Initially it may seem strange to argue that a Jewish author would
so interpret Daniel 7 as to produce an exalted view of Adam and Abel, even
substituting the former for the Ancient of Days. However, it has long been
known that the Christian community, a distinctly Jewish community at its
inception, made significant use of Daniel 7 in its exaltation of Jesus. This
tendency of early Christianity to exalt a human figure, Jesus of Nazareth,
beyond the status and function of ordinary humanity, is understood by L. Hurtado
as 'standard fare in post-exilic Judaism' and was paralleled by what Casey
calls a 'process of development of purely Jewish figures' also by communities
other than Christian in Middle Judaism (Hurtado, One God, One Lord, p.
51).
Rev. 1.13-14 demonstrates how the Christian community interpreted both
the Ancient of Days and the Son of Man of Daniel 7 in light of its
allegiance to Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus is given attributes from each figure:
the designation 'one like a son of man' and hair like white 'wool'.
Rev. 1.13-14: and in the midst of the lampstands I saw one like a
Son of Man, clothed with a long robe and with a white sash across his chest.
His head and his hair were white as white wool, white as snow; his eyes were
like a flame of fire.
Concerning this connection of Jesus and the Ancient of Days, Casey
writes:
It is not impossible that John identified the Ancient of days as
Jesus. Some Jewish exegetes saw an angelic figure here, Galipapa identified him
as Mattathias, and the identification as Jesus was held by Ephrem . . . At this
time Jewish authors did reuse such imagery in their descriptions of the
intermediary figures characteristic of their apocalyptic works, and it is
consistent with John's use of the rest of the OT to suppose that he did the
same (Casey, Son of Man, p. 146).
Beside the Christian interpretation of Jesus in the tradition of
the Ancient of Days and the one like a son of man, there is the angel Iaoel of
the Apocalypse of Abraham. In this text Iaoel is described like Jesus
was, with characteristics derived from both figures of Daniel 7.
Apoc. Abr.
10.4: "The angel [Iaoel] he sent me to me in the likeness of a man
came . . . (emphasis mine)
Apoc. Abr.
11.2: The appearance of his body was like sapphire, and the aspect of his face
was like chrysolite, and the hair of his head like snow . . . (emphasis
mine)
Jesus and Iaoel as the 'Son of Man' and the 'Ancient of Days'
illustrates the diversity of opinion over the identity of the ambiguous figures
of Dan. 7.9-27. Speculation over the divine status of the 'Son of Man' could be
encouraged by the text of Dan. 7.13. A Feuillet has shown how the accompaniment
of clouds at the appearance of the 'one like a son of man' (Dan. 7.13) can be
taken to indicate a divine figure since clouds often accompany Old Testament
theophanies (A. Feuilet, 'Le fils de l'homme de Daniel et le tradition biblique,
RB [1953], pp. 170-202 [197-88]). Goldingay notes how the 'one like a
son of man' comes with or among the clouds, not on them, and adds that clouds
came to collect Moses in Josephus (Ant. 4.4.48) and Jesus in the New
Testament (Acts 1.9) (Goldingay, Daniel, p. 171). The Testament of
Abraham adds to the controversy over this text through its near deification
of Adam and Abel, both of whom are granted divine characteristics by the
author. Even a figure like Adam, known as the fallen head of the human race in
Genesis, could be interpreted as the 'Ancient of days' when the characteristics
of this rather ambiguous Danielic figure were interpreted in a broader light. (Phillip
B. Munoa, III, Four Powers in Heaven: The Interpretation of Daniel 7 in the
Testament of Abraham [Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha
Supplement Series 28; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998], 62-64)