"As the host of heaven cannot be numbered,
Neither the sand of the sea measured:
So will I multiply the seed of David My servant,
And the Levites that minister unto Me."
The prophets of Israel recognized clearly, that the starry host of heaven and the angelic host were distinct; that the first, in their brightness, order, and obedience formed fitting comparison for the second; but that both were created beings; neither were divinities.
The heathen nations around recognized also the hosts both of the stars and of spiritual beings, but the first they took as the manifestations of the second, whom they counted as divinities. There was often a great confusion between the two, and the observance or worship of the first could not be kept distinguished from the recognition or worship of the other; the very ideogram for a god was an 8-rayed star.
The Hebrews were warned again and again lest, confusing in their minds these two great hosts of stars and angels, they should deem the one the divine manifestation of the other, the divinity, not accounting them both fellow-servants, the handiwork of God.
Thus, in the wilderness, the Lord commands them through Moses—
"Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves, . . . lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the Lord thy God hath divided [distributed] unto all nations under the whole heaven."
But the one celestial army continually suggests the other, and the two are placed in the closest parallelism when reference is made to the time when the foundations of the earth were fastened, and the corner stone thereof was laid,
"When the morning stars sang together,
And all the sons of God shouted for joy."
So when Deborah sings of the deliverance which the Lord gave to Israel at the battle of the Kishon, she puts the stars for the angelic legions that she feels assured were engaged in warring in their support.
"They fought from heaven;
The stars in their courses fought against Sisera."