While he believes the Ancient of Days to be God (the Father) and not the archangel Michael (a point of departure with Latter-day Saint theology), Peter R. Carrell writes that God the Father has been seen in the Old Testament:
. . . although it could be argued
that the appearance of the Ancient of Days with details given about his
clothing and the hair of his head seems to be contrary to the OT precept that
no one may see God and live (cf. Exod. 33.20, Judg. 13.22), such a vision is,
however, in line with other accounts in the OT. Thus, in both 1 Kings 22.19 (‘I
saw the LORD sitting on his throne, with all the host of heaven standing beside
him’) and Isaiah 6.1 (‘I saw the Lord sitting on a throne’), there is an implicit
suggestion that God may be ‘seen’ in certain circumstances. (Peter R. Carrell, Jesus
and the Angels: Angelology and the Christology of the Apocalypse of John [Society
for New Testament Studies Monograph Series 95; Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1997], 36)
