The Malʾak Yahweh, the Angel or Messenger of Yahweh, is the emissary through whom the deity appears and speaks in the narrative tradition. He finds Hagar at the spring, stays Abraham's hand on Moriah, calls to Moses from the burning bush, goes before Israel in the wilderness with the divine Name within him, commissions Gideon, announces Samson's birth to Manoah, and in a single night strikes down the Assyrian host. A distinctive feature of these accounts is that the messenger repeatedly speaks and is addressed as Yahweh himself, so that those who meet him fear they will die for having seen God. Sources differ on whether he is a separate heavenly being or a mode of Yahweh's own self-manifestation.