Claim 1 of 15 · Case 12 · Jehovah’s Witnesses
Jesus is not Michael the archangel: Hebrews says God never called any angel his Son and commands the angels to worship him, and Jude has Michael unable to rebuke the devil on his own authority.
One claim from the free evidence repository at apologetics.pro.
To a Witness, Jesus is not God. He is Jehovah’s first and greatest creation, and in his life before earth he was Michael the archangel, the being through whom God then made everything else; the organization’s own reference work says so, and the teaching is close to the view of Arius that the early church rejected at Nicaea. The New Testament will not bear the identification. The letter to the Hebrews is an argument that the Son is superior to the angels: to which of the angels did God ever say “You are my Son”, it asks, and it commands all God’s angels to worship him, which an angel may not receive. Jude records that Michael, disputing with the devil, did not dare pronounce a judgment against him but said “The Lord rebuke you”, whereas Jesus rebukes demons on his own authority throughout the Gospels. The Witness texts for a created Christ (Colossians 1:15, Proverbs 8, Revelation 3:14) have answers, given under the firstborn claim below and in the Trinity case; the Michael identification has none in the text.
Backed by 3 pieces of evidence
Watchtower publications on Jesus as Michael
This is the organization’s own words: the identification of Jesus with Michael is documented rather than alleged.
Catholic Answers on the Arian parallel
Placing the teaching in its historical category helps a lay reader see that this is an old, already-examined position, not a new insight.
Hebrews 1:5-6 and 1:13, and Jude 9
The whole first chapter of Hebrews sets the Son over against the angels as a different kind of being, and Jude shows Michael deferring to the Lord’s authority rather than exercising his own. If Jesus were Michael, Hebrews 1 would be an argument that an angel is superior to the angels, and the Michael of Jude would be the Jesus who commands demons directly. Read the chapter whole; it is the plainest text on the question.