Slojodan

Hey Guys,

On a Jewish forum, I was discussing spiritual warfare, and the Host of Heaven came up. I looked up Host of Heaven in the JPS, and this is what I found:

Deu 17:3 " and hath gone and served other gods, and worshipped them, or the sun, or the moon, or any of the host of heaven, which I have commanded not; "

1Ki 22:19 "And he said: 'Therefore hear thou the word of the LORD. I saw the LORD sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by Him on His right hand and on his left."

2Ki 21:5 "And he built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the LORD. "

Nehemiah 9:6 "and the host of heaven worshippeth Thee. "

So to backtrack, The host of heaven is at G-d's side, worships G-d, but is also worshipped by idolators.

Then it gets interesting. There is Judgement on the host

Isa 24:21 "And it shall come to pass in that day, that the LORD will punish the host of the high heaven on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth. "

Isa 34:4 "And all the host of heaven shall moulder away, and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll; and all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig- tree. "

Dan 8:10 "And it waxed great, even to the host of heaven; and some of the host and of the stars it cast down to the ground, and trampled upon them"

So now I'm confused. I would think the host of heaven were angels, but the Lord will punish the host first of all, which implies they did something wrong. Then in Isaiah 34:4 it says all of them will moulder away and the host will fall down. Then in Daniel it says SOME of them will be cast down and trampled.

So putting it all together, is it that the host are angels that were worshipped by humans and then punished for it? How come all of them dissolve in Isaiah, but in Daniel it's only some of them. And are those who are cast down in Daniel by the Lord's side in the Torah and Kings? Your thoughts? What exactly is the host of heaven?

Thanks,

--Dan

spin

While the host of heaven is a conundrum, its use in Daniel is strictly allegorical, as is much in the second half of the book, though its significance is relatively transparent if one doesn't cloud the issue with christian reinterpretation.

Daniel 8:8 refers to Alexander as the great horn and Macedonia is the male goat, yet at the height of his power the horn is broken, to be replaced by the four horns of Alexander's successors. From Seleucus, one of the successors, eventually comes Antiochus IV, the little horn, also the little horn in 7:8, and the prince who is to come in 9:26, as well as the last king of the north, 11:21ff (kings of the north are Seleucids, while the kings of the south are Ptolemies).

Antiochus IV was the polluter of the Jerusalem temple in 167 BCE. He had already dethroned the high priest Onias III (the prince of the host in 8:11) and in 167 he set out to do away with the heathen religion, thus making a vigorous attack on the Jerusalem priesthood. The priests were god's servants on earth just as the angels were his servants in heaven. God's hosts in heaven are made up of angels, who are analogous to the priests on earth. Antiochus stopped regular sacrifice (8:11b, 9:27a, and 11:31b).

As the text of Daniel is allegorical, we should note all the priestliness of this host from heaven and see it as the Jerusalem priesthood.

Remember that the christian interpretation of Daniel is generally, overtly wrong.


spin

CJD

spin, with all due respect, what you've proffered above is the Christian interpretation. Let's not base our idea of what constitutes a 'Christian' interpretation on the 'end-times' fanaticism that has gripped certain western Christan sects.

CJD

spin

It is the general scholarly analysis.

The non-scholarly analysis, which is seen in most christian circles, of the prophecy of the 70 weeks in Dan 9 is that we are dealing with the messiah Jesus and the coming christian apocalypse.

It may be that the only christian analysis, other than that supported by the scholarly community, that I have heard for Dan 8 is base "on the 'end-times' fanaticism that has gripped certain western Christan sects", which cashes out in my understanding to be very many evangelical groups throughout the world.

Most christians keep out of chapter 11.

I guess I should have said,

Remember that most christian interpretations of Daniel are generally, overtly wrong.


spin

Loomis

I’m a big Star Trek fan and have had a similar problem with R-mulans. (My parents and grandparents were Star Trek fans too.)

After giving the issue much consideration, I have come to the conclusion that R-mulans are fictional characters. And as such, there is no exact answer to define what R-mulans are.

In any case you might want to google "Sons of El," “Divine Council,� or “Morning Stars.�

The host of heaven had a hierarchical arrangement. It included a supreme deity named El who was accompanied in the heavenly realm by other gods. (Yahweh, Chemosh, Milcom, Baal, Qos, etc.)

In later permutations the cast changed: Yahweh became supreme deity (El was forgotten by the wayside), and all the other gods were recast as evil bad guys.

Finally in the last season polytheism was almost completely abandoned. The screenwriters weren’t sure what to do with those “other gods,� so they embellished the concept of “messengers� and recast them again as “angels.�

Jedi Mind Trick

Novice question here…

Could it be that the hosts of heaven are the 70(?) sons of El? Yahweh, having taken El’s place as the most high god?

Edit to add:
The post above mine already covered this... Sorry.

webwide

I had not looked at this phrase since deconversion, but now that you mention it I can plainly see that the 'host of heaven' is a general reference to the planets and stars and/or comets and meteors. Try re-reading those verses with that interpretation and see how it works for you......

Nero's Boot

I always believed those passages were in reference to other divine beings, whom YHWH opposed out of spite.

--the Old Testament danced merrily around the possibility of other Gods NB