Tagged: Angel of the Lord
The angel of the Lord appears to Gideon
Judges 6:11-24
Apostasy is a recurring theme in Judges 3-16. The Israelites consistently violate their covenant with Yahweh, embracing idolatry and immorality. They overlook – even celebrate – lying, cheating, stealing, deception, adultery, and murder. When the LORD brings down the hammer of retribution, the people cry out for relief from their divinely appointed tormentors. No doubt, these perilous times are the fulfillment of the covenant curses outlined in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28.
In the opening verses of Judges 6, we learn the Israelites have suffered for seven years under Midianite cruelty. The Midianites are a seminomadic people of the Sinai Peninsula and western Arabia. According to Genesis 25:2-4, they are distant relatives of the Israelites, being descended from Abraham by his second wife, Keturah. The relationship between the Israelites and Midianites is tenuous, to say the least.
For starters, Midianites play a role in the sale of Joseph to Egypt (Gen. 37:28, 36), although Joseph comes to see it as divine providence (Gen. 45:4-8; 50:19-20). Later, the Midianites provide Moses with a safe haven after he flees Pharaoh. What’s more, Moses takes the daughter of a Midianite priest as his wife (Exod. 2:15-22). God sends Moses back to Egypt from Midian (Exod. 3:1 – 4:23), and after the Israelites escape from Pharaoh, Moses leads them to Midianite soil, where they enter into a covenant relationship with Yahweh and receive the Torah (Exod. 19 – Num. 7). Moses’ father-in-law, Jethro, even has a hand in Israel’s civic affairs (Exod. 18).
But once the Israelites leave Sinai, their relationship with Midian begins to sour. Moses delivers a severe blow to the Midianites at the LORD’s command. He recruits a thousand warriors from each Israelite tribe and wages war with Midian, killing every male as well as the Midianites’ five kings. The Israelites also kill Balaam, the prophet for hire who had led them to intermarry with the Midianites. Moses also commands the people to plunder the livestock and property, burn down the cities, and kill every woman, sparing only the virgins, for the older women are the ones who actively participated in leading the Israelites astray (Num. 31:1-18).
Continue reading
The angel of the Lord in the time of the judges
The Book of Judges introduces us to Israel’s arduous struggle to maintain control of the Promised Land between the death of Joshua and the anointing of King Saul. While conquest of the land is relatively quick, settlement of the tribal territories proves challenging. There are pockets of strong resistance, and worldly allures, that lead many of the Israelites to adopt a policy of coexistence rather than total conquest.
A loose tribal confederacy emerges after Joshua’s death. The Spirit of God empowers various leaders, called judges, to deliver the people from their common enemies. For the Israelites, there are six cycles of sin, distress, and salvation, which form the core of the book structured around six major judges and six minor ones (3:7 – 16:31).
The Hebrew word for judge (shophet) is closely related to the verb shaphat (“to judge”), and also to mishpat(“justice”). Judges maintain justice and settle legal disputes. The term also may apply to governors, and in the Book of Judges we see God raise up special leaders who judge, administer, and deliver. The word shophet in Judges is used once in reference to the LORD (11:27), six times in reference to those who deliver Israel under God’s power or Spirit (2:18; 3:9-10; 13:25; 14:6, 19; 15:14), and seven times in relation to judges who serve as administrators (4:4; 12:8-9, 11, 13-14; 15:20). Throughout the Book of Judges, these Spirit-empowered leaders save the Israelites from their enemies as Yahweh judges their hearts and demonstrates divine grace.
Continue reading
The Angel of the Lord and a Talking Donkey
The background in the previous post helps us better understand the encounter between Balaam and the angel of the Lord. At the beginning of Numbers 22, the Israelites are camped on the plains of Moab near the Jordan River, across from Jericho. They have just defeated the Amorites, and the Moabite king Balak fears the Israelites plan to overthrow him. So, he sends a diplomatic envoy to Balaam of Pethor in upper Mesopotamia, a distance of some four hundred and twenty miles, which requires roughly twenty-five days of travel in each direction.
Seers of the gods in ancient times are called upon to place or remove curses, pronounce blessings, and provide counsel. Their techniques include divination, incantation, animal sacrifice, and the reading of omens. They are skilled at manipulating deities to bring about the result for which they are paid handsomely.
Balaam’s reputation is well known. An inscription in a temple at Deir ‘Alla, Jordan, discovered during a 1967 excavation, recalls that Balaam, son of Beor, a “seer of the gods,” has a frightening night vision that foretells a period of drought and darkness, of mourning and death, in which the natural order of the world is reversed. Balaam implores the goddesses Ashtar and Sheger to bring light, rain, and fertility to the land. Evidently, the goddesses deliver, for the structure at Deir ‘Alla and its wall inscriptions may have been built to honor them, and to acknowledge Balaam’s successful mediation. In any case, Balak sees a potential ally in Balaam, to whom the king says, “I know that those you bless are blessed and those you curse are cursed” (Num. 22:6).
The king is counting on Balaam. Ancient Near Eastern texts record the power of priests and prophets to discern, intervene, and even manipulate the will of the gods through means of augury (the interpretation of omens), special sacrificial rituals, and verbal pronouncements of blessing or cursing. Surely, this renowned prophet, who has called successfully on Ashtar and Sheger, is able to manipulate the will of the Israelite God.
Continue reading
The Error of Balaam
In Numbers 22, the angel of the Lord appears in a most curious scene involving a cursing king, a prophet for hire, a sword-wielding angel, and – strangest of all – a talking donkey. As Old Testament theologian Gordon Wenham notes, “The narrative is at once both very funny and deadly serious.”
The story begins with the Moabite king, Balak, who wishes to curse the Israelites. He approaches Balaam, a smarmy, pagan prophet who, curiously, doesn’t seem so bad at first. Insights from other passages of Scripture clue us in to the prophet’s blackened soul.
In this scene, the angel of the Lord holds a drawn sword in his hand. This is telling, for there are only two other times in which the phrase “drawn sword in his hand” appears in relation to divine messengers. One is Joshua 5:13-15, where the “commander of the LORD’s army” confronts Joshua. The other is 1 Chronicles 21:16, where King David sees the angel of the LORD standing between heaven and earth, and in his hand is a drawn sword stretched out over Jerusalem. In all three episodes, we see evidence that this “man,” “angel,” and “commander” are the same figure. As we learn in the next chapter, the writer of Joshua 5:13 points us back to the burning bush in Exodus 3, tying the commander of Yahweh’s army to the angel of the Lord.
Continue reading
A Promised Deliverer
Perhaps more than any other Old Testament passage, Exodus 23:20-23 serves as a backdrop against which we may view the record of the angel of the Lord’s visits to human beings. As Moses meets Yahweh at Mount Sinai, receives the law, and prepares for the journey to the Promised Land, there’s a brief message from God about what lies ahead:
I am going to send an angel before you to protect you on the way and bring you to the place I have prepared. Be attentive to him and listen to him. Do not defy him, because he will not forgive your acts of rebellion, for my name is in him. But if you will carefully obey him and do everything I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and a foe to your foes. For my angel will go before you and bring you to the land of the Amorites, Hethites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites, and Jebusites, and I will wipe them out.
Exod. 23:20-23
Something extraordinary happens here. The description God gives Moses is of no ordinary angel. This angel has the authority to forgive sins, an authority that belongs exclusively to God. Even more curious is God’s statement that “my name is in him.” God’s name oftentimes is used in Scripture to depict God’s presence. In this case, the very essence of Yahweh is in the messenger being sent.
Michael Heiser writes:
When God told Moses that his name was in this angel, he was saying that he was in this angel – his very presence or essence. The I AM of the burning bush would accompany Moses and the Israelites to the promised land and fight for them. Only he could defeat the gods of the nations and the descendants of the Nephilim whom Moses and Joshua would find there.
The Unseen Realm, 143
Other Scriptures confirm this angel is Yahweh.
Continue reading
OnceDelivered.net 