I know that Spurgeon for one believed that there was no such person as Michael the Archangel, that this was only another name for (pre-Incarnate?) Christ. I know George Lamsa also didn't believe in angels, for instance rendering Hebrews 13:2 as "pious men." Though I know Lamsa is kind of sketchy as a source.
This all got me thinking as to whether "Gabriel" and other "angels" are really in the Bible separately from God, either. What are some arguments for and against such an idea?
Right off the bat, it doesn't seem possible to completely write Satan* out of the Bible. Discounting Job 1 as the later forgery I've heard it argued to be and then also discounting the alleged "Lucifer passages" of Isaiah and Ezekiel- Even if Revelation 12:4 and the Temptation in the desert were both "metaphorical" in some way, Luke 10:18 still seems inescapable. Could that verse and Luke 22:31 still just represent some kind of metaphor for human darkness?
Revelation 22:9 is the only argument against it that I can think of. The "angel" does compare itself to the Prophets and Apostles, though. Could that indicate that this is actually some human servant of God (whether dead of alive)?
The only references to angels (including Hebrews 13:2?) in the Bible could all be Theopanies or Christophanies, which is how I'd explain Gabriel. The "one like the son of man" in Daniel 7 might rule this out, as I'd like to say for the argument that Daniel's vision allows us to put different portrayals of God side by side in a vision, but I know not all scholars consider the one like the son of man to be Christ. According to the NET Bible commentary, some scholars see this figure as Michael (erhem) and some see this figure as the people of God corporately.
*Yes, I know that I'm making the assumption that Satan should really be called an "angel." But even if he is a "nacash" or subordinate god or whatever, that would still make him a non-human, non-God spiritual being- an angel by any other name or the purposes of this thread.
This all got me thinking as to whether "Gabriel" and other "angels" are really in the Bible separately from God, either. What are some arguments for and against such an idea?
Right off the bat, it doesn't seem possible to completely write Satan* out of the Bible. Discounting Job 1 as the later forgery I've heard it argued to be and then also discounting the alleged "Lucifer passages" of Isaiah and Ezekiel- Even if Revelation 12:4 and the Temptation in the desert were both "metaphorical" in some way, Luke 10:18 still seems inescapable. Could that verse and Luke 22:31 still just represent some kind of metaphor for human darkness?
Revelation 22:9 is the only argument against it that I can think of. The "angel" does compare itself to the Prophets and Apostles, though. Could that indicate that this is actually some human servant of God (whether dead of alive)?
The only references to angels (including Hebrews 13:2?) in the Bible could all be Theopanies or Christophanies, which is how I'd explain Gabriel. The "one like the son of man" in Daniel 7 might rule this out, as I'd like to say for the argument that Daniel's vision allows us to put different portrayals of God side by side in a vision, but I know not all scholars consider the one like the son of man to be Christ. According to the NET Bible commentary, some scholars see this figure as Michael (erhem) and some see this figure as the people of God corporately.
*Yes, I know that I'm making the assumption that Satan should really be called an "angel." But even if he is a "nacash" or subordinate god or whatever, that would still make him a non-human, non-God spiritual being- an angel by any other name or the purposes of this thread.
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