Joshua 5:14

A brother asked a hermit, 'Is it good to be always repenting?' He answered, 'We have seen Joshua the son of Nun; it was when he was lying prostrate on his face that God appeared to him' (cf. Josh. 5:14).

And he says: "I am the prince of the host of the Lord's power; now I have come." And when he had heard this, Jesus worshiped and said: "Lord, what do you command your servant?" What is it that Jesus teaches us through this? That, without doubt, which the Apostle says: "do not believe every spirit, but test whether it is of God." Jesus, then, recognized not only that "he is of God," but that he is God; for he would not have worshiped had he not recognized God. For who else is the "prince of the host of the Lord's powers" but our Lord Jesus Christ? For all the host of heaven, whether angels or archangels, or powers "or dominions or principalities or authorities," all these, which were made through him, do military service under him as prince, who is the prince of princes and who bestows principalities upon princes. For it is he who says in the Gospel: "be one having authority over ten cities," and to another: "be one having authority over five cities." It is he who, "having received the kingdom, returned."

The same words, you will remember, were said by the same Lord to Moses at the beginning of the vision of the Bush, for Scripture says: "And when the Lord saw that he drew nigh to see, He called him from the midst of the Bush, saying, Moses, Moses, come not near here; loose thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground." So, then, the command that was given shews that the God Who answered on both occasions was one and the same. Though here He prophesies through the Chief and Captain of His power, and to Moses by the vision of the angel. And of the heavenly armies, celestial powers and invisible spirits, holy angels and archangels ministering to God the King of kings and the Lord of lords (as Daniel says: "Thousand thousands ministered to him, and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him"), what other could be highest of all but the Word of God, His Firstborn Wisdom, His Divine Offspring? Rightly, then, He is here called Chief Captain of the Power of the Lord, as also elsewhere "Angel of Great Counsel," "Throned with the Father," "Eternal and Great High Priest." And it has been proved that the same Being is both Lord and God, and Christ anointed by the Father with the oil of gladness. Thus, appearing to Abraham by the oak in human form, He reveals Himself in a calm and peaceful guise, foreshowing by it His future Coming to save mankind; He appeared to Jacob, as to an athlete and a champion destined to wrestle with enemies, in the form of a man, and to Moses and the people in the form of cloud and fire, and led them, shewing Himself terrible and shadowy. And as Joshua, the successor of Moses, was about to fight against the former possessors of Palestine his enemies, foreign and most ungodly races, He rightly appears to him with a sword drawn and pointed against the enemy, shewing by the vision that He Himself is about to attack the ungodly with an unseen sword and with divine power, the fellow-soldier and the fellow-combatant of His people. Wherefore He gives Himself the name of Chief and Captain of the Lord to suit the occasion.