L’angelo vicario del Dio d’Israele

Origine e necessità di una funzione politica sostitutiva

Abstract

First published in Angeli delle Nazioni. Origine e sviluppi di una figura teologico-politica («Politica e Religione», 2007), pp. 17-53.

This paper analyzes the origins of the concept of the Angel of the Nation within the Judaic tradition. The main features and functions of the intermediary figure of the divine messenger mal’āk YHWH are examined. We focus particularly on the problematic nature of the relationship between the mal’āk and YHWH, and on the exegetical tradition’s interpretations – not always convincing – of that relationship. We then go on to propose an historico-religious solution, examining the process in which the Semitic pantheon is replaced by YHWH, the only God of Israel; monotheism, however, did not succeed in deleting the function of the intermediary, instead gradually transferring it to the mal’āk, who acts like an intermediary and partakes of its sender’s power, while always recalling a divine world inhabited by a plurality of gods.