“Now the angel of Adonai came up from Gilgal to Bokhim and said, “I brought you up out of Egypt, led you to the land I swore to your fathers and said, ‘I will never break my covenant with you”-Judges 2:1
Although it might not seem like it at first glance, Judges Chapter 2 is jam-packed with powerful theological insights we’d be remiss to overlook.
So we’re not gonna overlook ’em.
As I’ve done with previous chapters, we’re gonna take our good ‘ole sweet time here and wade in the riches this chapter has to offer.
Alrighty, let’s get started.
Right out of the gate, we’re introduced to the controversial “angel of the Lord” phrase.
In Hebrew, the phrase is “the MALACH of YHWH”.
In case you’ve forgotten, MALACH does not mean “angel”.
It means a “messenger”.
And that “messenger” can be your average Joe human being.
Or it can be a bonafide “angel”.
It’s always the context that lets us know which is which.
In the Jewish camp, the rabbis and Jewish scholars often insist a MALACH is a flesh-and-blood, human prophet.
That’s one way to simplify things.
But, I’m afraid things are a bit more complex than that.
Christian theologians also struggle greatly with the identity of “the angel of the Lord”.
A lot of them say this is a “pre-incarnate Christ”.
An idea I feel is fallacious as all hell.
So who or what is this “angel of the Lord”?
That’s really the issue we’re facing here, isn’t it?
Again, the Jewish sages will insist this is a human, flesh-and-blood prophet who traveled by foot from Gilgal to deliver a message from Hashem.
However, there’s a problem with that interpretation.
This being is referring to himself in the first person saying “I”.
If that’s the case, that means this being is identifying himself as God Himself.
And that’s an issue Judaism struggles with greatly.
One could argue it’s a normal thing for God to speak through a prophet using His own very own words.
However, even in those cases, the prophet lets his audience know beforehand that “Hey, this message is from the Lord folks”.
So what we’re dealing with here is different.
We’ll continue this discussion the next time we meet.
Since no one has seen YHWH face to face we know that the messenger is speaking in YHWH’s place.