Journal: Westminster Theological Journal
Volume: WTJ 86:2 (Fall 2024)
Article: Defending Christophanies: A Response To Greg Palys On Exodus 33–34 And 2 Corinthians 3–4
Author: Matt Foreman

WTJ 86:2 (Fall 2024) p. 137

Defending Christophanies: A Response To Greg Palys On Exodus 33–34 And 2 Corinthians 3–4

Matt Foreman

And

Doug Van Dorn

Matt Foreman is pastor of Faith Reformed Baptist Church in Media, PA, and lecturer in Practical Theology at Reformed Baptist Seminary.

Doug Van Dorn is pastor of Reformed Baptist Church of Northern Colorado in Boulder.

In the April 2023 edition of Themelios, citing Exod 33–34 and 2 Cor 3–4, Greg Palys argues that all OT Christophanies are inappropriate. But a more thorough exegesis of these verses disproves his thesis. The context and intertextual connections of Exod 33–34 actually favor seeing God the Son as the “angel of God’s presence” personally acting in the passage. In 2 Cor 3–4, Palys fails to understand the distinction between the covenantal mediators. Moses was a “second-hand” mediator, who had some fading glory. But the Son is the original mediator, who has always been the radiating image of God, now fully revealed to all believers. Paul’s language actually supports a Christophany interpretation of the OT. Christians today should join the overwhelming consensus of Christian interpretive history in identifying the real presence and activity of the Son in the OT.

I. Introduction

From the earliest days of the church, Christians have argued that the Trinity was revealed in both the OT and the NT.1 In the OT, attention has rightly focused on the “Angel of the Lord” as a pre-incarnate revelation

WTJ 86:2 (Fall 2024) p. 138

of God the Son. John Calvin summarizes this understanding:

We have said that in the books of Moses the name of Jehovah is often attributed to the presiding Angel, who was undoubtedly the only-begotten Son of God. He is indeed very God, and yet in the person of Mediator by dispensation, he is inferior to God. I willingly receive what ancient writers teach on this subject—that when Christ anciently appeared in human form, it was a prelude to the mystery which was afterwards exhibited when God was manifested in the flesh.2

Similarly, Jonathan Edwards wrote,

When we read of God appearing after the fall, in some visible form or outward symbol of his presence, we are ordinarily, if not universally, to understand it of the second person of the Trinity.