Some early Christians believed the archangel Michael and Christ were the same being
Michael is the warrior angel shared by Judaism, Christianity and Islam, famous for casting Satan out of heaven. Less known is that from the second century several Christian groups identified him with Christ himself, and medieval theologians could not even agree whether he led the highest rank of angels or the lowest.
His name first survives in Jewish writings of the third and second centuries BC. The Book of Enoch lists him among seven archangels alongside Gabriel, Raphael and Uriel, and the Book of Daniel describes Michael, your prince, fighting a heavenly prince of Persia and rising at the end of time to protect Israel. Later Jewish texts made him chief of the angels, mediator of the Torah, advocate for Israel against its accuser and guide of righteous souls to paradise. His role as Israel's defender grew so popular that rabbis had to insist people pray to God directly, not to Michael or Gabriel.
Rabbinic storytellers credited him with rescues throughout the lives of the patriarchs: pulling Abraham from Nimrod's furnace, substituting the ram for Isaac and shielding Jacob before birth. In the New Testament he disputes with the devil over the body of Moses in the Epistle of Jude and defeats Satan in Revelation. Alongside that orthodox picture ran bolder ideas. Texts such as the Shepherd of Hermas and accounts of the Ebionites seem to treat Michael and Christ as one, and a range of second- and third-century writings show that picturing Christ as an angel was not unusual, probably building on earlier Jewish speculation.
His cult spread through churches. Byzantine tradition credited Constantine with Michaelion sanctuaries on the Bosporus, and a painting there of the archangel slaying a serpent, linked to Constantine's victory over Licinius in 324, helped fix the familiar image of Michael as a dragon-slaying warrior. In Phrygia he absorbed the healing springs once tied to the god Attis, and in sixth-century Rome, after a plague, the sick slept in Castel Sant'Angelo hoping he would appear.
Rankings differed sharply. Bonaventure called him prince of the seraphim, the first of nine angelic orders, while Thomas Aquinas placed him over the lowest choir. Catholic teaching assigns him four roles: commander of heaven's army, escort of the dying, weigher of souls on a balance, and guardian of the Church, which is why medieval knights and many cities adopted him as patron.
Source: Michael (archangel)
