and was glad, and as our Lord said, Before Abraham was I am. This proves that the person predicted as the seed of the woman and as the seed of Abraham, through whom redemption was to be effected, was to be both God and man. He could not be the seed of Abraham unless a man, and he could not be the Saviour of men unless God.
We accordingly find throughout the Old Testament constant rfiention made of a person distinct from Jehovah, as a person, to whom nevertheless the titles, attributes, and works of Jehovah are ascribed. This person is called the c^rlbs TJS^x:, nirT^ TTSbT^, "'DIN nSn^, D"^.nbsi. He claims divine authority, exercises divine prerog- atives, and receives divine homage. If this were a casual matter, if in one or two instances the messenger spoke in the name of him who sent him, we might assume that the person thus designated was an ordinary angel or minister of God. But when this is a pervading representation of the Bible ; when we find that these terms are applied, not first to one, and then to another angel indis- criminately, but to one particular angel ; that the person so desig- nated is also called the Son of God, the Mighty God ; that the work attributed to him is elsewhere attributed to God himself; and that in the New Testament, this manifested Jehovah, who led his people under the Old Testament economy, is declared to be the Son of God, the Aoyos, who was manifested in the flesh, it becomes cer- tain that by the angel of Jehovali in the early books of Scripture, we are to understand a divine person, distinct from the Father.
A. The Booh of Crenesis.
Thus as early as Gen. xvi. 7, the angel of Jehovah appears to Hagar and says, "I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude." And Hagar, it is said, " called the name of Jehovah that spake unto her [Attah el Hoi^ Thou God seest me " (ver. 13). This angel therefore is declared to be Jehovah, and promises what God only could perform. Again, in Gen. xviii. 1, it is said, Jehovah appeared to Abraham in the plains of Mamre, who promised to him the birth of Isaac. In ver. 13, he is again called Jehovah. Jehovah said, " Is anything too hard for Jehovah ? At the time appointed I will return unto thee .... and Sarah shall have a son." As the angels turned toward Sodom, one of them, called Jehovah, said, " Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do ? " and, " Jehovah said, Be- cause the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their
486 PAKT I. — THEOLOGY. [Ch. VH. — Divinity of Chrwt.
Bin is very grievous, I will go down now and see," etc., and Abraham, it is added, stood before Jehovah. Through the whole of Abraham's intercession in behalf of the cities of the plain, the angel is addressed as Adonai, a title given only to the true God, and speaks as Jehovah, and assumes the authority of God, to pardon or punish as to him seems fit. When the execution of the sentence pronounced on Sodom is mentioned, it is said, " Jehovah rained .... brimstone and fire from Jehovah out of heaven*" With regard to this and similar remarkable expressions, the ques- tion is not. What may they mean ? but. What do they mean ? Taken by themselves they may be explained away, but taken in the light of the connected revelations of God on the subject, it becomes ap- parent that Jehovah is distinguished as a person from Jehovah ; and therefore that in the Godhead there is more than one pei'son to whom the name Jehovah belongs. In this case, the words " brim- stone and fire " may be connected with the words "from Jehovah," in the sense of "fire of God" as a figurative expression for the lightning. The passage would then mean simply, " Jehovah rained lightning on Sodom and Gomorrah." But this is not only against the authorized punctuation of the passage as indicated by the accents, but also against the analogy of Scripture. That is, it is an unnatural interpretation, and brings this passage into conflict with those in which the distinction between the angel of Jehovah and Jehovah, i. e., between the persons of the Godiiead, is clearly indicated.
In Gen. xxii. 2, God commands Abraham to offer up Isaac as a sacrifice. The angel of Jehovah arrests his hand at the moment of immolation, and says (ver. 12), " Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me." And in ver. 16, the angel of the Lord said, " By myself have I sworn, saith Jehovah .... that in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed." And Abraham called the name of that place " Jehovah-jireh." Here God, the angel of Jehovah, and Jehovah are names given to the same per- son, who swears by Himself and promises the blessing of a numer- ous posterity to Abraiiam. The angel of Jehovah must therefore be a divine person.
In Jacob's vision, recorded Gen. xxviii. 11-22, he saw a ladder reaching to heaven, " and behold Jehovah stood above it, and said, I am the Lord God of Abraiiam thy father, and the God of Isaac : the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to tliy seed. And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth." Hei-e the person
§1,B.] THE DIVrniTY OF CHRIST. 487
elsewhere called the angel of Jehovah, and who had given the same promise to Abraham, is called the Lord God of Abraham and the God of Israel. In Gen. xxxii. 24-32, Jacob is said to have wrestled with an angel, who blessed him, and in seeing whom Jacob said, " I have seen God face to face." The prophet Hosea, xii. 4, in referring to this event, says, " Jacob had power over the angel, and prevailed : he wept, and made supplication unto him : he found him in Beth-el, and there he spake with us; even Jehovah God of Hosts ; Jehovah is his memox-ial." The angel with whom Jacob wrestled, was the Lord God of Hosts.
B. The other Historical Books of the Old Testament. In Exodus iii. we have the account of the revelation of God to Moses on Mount Horeb. " The angel of the Lord," it is said, " appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush." And Moses turned to see this great sight, " and when Jehovah saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him, out of the midst of the bush .... and 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." Here the angel of Jehovah is identical with Jeho- vah, and is declared to be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The personal distinction between Jehovah and the angel of Je- hovah (i. e., between the Father and the Son, as these persons are elsewhere, and usually in the later Scriptures, designated), is clearly presented in Ex. xxiii. 20, where it is said, " Behold, I send an angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not ; for he will not pardon your transgressions : for my name is in him." The last phrase is equiv- alent to, " I am in him." By the name of God, is often meant God himself as manifested,. Thus it is said of the temple, 1 Kings viii. 29, " My name shall be there," i. e., " There will I dwell." As in the New Testament the Father is said to send the Son, and to be in Him ; so here Jehovah is said to send the angel of Jehovah and to be in him. And as the Son of Man had power on earth to forgive sin, so the angel of Jehovah had authority to forgive or punish at his pleasure. Michaelis, in his marginal annotations to his edition of the Hebrew Bible, says in reference to this passage ('Ex. xxiii. 20) : " Bechai ex Kabbala docet, hunc angelum non
488 PART I. — THEOLOGY. [Ch. Vn. — Divinity of Christ