Christophany

A Christophany is an appearance or non-physical manifestation of Christ. Traditionally the term refers to visions of Christ after his ascension, such as the bright light of the conversion of Paul the Apostle. Also, following the example of Justin Martyr who identified the Angel of the Lord with the Logos,in The new Schaff-Herzog encyclopedia of religious knowledge: vol 11,1912 "the practise of the Greek Fathers from Justin Martyr, who identified the "angel of the Lord " with the Logos, furnish excuse for conceiving also the theophanies of the Old Testament as christophanies." some appearances of angels in the Hebrew Bible are also identified by some Christians as preincarnate appearances of Christ. The etymology is from the Greek Χριστός (Christos) and the ending "-phany", coming from the Greek verb φαίνειν phainein "bring to light, cause to appear, show." This noun is derived by direct comparison with the term Theophany (Theophaneia''). George Balderston Kidd (1852) popularised the term in relation to the identification of angels in the Old Testament as Christ. The term was used by Albert Joseph Edmunds (1857–1941) in relation to the revealing of Christ in Christianity and Buddhism. Since the work of James Borland (1978) usage of the term in conservative Christian publications related to Old Testament appearances of Christ has multiplied exponentially. Certain early Christian writers identified the Angel of the Lord as a pre-incarnate Christ. For example, Justin Martyr claimed that the Angel was the Logos. He writes that "He who is called God and appeared to the patriarchs is called both Angel and Lord ...The word of God, therefore, recorded by Moses, when referring to Jacob the grandson of Abraham, speaks thus" and that "neither Abraham, nor Isaac, nor Jacob, nor any other man saw the Father ... but saw Him who was according to His will His Son, being God, and the Angel because He ministered to His will". Irenaeus also held to this view; he wrote that "when the Son speaks to Moses, He says, 'I have come down to deliver this people'.