Jesus Christ: YHWH’s Destroying Angel
- samshmn
- 7 hours ago
- 7 min read
According to the Hebrew Bible, God sent a Destroyer to slay the firstborn of Egypt:
“And Yahweh will pass through to smite the Egyptians; and He will see the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, and Yahweh will pass over the doorway and will not allow the destroyer (ha mashkhit) to come into your houses to smite you.” Exodus 12:23
In later texts, this Destroyer is identified as the Angel of YHWH:
“So Yahweh sent a pestilence against Israel from the morning until the appointed time, and 70,000 men of the people from Dan to Beersheba died. Then the angel sent forth his hand toward Jerusalem to destroy it, and Yahweh relented of the calamity and said to the angel who destroyed (la malach ha mashkhit) the people, ‘It is enough! Now relax your hand!’ And the angel of Yahweh was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite. Then David spoke to Yahweh when he saw the angel who was striking down the people, and said, ‘Behold, it is I who have sinned, and it is I who have done unrighteousness; but these sheep, what have they done? Please let Your hand be against me and my father’s house.’” 2 Samuel 24:15-17
“So Gad came to David and said to him, ‘Thus says Yahweh, “Take for yourself either three years of famine, or three months to be swept away before your adversaries, while the sword of your enemies overtakes you, or else three days of the sword of Yahweh, even pestilence in the land, and the angel of Yahweh destroying throughout all the territory of Israel.’ So now, see what word I should return to Him who sent me.”’ Then David said to Gad, ‘I am in great distress. Let me now fall into the hand of Yahweh, for His compassions are exceedingly abundant. But do not let me fall into the hand of man.’
“So Yahweh sent a pestilence against Israel; and 70,000 men of Israel fell. And God sent an angel to Jerusalem to destroy it; but as he was about to destroy it, Yahweh saw and relented concerning the calamity, and said to the destroying angel (la malach ha mashkhit), ‘It is enough! Now relax your hand.’ And the angel of Yahweh was standing by the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. Then David lifted up his eyes and saw the angel of Yahweh standing between earth and heaven, with his drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders, covered with sackcloth, fell on their faces. And David said to God, ‘Is it not I who commanded to number the people? Indeed, I am the one who has sinned and done a great evil; but these sheep, what have they done? O Yahweh my God, please let Your hand be against me and my father’s household, but not against Your people that they should be plagued.’…
“Then the angel of Yahweh said to Gad to say to David, that David should go up and erect an altar to Yahweh on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. So David went up at the word of Gad, which he spoke in the name of Yahweh. Now Ornan turned back and saw the angel, and his four sons who were with him hid themselves…
“Then Yahweh spoke to the angel, and he returned his sword to its sheath. At that time, when David saw that Yahweh had answered him on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite, he sacrificed there. Now the tabernacle of Yahweh, which Moses had made in the wilderness, and the altar of burnt offering were in the high place at Gibeon at that time. But David could not go before it to inquire of God, for he was terrified by the sword of the angel of Yahweh.” 1 Chronicles 21:11-20, 27-30
What makes this rather interesting is that this Destroying Angel is actually identified as the Word of God!
“Formerly they had disbelieved everything as a result of their sorceries, but at the destruction of their firstborn they acknowledged this people to be the offspring of God. For when profound silence encompassed all things and the night was at midpoint in its swift course, your all-powerful Word leapt from your royal throne in heaven like a relentless warrior into the midst of a land doomed to destruction. Carrying the sharp sword of your inexorable decree, and touching the heavens while standing on earth, he filled the universe with death.” Wisdom 18:13-16 New Catholic Bible (NCB)
If this weren’t astonishing enough, the NT claims that this was the Lord Jesus Christ in his prehuman existence, since he is said to have been there leading Moses and the Israelites:
“For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea; and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea; and all ate the same spiritual food; and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them, and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well-pleased. For they were struck down in the wilderness… Nor let us put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the serpents. Nor grumble, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer.” 1 Corinthians 10:1-5, 9-10
“For certain men have secretly slipped in among you—men who long ago were marked out for the condemnation I am about to describe—ungodly men who have turned the grace of our God into a license for evil and who deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ. Now I desire to remind you (even though you have been fully informed of these facts once for all) that Jesus, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, later destroyed those who did not believe.” Jude 1:4-5
Jude 1:4 tn The terms “Master and Lord” both refer to the same person. The construction in Greek is known as the Granville Sharp rule, named after the English philanthropist-linguist who first clearly articulated the rule in 1798. Sharp pointed out that in the construction article-noun-καί-noun (where καί [kai] = “and”), when two nouns are singular, personal, and common (i.e., not proper names), they always had the same referent. Illustrations such as “the friend and brother,” “the God and Father,” etc. abound in the NT to prove Sharp’s point. For more discussion see ExSyn 270-78. See also Titus 2:13 and 2 Pet 1:1
Jude 1:5 tc The reading ᾿Ιησοῦς (Iēsous, “Jesus”) is deemed too hard by several scholars, since it involves the notion of Jesus acting in the early history of the nation Israel (the NA27 has “the Lord” instead of “Jesus”). However, not only does this reading enjoy the strongest support from a variety of early witnesses (e.g., A B 33 81 88 322 424c 665 915 1241 (1735: “the Lord Jesus”) 1739 1881 2298 2344 vg co eth Or1739mg Cyr Hier Bede), but the plethora of variants demonstrate that scribes were uncomfortable with it, for they seemed to exchange κύριος (kurios, “Lord”) or θεός (theos, “God”) for ᾿Ιησοῦς (though P72 has the intriguing reading θεὸς Χριστός [theos Christos, “God Christ”] for ᾿Ιησοῦς). As difficult as the reading ᾿Ιησοῦς is, in light of v. 4 and in light of the progress of revelation (Jude being one of the last books in the NT to be composed), it is wholly appropriate. The NA28 text now also reads Ιησοῦς. For defense of this reading, see Philipp Bartholomä, “Did Jesus Save the People out of Egypt: A Re-examination of a Textual Problem in Jude 5, ” NovT 50 (2008): 143-58.
sn The construction our Master and Lord, Jesus Christ in v. 4 follows Granville Sharp’s rule (see note on Lord). The construction strongly implies the deity of Christ. This is followed by a statement that Jesus was involved in the salvation (and later judgment) of the Hebrews. He is thus to be identified with the Lord God, Yahweh. Verse 5, then, simply fleshes out what is implicit in v. 4. New English Translation (NET)
Jesus is also described as the Almighty Word of God who comes down from the Father’s throne to destroy the wicked by the sword of his mouth:
“I will grant the one who conquers permission to sit with me on my throne, just as I too conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne.” Revelation 3:21
“Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse, and He who sits on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and wages war. His eyes are a flame of fire, and on His head are many diadems; having a name written on Him which no one knows except Himself, and being clothed with a garment dipped in blood, His name is also called The Word of God. And the armies which are in heaven, clothed in fine linen, white and clean, were following Him on white horses. And from His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the wrath of the rage of God, the Almighty. And He has on His garment and on His thigh a name written, ‘KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.’
“Then I saw an angel standing in the sun, and he cried out with a loud voice, saying to all the birds which fly in midheaven, “Come, assemble for the great supper of God, so that you may eat the flesh of kings and the flesh of commanders and the flesh of strong men and the flesh of horses and of those who sit on them and the flesh of all men, both free men and slaves, and small and great.’ Then I saw the beast and the kings of the earth and their armies assembled to make war with Him who sits on the horse and with His army.
“And the beast was seized, and with him the false prophet who did the signs in his presence, by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image. These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire which burns with brimstone. And the rest were killed with the sword which came from the mouth of Him who sits on the horse, and all the birds were filled with their flesh.” Revelation 19:11-21
Unless stated otherwise, scriptural citations taken from the Legacy Standard Bible (LSB).
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