Daniel 10:12-14
The prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me
The delay is twenty-one days and the prayer was heard on the first. The explanation given is not silence but resistance, and Michael is the help sent.
People of the Bible
Michael
Called one of the chief princes, and the only one who fights, and he will not pick an argument he is not given.
Where Gabriel explains, Michael stands. Daniel is told that a messenger was withstood twenty-one days by the prince of the kingdom of Persia until Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help. The same chapter calls him your prince, meaning Israel’s, and the phrase is repeated. He is never described. No wings, no face, no height, nothing that would let a painter start. What the text gives instead is a function and a side.
Scroll down to the storyThe movements, in the order the text gives them.
The story of Michael
- 01
- 02
Daniel 10:21
Michael your prince
The messenger says none holds with me in these things but Michael. The relationship is stated as an alliance rather than a hierarchy.
- 03
Daniel 12:1
At that time shall Michael stand up
He is the great prince which stands for the children of thy people, and his standing up coincides with a time of trouble such as never was.
- 04
Jude 1:9
The Lord rebuke thee
In a dispute about the body of Moses he brings no railing accusation. The archangel is quoted as an example of what not to say rather than of power.
- 05
Revelation 12:7-9
There was war in heaven
Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon prevailed not. The one cast out is named four ways in a single verse.
Why it matters
Jude records the one scene where he refuses to use his rank. Disputing with the devil about the body of Moses, he durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said the Lord rebuke thee. The restraint is the point of the citation. Then Revelation gives him the war: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought and prevailed not, and the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil and Satan.
5 songs
The music
Every song in the catalogue whose passage falls inside these chapters.
