the bush, at Peniel and at Jericho. On this reading “his angel” is not evidence against a christophany. It is the same title the doctrine has been working with the whole way through.
Where Readers Differ
three other readings of the fourth man, named with their holders
Serious readers of the same verse land elsewhere, and for reasons worth hearing. None of what follows is offered as an error to be corrected.
A created angel, on theological groundsJohn Calvin, Commentary on Daniel, 1561
Calvin holds that God sent one of His angels, and he says directly that the king did not mean Christ. His reason is not caution about the Hebrew. It is that he wants to guard the uniqueness of the incarnation: angels appeared as men, and Christ alone truly became man, and Calvin will not let the first blur the second.
No doubt God here sent one of his angels, to support by his presence the minds of his saints, lest they should faint. ... A single angel was sent to these three men; Nebuchadnezzar calls him a son of God; not because he thought him to be Christ, but according to the common opinion among all people, that angels are sons of God, since a certain divinity is resplendent in them; and hence they call angels generally sons of God.
John Calvin· Commentary on Daniel, 1561Reformed
Daniel 3:25
A created angel, on grammatical groundsKeil & Delitzsch · Barnes · the Cambridge Bible · the Pulpit Commentary
A separate line of commentators reaches the same conclusion by a different road. They argue only from the words: a plural noun with no article cannot carry a definite title, and a Babylonian king’s vocabulary is not a Christian creed. Keil and Delitzsch add that the king’s language shifts between 3:25 and 3:28 because his own understanding shifted, most likely after he talked with the three men.
Worth keeping distinct: the grammar not requiring a reading is a much smaller claim than Calvin’s, which is a doctrinal argument against it. Treating the two as one position understates both.
A heavenly messenger, in Jewish readingThe Song of the Three Young Men, LXX Daniel 3:49 · later rabbinic tradition
The earliest Jewish expansion of this chapter, the Greek Song of the Three Young Men, already narrates that the angel of the Lord came down into the furnace and shook the flame out of it. Later rabbinic tradition names the angel. Read on its own terms, this is a heavenly messenger sent by God to protect His own, and the question of a second divine person is simply not in the frame, because the doctrine of the Trinity is not a category in that tradition.
That difference is real and it is named here rather than smoothed over: the Christian confession that the Son is God is an essential of the faith, and this site teaches it. The Jewish reading of Daniel 3 is presented accurately, as the tradition itself holds it, and the men who carry it are not mocked for holding it. How this site handles rabbinic sources generally is set out at Reading Rabbinic Sources as a Christian.
On Daniel 3:25 this site teaches the christophany reading. On the wider question of every appearance in the catalogue, it names the positions and their holders and stamps no verdict. The founder’s own slot follows below.
Where It Lands in Christ
what the New Testament says about who was seen
No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.No man hath seen God at any time: the sentence the whole doctrine turns on.
These things said Isaiah, because he saw his glory; and he spake of him.John names whose glory Isaiah saw on the throne in Isaiah 6.
John states two things that sit oddly together until this doctrine holds them. No one has ever seen God. And Isaiah, who wrote that he saw the Lord on a throne, saw the glory of Christ. The Father is not seen. The Son is the one who is seen, and He was being seen long before Bethlehem. That is the argument Irenaeus was already making in the second century.
If, then, neither Moses, nor Elias, nor Ezekiel, who had all many celestial visions, did see God; but if what they did see were similitudes of the splendour of the Lord, and prophecies of things to come; it is manifest that the Father is indeed invisible, of whom also the Lord said, "No man hath seen God at any time."
Irenaeus of Lyons· Against Heresies 4:20.11, 180Early Church
John 1:18
These things said Esaias,.... Concerning the blinding and hardening of the Jews: when he saw his glory, and spake of him; when he saw, in a visionary way, the glory of the Messiah in the temple, and the angels covering their faces with their wings at the sight of him; and when he spake of him as the King, the Lord of hosts, whom he had seen, Isa 6:1, from whence it is clear that he had respect to the Jews in the times of the Messiah.
John Gill· Exposition of the New Testament, 1746-1748Reformed Baptist
John 12:41
Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was born, I am.Jesus does not say he was, he says I am, in the tense that answers the bush.
Jesus said this to men who had just asked how He could have seen Abraham. He answered with a verb, and they picked up stones. The claim is not that He is older than Abraham. It is that He never began at all, in the words spoken out of a burning bush to Moses. If that is true of Him, then a figure appearing through the Old Testament who speaks as God, takes worship, and is still sent, has a name.
The one clause means, "Abraham was brought into being"; the other, "I exist." The statement therefore is not that Christ came into existence before Abraham did (as Arians affirm is the meaning), but that He never came into being at all, but existed before Abraham had a being; in other words, existed before creation, or eternally (as Joh 1:1).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871Reformed
John 8:58
Three things follow, and they are the reason the doctrine mattered enough for the early church to fight over it. The Father and the Son are distinct persons, because one is invisible and the other is seen, which is what Tertullian and Novatian argued against the teaching that God merely changes masks. The two Testaments tell one story, because the Christ who walks among men in the Gospels had been walking among them since Genesis. And the promise of Isaiah 43:2 is not a metaphor. Daniel 3 shows what it looks like when a man has to go into the fire and is not left alone in it. The full case for Christ’s deity from the New Testament sits at The Deity of Christ, and the persons of the Godhead at The Trinity.
The Words Underneath
the Hebrew, the Aramaic, and the Greek this question turns on
Five roots carry the whole argument: the word for messenger, the word for the act Joshua performed, the word Manoah was given instead of a name, and the two Aramaic words behind Nebuchadnezzar’s phrase.
The words underneath
malak: messenger
Hebrew · H4397Strong's entry: a messenger; specifically, of God, i.e. an angel (also a prophet, priest or teacher)
The word rendered angel in every scene on this page. It means messenger and says nothing by itself about the messenger's nature.
213 times in the Old Testament · malak, in full →
shachah: to bow
Hebrew · H7812Strong's entry: to depress, i.e. prostrate (especially reflexive, in homage to royalty or God)
What Joshua does at Joshua 5:14, rendered did worship. The same act John performs in Revelation 22:8, where the angel refuses it.
172 times in the Old Testament · shachah, in full →
pili: incomprehensible
Hebrew · H6383Strong's entry: remarkable
Judges 13:18's answer to the question about his name, rendered wonderful. Isaiah 9:6 uses the same root of the child who is born.
2 times in the Old Testament · pili, in full →
bar: son
Hebrew · H1247Strong's entry: a son, grandson, etc.
The Aramaic son in Daniel 3:25's bar elahin. Aramaic, not Hebrew, because Daniel 2 through 7 is written in the empire's own language.
19 times in the Old Testament · bar, in full →
elahh: god
Hebrew · H426Strong's entry: God
The Aramaic word for God, plural here as elahin. The plural without an article is why the newer versions read a son of the gods.
95 times in the Old Testament · elahh, in full →
Notable Art
the scenes as painters and engravers have carried them
The Voices
with the work named
Commentary on the Bible (1832) · public domain
Names the figure as Christ at the well, at the altar, at Peniel and at the bush, and reads the wonderful name of Judges 13:18 back to Isaiah 9:6.
Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765) · public domain
Gives the three marks in one sentence at Joshua 5:14, calls the wrestler at Peniel no created angel, and reads the fourth man in the furnace as the Angel of the covenant.
Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710) · public domain
States both readings of the bush plainly and refuses to hide either, and calls Daniel 3 the promise of Isaiah 43:2 fulfilled in the letter.
Notes, Explanatory and Practical (1832-1869) · public domain
Reads the man at Jericho as God manifested in the Person of His Word, and records that what astonished the king was a fourth figure of divine appearance.
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) · public domain
Calls the fourth man the messenger of the covenant giving a prelude to His incarnation, and holds John 8:58 as a claim to eternal existence.
Commentary on Daniel (1561) · public domain
Reads the fourth man as a created angel, on the ground that Christ alone truly became man where angels only ever appeared as men.
Against Heresies 4:20.11 (c. 180) · public domain
Argues that the Father is invisible and that what the prophets saw were likenesses of the splendour of the Lord, the reasoning the whole doctrine rests on.
Homilies on Joshua 6.2 (c. 240) · public domain
Asks who else could be chief of the army of the powers of God, and takes Joshua's worship as proof of what Joshua recognised.
Commentary on Daniel (c. 407) · public domain
Notes plainly that the king who said son of God at 3:25 says angel at 3:28, the strongest textual objection, stated by a friend of the doctrine.
Exposition of the New Testament (1746-1748) · public domain
Reads John 12:41 as Isaiah seeing the glory of the Messiah in the temple, the New Testament naming whose throne vision it was.
Marcus Brown's own commentary leads above all; within a tier, all voices are equal. Every voice quoted above is public domain and quoted verbatim from the site's own verified quote pool. Keil and Delitzsch, the Cambridge Bible and the Pulpit Commentary are named for their position on Daniel 3:25 and not quoted, since no verified entry for them sits in the pool on this verse.
Where it leads
Featured studies7
- The Angel of YHWH: the five positions on this figure, argued in full
- The Burning Bush: Exodus 3, the whole scene
- Jacob Wrestles the Angel: the night at Peniel
- The Furnace: what fire does in Scripture, and what it never does
- The Deity of Christ: the New Testament case
- Reading Rabbinic Sources as a Christian, MannaFest
- The Trinity
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