When Daniel 10:5–6 is read in light of Rev 1:12–17 (cf. Acts 9:4, 7; 22:9; 26:14), it is hard to deny a messianic identification of the man clothed in linen. However, when verse 13 records the speaker saying that the “prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me twenty-one days” and that the angel Michael “came to help me,” it is hard to see how the divine Son could be in view. Note that if this figure is the Son, he would not be the incarnate Son, for this precedes the incarnation.
Stephen Miller (NAC) and Tanner (EEC) cut the knot by proposing that there are two beings in view: the divine Son in verses 5–9 and an angel in verses 10–21. Steinmann (ConcC) and Chase (ESVSC), however, argue strongly that the text does not clearly distinguish two persons. Instead, in both cases there is a “man” who speaks to Daniel and touches Daniel.
And yet without Miller and Tanner’s solution, I don’t see a way forward. The intertextual connections are too strong to deny a messianic identification in verse 5, and verse 13 cannot be reconciled with the person being the divine Son.
Perhaps, despite Steinman and Chase’s arguments, there is a way to justify the Miller/Tanner position. Daniel 10 begins a section that concludes with Daniel 12:13. Note that in Daniel 12:5–6 the man clothed in linen is still standing above the waters. Note also that there are two other figures present. These are not Daniel’s companions because they ran away (10:7). These are likely angelic beings. If we come back to chapter 10 with the understanding that the man clothed in linen remained positioned above the waters and that there were also angels present, then it becomes more plausible that the hand that touches Daniel in 10:10 is of an angelic being.
This can be further substantiated by a close reading of chapter 10. The figure who touches Daniel is identified in Daniel 10:16 as “one in the likeness of the sons of men” (LSB). Steinmann wants to link this phrase with the Daniel 7 vision of the Son of Man, but the plural “sons” points in a different direction. This is a being with “human likeness” (CSB) in contrast to the theophanic appearance of the man clothed in linen. This identification is reinforced in Daniel 10:18, where it is stated that the one who touched Daniel had the “appearance of a man.” With verse 18’s connection to Daniel 10:20 and verse 20’s allusion back to Daniel 10:13, the text may draw a distinction between the man clothed in linen (the divine Son) and the one in the likeness of the sons of man (an angel).
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