MICHAEL krp, (who as God? Sept.
MryojX). This, which seems to have been a mon name among the Jews (comp. Num. xiii. 13 ; Chron. v. 13, 14 ; vi. 4o ; vii. 3 ; viii. 16 ; xii. 20 ; XXVii. 18 ; 2 Chron. xxi. 2, 4 ; Ezek. viii. 8), is the name given to one of the chief angels, who, in Dan. x. 13-21, is described as having special charge of the Israelites as a nation ; and in Jude 9 as dis puting with Satan about the body of Moses, in which dispute, instead of bringing against the arch-enemy any railing accusation, he only said, The Lord rebuke thee !' Again, in Rev. xii. 7-9, Michael and his angels are represented as warring with Satan and his angels in the upper regions (4v 74; ot)pa4), from which the latter are cast down upon the earth. This is all the reference to Michael which we find in the Bible.
On the authority of the first of these texts the Jews have made Michael not only one of the ' seven' archangels, but the chief of them ; and on the authority of all three the Christian church has been disposed to concur in this impression. The Jews regard the archangels as being such, not simply as a class by themselves, but as respectively the chiefs of the several classes into which they suppose the angels to be divided; and of these classes Michael is the head of the first, and there fore chief of all the archangels (Sepher Othioth, fol. 16).
The passages in Daniel and Revelations must be taken as symbolical, and in that view offer little difficulty. The allusion in Jude 9 is more difficult to understand, unless, with Vitringa, Lardner, Macknight, and others, we regard it also as sym bolical ; in which case the dispute referred to is that indicated in Zech. iii. i ; and the body of Moses' as a symbolical phrase for the Mosaical law and institutions. A comparison of Jude 9 with Zech. iii. I gives much force and probability to this conjecture.—J. K.
[There seems good reason for regarding Michael as a name of the Messiah. Such was the opinion of the best among the ancient Jews ('Wetstein, N. T., note on Jude 9 ; Surenhusius Biblos Katall., p. 701, etc.) With this all the Bible representations of Michael agree. He appears as the Great Prince who standeth for Israel (Dan. xii. 1), and he is called prince of Israel' (Dan x. 21) ; expressions which may be compared with that used in chap ix. 25 of the Messiah. So in the N. T. Michael appears as the defender of the church against Satan (Rev. xii. 7), the special work of the Christ (i John iii. 8). The allusion in Jude 9 can hardly be understood as above suggested ; for though the church is called the body of Christ (Eph. i. 23), it is not in such a sense as admits of our giving an analogous explanation to the phrase body of Moses ;' the ancient Jewish state was never so in corporated into Moses as the spiritual church is into Christ. Jude doubtless cites here a Jewish tradition which there is no reason for not regarding as true ; for aught that can be shown to the con trary, Satan and the Logos, as Michael, may have contended for the body of Moses as a deep symbol of their grand contest for the spiritual dominion of the race. The appearance of Moses in a body at the transfiguration gives some countenance to the belief that he was on this occasion delivered from him that hath the power of death, and, like Elijah, triumphantly carried into heaven. As for an order of archangels, Scripture knows nothing of it. The Bible names but one archangel, Mi chael, the archangel, even the Lord, who shall come to judge the quick and the dead (1 Thess. iv. I6).]