Page:Keil and Delitzsch,Biblical commentary the old testament the pentateuch, trad James Martin, volume 1, 1885.djvu/193

 appearance of an angel,” is not in harmony with all the statements of the Bible. The form of the Angel of Jehovah, which was discernible by the senses, varied according to the purpose of the appearance; and, apart from Gen 21:17 and Gen 22:11, we have a sufficient proof that it was not a real angelic appearance, or the appearance of a created angel, in the fact that in two instances it was not really an angel at all, but a flame of fire and a shining cloud which formed the earthly substratum of the revelation of God in the Angel of Jehovah (Exo 3:2; Exo 14:19), unless indeed we are to regard natural phenomena as angels, without any scriptural warrant for doing so. These earthly substrata of the manifestation of the “Angel of Jehovah” perfectly suffice to establish the conclusion, that the Angel of Jehovah was only a peculiar form in which Jehovah Himself appeared, and which differed from the manifestations of God described as appearances of Jehovah simply in this, that in “the Angel of Jehovah,” God or Jehovah revealed Himself in a mode which was more easily discernible by human senses, and exhibited in a guise of symbolical significance the design of each particular manifestation. In the appearances of Jehovah no reference is made to any form visible to the bodily eye, unless they were through the medium of a vision or a dream, excepting in one instance (Gen 18), ), where Jehovah and two angels come to Abraham in the form of three men, and are entertained