Texts in Conversation
The Apocalypse of Zephaniah and Revelation both describe a fiery angel with a shining face and a golden sash, and in each they fall down and are told not to worship the angel. Both draw on Jewish angel traditions that developed in this period.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Apocalypse of Zephaniah 6:11
Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses
9 When I saw him, I was so afraid of him that every part of my body trembled, and I threw myself on my face. 10 I could not stand, and I began to pray before the Lord Almighty: "You will rescue me from this distress, you who rescued Israel from the hand of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. You rescued Susanna from the hand of the wicked elders. You rescued the three holy men, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, from the blazing, fiery furnace. I beg you to rescue me too from this distress." 11 Then I got up and stood, and I saw a great angel standing in front of me. His face shone like the rays of the sun in its glory, and his face was like the face of one filled with his glory. 12 He wore what looked like a golden belt around his chest, and his feet were like brass glowing in the fire. 13 When I saw him, I was glad, because I thought that the Lord Almighty had come to visit me. 14 I threw myself on my face and worshipped him. 15 He said to me, "Take care! Do not worship me. I am not the Lord Almighty; I am the great angel Eremiel, who is over the abyss and the underworld below, in whose hand all the souls have been shut up since the end of the Flood that came upon the earth, until this day."
Date: 100 BCE – 175 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
Revelation 1:13
New Testament
12 I turned to see whose voice was speaking to me, and when I did so, I saw seven golden lampstands, 13 and in the midst of the lampstands was one like a son of man. He was dressed in a robe extending down to his feet, and he wore a wide golden belt around his chest. 14 His head and hair were as white as wool, even as white as snow, and his eyes were like a fiery flame. 15 His feet were like polished bronze refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters. 16 He held seven stars in his right hand, and a sharp double-edged sword extended out of his mouth. His face shone like the sun shining at full strength. 17 When I saw him I fell down at his feet as though I were dead, but he placed his right hand on me and said: “Do not be afraid! I am the first and the last, 18 and the one who lives! I was dead, but look, now I am alive—forever and ever—and I hold the keys of death and of Hades!
Date: 92–96 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
Notes and References
"... The worship of angels aligned with God is also vigorously rejected in some Jewish and Jewish-Christian documents which do so within the narrative context of an angelophanic encounter. The passages listed below (where possible, with approximate dates of the writing) consist of prohibitions directed against a seer's revering reaction to the presence of an angelic figure ... In addition there are passages in the New Testament, as well as in later Jewish and Christian writings which, though not always in an angelophanic setting, may well have been formally influenced by this "refusal tradition." Here we may especially note Mark 10:17-18 and parallels ("Good Teacher..."; "Do not call me good; nobody is good except one, God"); Acts 10:25 (Peter's rejection of Cornelius' prostration); History of the Rechabites 5:3b-6:3 (a mild reprimand of Zosimus' posture); Joseph and Aseneth 14:9-11 (implicit rejection of Aseneth's fearful reaction) and 15:11-12 (esp. the longer recension; refusal to divulge name after Aseneth declares her intention to praise the angelic figure) ..."
Loren T. Stuckenbruck, Angel Veneration and Christology: A Study in Early Judaism and in the Christology of the Apocalypse of John, Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2. Reihe 70 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1995), 75–76.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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