The Watchers

A watcher (Aramaic עִיר ʿiyr, plural עִירִין ʿiyrin, Greek: ἐιρ or ἐγρήγορος, egrḗgoros) is a type of biblical angel. The word is related to the root meaning to be awake. It occurs in both plural and singular forms in the Book of Daniel, where reference is made to the holiness of the beings. The apocryphal Books of Enoch (2nd–1st centuries BC) refer to both good and bad Watchers, with a primary focus on the rebellious ones.

Good watchers in Daniel
In Daniel 4:13, 17, 23 there are three references to the class of "watcher, holy one" ("watcher", Aramaic ʿir; "holy one", Aramaic qaddish). The term is introduced by Nebuchadnezzar who says he saw "a watcher, a holy one come down (singular verb) from heaven." He describes how in his dream the watcher says that Nebuchadnezzar will eat grass and be mad and that this punishment is "by the decree of the watchers, the demand by the word of the holy ones" ... "that the living may know that the Most High rules in the kingdom of men." After hearing the king's dream, Daniel considers for an hour and then responds:

And whereas the king saw a holy watcher coming down from heaven and saying, ‘Cut down the tree and destroy it, but leave its stump and roots in the ground, with a band of iron and bronze, in the grass of the field, and let him be bathed with the dew of heaven, and let his lot be with the animals of the field, until seven times pass over him’— this is the interpretation, O king, and it is a decree of the Most High that has come upon my lord the king: You shall be driven away from human society, and your dwelling shall be with the wild animals. You shall be made to eat grass like oxen, you shall be bathed with the dew of heaven, and seven times shall pass over you, until you have learned that the Most High has sovereignty over the kingdom of mortals and gives it to whom he will. Daniel 4:23–25 (NRSVue)
Lutheran Protestant reformer Johann Wigand viewed the watcher in Nebuchadnezzar's dream as either God himself, or the Son of God.…