During the course of the prepr.ratorj' dispensations, the divine Being disclosed himself to the more pious and favored of our race in the form of man, and with the title of "the Angel of Jehovah"— nin 7 Ty<'^'^ The first of these appearances was to Hagar in her dis- tress. The angel addressed her in the person of God, and she, in return, attributed to him the name of " Thou, God, seest me." The foremost of the three angels with whom Abraham conversed with respect to the cities of the plain (Gen. xviii) is called not fewer than eight times " Jehovah," and six times '• Lord" C^nx). (See Hengstenberg, Christol. 1, 112, transl.) In the destruc- tion of the cities of the plain an unmistakable distinc- tion is made between two persons, each of whom bears the same divine name : •' Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven" (Gen. xix, •24). The full nature of the theophany to Jacob (Gen. xxxii, 24-30) is made man- ifest in Hos. xii, 3-5. The scene opens wdth the view of a man wrestling with Jacob, and closes Avith Jacob's calling the name of the place " Peniel, for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved." " T'ne pro[)het Hosea puts it beyond a doubt that this was a divine person by styling him not only an angel and God (n'^rtiS!), but Jeliovcth, God of hosts, Jehovah is his memorial. Whilst, therefore, he was a man and an anr/el, or the angel of the covenant, he was also the su- preme Jehovah. These titles and attributes belong to none other than the second person of the blessed Trin- ity, Christ the Saviour" (Davidson, Sacred llermeneu- tics, p. 281). The "Angel of Jehovah" appears to Mo- ses in a flame of fire from the bush, and still takes to himseKthe names of Deity, Elohim, and Jehovah (Exod. iii, 2-7) ; manifests himself to IManoah as man, and yet is recognised and worshipped as God, while he declares his name to be " Wonderful." the same as in Isa. ix, 6 ; and at the close of the Old-Testament canon (Mai. iii, 1) he is announced as the angel or messenger who
should suddenly come to his Temple. (See also Exod. xiv, 19; xviii, 20; xxii, 34; xxiii, 23; Numb, xx, 16; comp. Exod. xxiii, 21 ; xxxiii, 2, 3, 14; Josh, vi, 2; v, 13-15, 22 ; Judg. vi, 11-22 ; xiii, 6-22 ; Isa. Ixiii, 9.)
As to the nature of this mysterious personage, there have been those who have held, with Augustine, that the theophanies were " not direct appearances of a per- son in the Godhead, but self-manifestations of God through a created being" (see Liddon, Bampton Lect. ii, 87, note), among the latest defenders of -which view are Hoffman (in his Weissagung nnd Erjullung') and De- litzsch (on Genesis). On the other hand, the fathers of the Church prior to the Nicene Council were almost unanimous in the opinion that the " angel of Jehovah" is identical with Jehovah himself, not denoting an ex- istence apart from himself, but only the mode of mani- festation of the divine Logos, who subsequently became incarnate ; and m this view the Church has generally acquiesced. (On the subject of theophanies, see Justin Martyr, Ajmlogy ; Eusebius, B'ccl. Hist, i, ch. ii ; Km-tz, Old Gov. i, 181-201, transl.; an able article in the Stud, u. Krit. oi' 1840 by Nitzsch ; E. H. Stahl, Die Erschei- nungen Jehovas u. Seiner Engel im A . T., in Eichhorn's Bib. Re2).yu, 156 sq. ; Hiinlein, Ueber Theo. u. Chrisio- phanien, in the N. Theol. Journ. ii, 1 sq., 93 sq., 277 sq.) See Theoph.vny.
VII. The Logos. — In the description of the incarnation given by the evangelist John there appears the term '• Logos" in a sense new to the Scriptiu-es, and among New-Testament writers peculiar to him. j\Iuch has been written on the origin of this word. The Targums, the best of which are generally attributed to the 1st century, may be regarded as embodying the sentiments of that age (Etheridge, Lieb. Lit. p.'l91). In these, for the name of Deity, " Jehovah," there is employed the paraphrase "Word of the Lord." "On this circum- stance much argument has been built. Some have maintained that it supplies an indubitable ascription of personal existence to the Word, in some sense distinct from the personal existence of the supreme Father; that this Word is the Logos of the New Testament; and, consequently, that the phrase is a proof of a belief among the ancient Jews in the pre-existence, the per- sonal operations, and the deity of the JMessiah, 'the Word who became flesh, and fixed his tabernacle among us' " (J. Pye Smith, Messiah, bk. ii, sec. 11 ; compare Bertholdt, Christol. Jitd. p. 130 sq.). Others have re- ferred the origin of the word to Pliilo; but, as has been abundantly shown, the Logos of Philo has but little in common with that of the Gospel (Tholuck, Comm. ad loc. p. 61), and is but a nucleus of divine ideas, which lacks the essential element of personality. " Bli)iding as the resemblance between many of his ideas and modes of expression and those of Christianitj^ may be to the superficial reader, yet the essential principle is to its A-ery foimdation diverse. Even that which sounds like the expressions of John has in its entire connection a meaning altogether diverse. . . . His system stalks by the cradle of Christianit)- only as a spectral counterpart. It appears like the floating, dissolving y"«^n Morgana on the horizon, where Christianity is about to arise" (Dorner, Leh-e v. der Person Christi, ii, 198, 342. Comp. Burton, Bampton Lect, note 93 ; Eitter, Hist, of Philos. transl. iv, 407-478 ; Liddon, Bajnpton Lecture, p. 93-108 ; Dollinger, Heid. u. Judenthum, x, 3 ; Bih. Sacj-a, vi, 173; vii, 13, 696-732; Meth. Quart. Rev. 1851, p. 377; 1858, p. 110-129). See Logos.