An examination of Hosea 12:4-5 using an interlinear Bible reveals that the Angel of Yahweh is Yahweh Sabaoth (the Lord of Hosts):

Hosea 12:4-5 reads as follows:

And, yes, he struggled with the Angel and prevailed. He wept and sought favour from Him. He found him in Bethel and there He spoke to us, that is Yahweh God of Hosts. His memorable name is Yahweh.

Hosea 12:4-5 Interlinear

This means that the same God who sits on the throne in Heaven came Himself and spoke to people on earth such as Jacob, Hagar, Moses , Abraham , Manoah and Gideon. Human rulers send emissaries. They don’t leave their thrones and come themselves, but our God is dynamic and left His throne to come and deal with people on the earth. I really like that about Him. The most remarkable visitation to the earth was, of course, when He came as Jesus Christ. It is remarkable because of the length of time that He spent here during that visit and because of the fact that He became a Man to visit. The most remarkable thing of all was that He died on the cross during that visit to save those of us who believe in Him.

As Christians we need to be as dynamic and energetic as He is regarding reaching out to people.

Compare Job 33:4 with John 1:1-5, Colossians 1:15-16 and Hebrews 1:2-3

The Spirit of God has made me;
    the breath of the Almighty gives me life.

Job 33:4 NIV

¹ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was with God in the beginning. ³ Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. ⁴ In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. ⁵ The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

John 1:1-5 NIV

He is the image of the invisible God, the Firstborn over all creation. Because in Him were created all things in the heavens and upon the earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities. All things through Him and into Him have been created. And He is before all things and all things in Him hold together.

Colossians 1:15-17 Interlinear

² but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. ³ The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word…

Hebrews 1:2-3 NIV

It is clear from Job 33:4 that the Holy Spirit created human beings. The three New Testament verses make it clear that Jesus was responsible for creating everything. Human beings form a part of the creation of all things and are a part of the universe. Therefore, Jesus created human beings. Clearly Jesus was the Holy Spirit before He was Jesus. The Holy Spirit became the Man, Jesus Christ, and came and died for the creation that He had created to restore it back to God.

Compare Nehemiah 9:20 and Exodus 23:20-22

²⁰ You gave your good Spirit to instruct them. You did not withhold your manna from their mouths, and you gave them water for their thirst.

Nehemiah 9:20 NIV

²⁰ “See, I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared. ²¹ Pay attention to him and listen to what he says. Do not rebel against him; he will not forgive your rebellion, since my Name is in him. ²² If you listen carefully to what he says and do all that I say, I will be an enemy to your enemies and will oppose those who oppose you.

Exodus 23:20-22 NIV

There can be little doubt that the Holy Spirit and the Angel of Yahweh are one and the same and that the Holy Spirit is an angel. However, He is not merely an angel. He is the Angel. The firstborn over all creation and the other angels were created through Him.

In Biblical thinking an angel and a spirit seem to be the same thing. When Peter is miraculously freed from prison in Acts 12 and knocked at the door of Mary the mother of John, the disciples did not believe it was him, but thought that it was his angel:

¹² When this had dawned on him, he went to the house of Mary the mother of John, also called Mark, where many people had gathered and were praying. ¹³ Peter knocked at the outer entrance, and a servant named Rhoda came to answer the door. ¹⁴ When she recognized Peter’s voice, she was so overjoyed she ran back without opening it and exclaimed, “Peter is at the door!”

¹⁵ “You’re out of your mind,” they told her. When she kept insisting that it was so, they said, “It must be his angel.”

Acts 12:12-15 NIV

The meaning here seems to be that the disciples thought that Peter had been executed in prison and that it was Peter’s spirit who was at the door. I guess another word for it is the word ‘ghost’. The disciples thought that Rhoda was seeing Peter’s ghost. Interestingly, the Holy Spirit is also referred to as the Holy Ghost. Therefore, the words ‘angel’, ‘spirit’ and ‘ghost’ seem to be synonymous.

In Exodus 6:2-3 the preposition on the word בְּאֵ֣ל means either ‘in’ or ‘with’. It does not mean ‘as’ because כְּ is the prefix which means ‘as’. Therefore, the verse does not read:

….. I am Yahweh and I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as El Shaddai…

Rather, the verse either reads as:

….I am Yahweh and I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob in El Shaddai…

or the verse reads as:

….I am Yahweh and I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob with El Shaddai…

No matter which of the two is the correct translation, in either case it is apparent that El Shaddai is the Angel of Yahweh.

If the verse reads that Yahweh was ‘in’ El Shaddai we can understand this in terms of Exodus 23:21 where the Father tells Moses that His Name is in the Angel. If the verse reads that Yahweh was ‘with’ El Shaddai we can understand this in terms of Judges 6:21-23 where we see that after the Angel of Yahweh departed from Gideon that the Father, the invisible Yahweh, was still present and spoke to Gideon reassuring him that he would not die in spite of having seen the Angel of Yahweh face to face.

In the New Testament Jesus spoke of the Father both living ‘in’ Him and being ‘with’ Him. In John 14:10 Jesus says:

¹⁰ Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.

John 14:10 NIV

In John 16:32 Jesus says:

³² “A time is coming and in fact has come when you will be scattered, each to your own home. You will leave me all alone. Yet I am not alone, for my Father is with me.

John 16:32 NIV

Genesis 48 makes it clear that El Shaddai is the Angel of Yahweh. In verse 3 Jacob tells Joseph that El Shaddai appeared to him at Luz. In verses 15 and 16 Jacob, still speaking to Joseph, calls the God that has fed him all his life, the Angel Who has redeemed him:

And he blessed Joseph and said, ‘The God Whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked before, the God Who has fed me all my life to this day, the Angel Who has redeemed me from all evil bless the boys…

Genesis 48:15-16 Interlinear

It is clear that El Shaddai is the Angel of Yahweh.

An examination of Hosea 12:4-5 using an interlinear Bible reveals that the Angel of Yahweh is Yahweh Sabaoth (the Lord of Hosts):

Hosea 12:4-5 reads as follows:

And, yes, he struggled with the Angel and prevailed. He wept and sought favour from Him. He found him in Bethel and there He spoke to us, that is Yahweh God of Hosts. His memorable name is Yahweh.

Hosea 12:4-5 Interlinear

However, in Zechariah 1:12 the Angel of Yahweh speaks to the Father addressing the Father as Yahweh Sabaoth:

And answered the Angel of Yahweh and said: ‘Yahweh of Hosts, how long will You not have mercy on Jerusalem and on the cities of Judah against which You were angry this seventy years.

Zechariah 1:12 Interlinear

If one examines the previous verses it becomes clear that the Father is not physically present at the scene and that the Angel of Yahweh is actually praying to the Father.

In Zechariah 1:13 the Father answers the Angel with good and comforting words. However, it appears that only the Angel can hear the words of the Father. Then in verse 14 the Angel instructs Zechariah to proclaim the words of the Father:

And answered Yahweh the Angel who talked to me with good words and comforting words. So said to me the Angel Who spoke with me proclaim saying thus says Yahweh of Hosts I am zealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with great zeal.

Zechariah 1:13-14 Interlinear

If you take a verse like Exodus 23:21 into account where the Father tells Moses that His name is in the Angel, it becomes understandable that the Father and the Angel are both called Yahweh Sabaoth. The Father is the invisible Yahweh Sabaoth, while the Angel is the visible Yahweh Sabaoth.

The New Testament provides far greater understanding with regard to how it is possible that the Angel of Yahweh and the Father are both Yahweh Sabaoth. In John 10:30 Jesus says: ‘I and the Father are one.’ In John 14:9 Jesus tells one of His disciples that anyone who has seen Him has seen the Father:

⁹ Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’?

John 14:9 NIV

In John 14:10 Jesus says:

¹⁰ Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.

John 14:10 NIV

It doesn’t get much clearer than that. Just as the Father lived in Jesus when Jesus pre-existed as the Angel of Yahweh (the Holy Spirit) the Father lived in Jesus while He was on the earth.

Obviously the Father continues to live in Jesus even today because the two of them are one. The Father lives in Christians if they obey Jesus’ commandments, and they too become one with Him in the same way that Jesus and the Father are one.

In Isaiah 6 when Isaiah says that he has seen the Lord of Hosts, he was saying that he had seen the visible Lord of Hosts. He was, however, also in the presence of the invisible Lord of Hosts Who lives within the Angel of Yahweh.

The Angel of Yahweh did not always look the same when people saw Him. Although, at certain times, He appeared looking like a man, there were also times when He appeared to people looking different to a man. For example, when He appeared to Moses in the burning bush He looked like flames of fire. When He appeared to Manoah and his wife and went up in the fire, He must have undergone a transformation from looking like a man to turning into fire on front of Manoah and his wife:

²⁰ As the flame blazed up from the altar toward heaven, the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame. Seeing this, Manoah and his wife fell with their faces to the ground.

Judges 13:20

In Ezekiel 1 He is seen by Ezekiel as a man Who is burning with fire:

²⁶ Above the vault over their heads was what looked like a throne of lapis lazuli, and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man. ²⁷ I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him.

Ezekiel 1:26-27 NIV

The reason that the Angel of Yahweh could transform into fire is because He is an Angel. Hebrews 1:7 confirms that angels, the servants of God, can become flames of fire:

⁷ In speaking of the angels he says,

“He makes his angels spirits,
    and his servants flames of fire.”^[a]

Hebrews 1:7 NIV

The fact that the Angel of Yahweh can transform into flames of fire, is key to helping us understand Who the Angel of Yahweh really is. The Angel of Yahweh is the Holy Spirit, Who descended onto Mount Sinai as fire and Who appeared as tongues of fire on the disciples who were gathered together in the upper room on the Day of Pentecost.

In Isaiah 63 we are told that the Holy Spirit is an Angel:

⁸ He said, “Surely they are my people,
    children who will be true to me”;
    and so he became their Savior.
⁹ In all their distress he too was distressed,
    and the angel of his presence saved them.^[a^]
In his love and mercy he redeemed them;
    he lifted them up and carried them
    all the days of old.
¹⁰ Yet they rebelled
    and grieved his Holy Spirit.
So he turned and became their enemy
    and he himself fought against them.

Isaiah 63:8-10 NIV

We see from Isaiah 63 that the Holy Spirit is a very special Angel called the Angel of His presence. He was called the Angel of His presence because Yahweh the Father lived in Him and spoke through Him.

In Exodus 6: 2-3 we are told by Yahweh the Father what the specific name of this Angel is and that the Father is present within Him:

² And God said to Moses, “I am Yahweh—‘the Lord.’ ³ I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob in El-Shaddai but I did not reveal my name, Yahweh, to them.

Exodus 6:2-3

Although commonly translated as God telling Moses that He appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as El Shaddai, this is not what the verse actually says. The correct translation of the verse says that He appeared to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in El Shaddai. I have corrected the Interlinear translation above to read ‘in’ El Shaddai because the preposition on the word ‘el’ is בְּ which is the preposition ‘in’ in ancient Hebrew.

In Exodus 6:2-3 the preposition בְּ is attached to the beginning of the word אֵ֣ל forming the word בְּאֵ֣ל. The word אֵ֣ל is the ‘El’ of El Shaddai. If you look at the blue parts of speech under the original Hebrew text the preposition is listed as Prep-b. Prep-b, according to the Hebrew parsing, means ‘in’ (https://biblehub.com/hebrewparse.htm). It does not mean ‘as’ because כְּ is the preposition which means ‘as’ (8af3842462324e4d5443b28852f9368b3e9aa672.html). Therefore, the verse does not read:

….. I am Yahweh and I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob as El Shaddai…

Rather, the verse reads as:

….I am Yahweh and I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob in El Shaddai…

Therefore, the Angel of Yahweh, Who appeared as flames of fire in the burning bush, is the Holy Spirit and the name of the Holy Spirit is El Shaddai, which means God of the Mountains. In Moses’ blessing to the tribes of Israel he described the Holy Spirit, the visible Yahweh, in relation to three of these mountains, Sinai, Seir and Paran:

33 This is the blessing that Moses the man of God pronounced on the Israelites before his death. ² He said:

“The Lord came from Sinai
    and dawned over them from Seir;
    he shone forth from Mount Paran.
He came with^[a] myriads of holy ones
    from the south, from his mountain slopes.^[b]

Deuteronomy 33:1-2 NIV

In Ezekiel 1:26 we see that the throne of the Holy Spirit looks like lapis lazuli:

²⁶ Above the vault over their heads was what looked like a throne of lapis lazuli, and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man.

Ezekiel 1:26 NIV

This is what lapis lazuli looks like:

I am so glad that our God loves bright colours.

If you study verse 28 of Ezekiel 1 very carefully, the rainbow seems to be what is described as the ‘likeness’ or resemblance of the Glory of God:

²⁸ Like the appearance of the bow that is in the cloud on the day of rain, so was the appearance of the brightness all around.

Such was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. And when I saw it, I fell on my face, and I heard the voice of one speaking.

Ezekiel 1:28 ESV

See the Interlinear version as well at: https://biblehub.com/interlinear/ezekiel/1-28.htm which makes this clearer.

When I was writing the article Finding Jesus in the Old Testament the Lord spoke to me about how the Holy Spirit was the Rainbow that God placed in the sky after the flood. Ezekiel 1:28 corroborates what He told me.

In ancient Sumerian literature the fallen angels Inanna and Enlil are referred to as rainbows. In the Sumerian story ‘Inana and Šu-kale-tuda the South wind’ Inanna is said to have stretched herself across the sky like a rainbow and in ‘Enlil in E-Kur’ Enlil is described as spanning the sky as the rainbow.

⁴ And there before me was the glory of the God of Israel, as in the vision I had seen in the plain.

⁵ Then he said to me, “Son of man, look toward the north…….

Ezekiel 8:4-5 NIV

The Glory of the God of Israel is the Holy Spirit. Verse 4 would be clearer for the reader if the word ‘glory’ was capitalized so that the verse reads: ‘And there before me was the Glory of the God of Israel…’

The Glory of the God of Israel is initially seen by Ezekiel in Ezekiel chapter 1:

²⁵ Then there came a voice from above the vault over their heads as they stood with lowered wings. ²⁶ Above the vault over their heads was what looked like a throne of lapis lazuli, and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man. ²⁷ I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him. ²⁸ Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him….

Ezekiel 1:25-28 NIV