Saint is the collective name of all human believers. They are usually designated such by Paul when he is addressing the churches.. eg "to the Saints in Ephesus" but Revelation also specifically discusses "the prayers of the saints" in Rev 5:8, Rev 8:3.
Constantly in Revelation, the Saints are the collective name for believers who make up the church. the bride of Christ. Saints in the local church according to Paul, are all born again believers.
There are no such things as special saints, because Ephesians 1 and 2 amongst many other verses says that all believers are saints and share the glorious inheritance.
This is not a New Testament thought either. In the Old Testament, for example, in Daniel 7:18 the term is already in use when discussing the inheritance of the saints a thought also seen in such Psalms as Psalm 30:4, when the Saints are told to sing for joy.
There is no understanding of saints only being those who have died and done special deeds. All references of saints with few exceptions, relate to living breathing believers on this earth.
Angels are created beings who have specific roles of service. Saints as humans have limited abilities, whereas Angels have limited supernatural abilities.
Hebrews 1 probably gives us most insight into Angels and their role, though they appear many times in Scripture, even taking on human features at times, for example when the Lord and two Angels appeared to Abraham to tell him that he and Sarai would have a baby in their old age. Genesis 18.
Hebrews 1 says of Angels
vs 4 Jesus is superior to all the angels
Vs 5 The angels worship Jesus
vs 7 They are like wind, and are servants described as flames of fire
vs 13 They will never share the throne of Heaven like the Saints will
vs 14 They are ministering spirits sent to serve the saints
Chapter2
vs 9 Jesus was made a little lower than the angels when he became man.. or shared our humanity
vs 16 Jesus's death and resurrection, was for the Saints, not the angels
I Peter 1:12 states that the angels long to look and understand all the things that God did for the saints in Christ.
Daniel 10:5 Archangel Michael was involved in spiritual warfare which prevented the immediate answer to Daniel's prayer.
That Angels and Saints are separate and totally different creations of God, is absolutely asserted in Scripture.
Now as to the meaning of Dueteronomy 33:2 and I'm borrowing from my answer to a similar question asked earlier by Buty and Q blitz in the forums.
Again, you must see it in context.. Moses is here about to die, and he has passed his leadership on to Joshua, Son of Nun, and has written a song to declare the praises of God and to remind the people of God's dealings with them and now he is told by God to go upto MT Nebo. His disobedience, like that of his brother Aaron, meant that God had ruled they would NOT enter the promised land that had been the vision of Israel both in Egypt and whilst they wondered in the wildnerness for 40 years. (Hebrews 11 says that his faith(that caused him to lead Israel out of Egypt) was commended, but he won't receive the final promise until we who are alive today receive it too...)
Moses now speaks a blessing out onto the people of Israel, all the 12 tribes and their members before he dies and here in chapter 33 that blessing is given.
It's addressed to the 12 tribes of Israel and it looks back and looks ahead at their experiences.
He states that
"The Lord came down from Sinai, and dawned over them from Seir, he shone forth from MT Peran. He came with myriads of holy ones from the south, from his mountaineous slopes"
Now.. where is this Mt Paran? I know that as Muslims, you believe Mecca is the Mt Paran talked about here, but I suggest it can't be for these reasons
The Wilderness of Paran in the Bible is not Arabia. The traditional view is that Paran is in the Sinai Peninsula, starting at Kadesh Barnea, which is south of Israel. Consider the following:
1. Hadad the Edomite, during the reign of Solomon, escaped to Egypt when he was a boy (1 Kings 11:17). "They set out from Midian and went to Paran. Then taking men from Paran with them, they went to Egypt..." (1 Kings 11:8-19). To think that Hadad set out from Midian (which is south east (SE) of Israel, near the Sinai in the Arabian Peninsula, go up north east east (NEE) to "Paran" (Mecca), then somehow end up in Egypt (south west of Mecca) is unthinkable.
2. The Israelites left Sinai (after receiving the Law) for the Desert of Paran (Numbers 10:12), on the way passing through Kibroth Hattavah (Numbers 11:34), Hazeroth (Numbers 12:16), and settling at Kadesh [Barnea] of Paran (Numbers 13:26), which is the northern part of the desert. From Paran, spies were sent to Canaan to check out the land (Numbers 13:3). The spies' exploration took them from Paran through the Desert of Zin (south of Israel), Rehob, Lebo Hamath, Negev, Hebron (Numbers 13:21-22). The southern boundary of the Israelite promised land is given as "Your southern side will include some of the Desert of Zin along the border of Edom. On the east, your southern boundary wll start from the end of the Salt Sea [i.e. Dead Sea], cross south of the Scorpion Pass, continue on to Zin and go south of Kadesh Barnea. Then it will go to Hazar Addar and over to Azmon, where it will turn, join the Wadi of Egypt and end at the Sea [i.e., Mediterranean]" (Numbers 34:3-5). Zin and Kadesh are clearly to the south of Israel, so to demand that Paran is on the east of Israel requies an impossible boundary.
3. The above verses also show that Moses and the Israelites were at Paran. But if Paran is Mecca, and that Moses is a prophet of Islam, then the obvious conclusion is that Moses was at Mecca and that he must have worshipped at the Ka'aba. Nothing of this sort is ever suggested by any Muslim. It also means that the whole group of Israelites (many thousands of them) passed through Mecca.
4. Ishmael married an Egyptian. Mecca is more than 700 miles away from Egypt, and getting an Egyptian wife seems a little too far. Although this is not conclusive, getting an Egyptian wife from the Sinai Peninsula is more probable.
So, to understand the phrase "He shone forth from Mt Paran".. please also read Habbakuk chapter 3,
and see the same expression used there and what it means... and know that this was purely a reminder to Israel that as they moved into the promised Land, no matter what lay ahead (and the spies sent out in Numbers 13 from Paran into Canaan, had seen fierce and fearful tribes who would need to be dealt with before they entered the promised land).. The God who is described as having "shone forth" is with them. The God who stood, and shook the earth, who looked and made the nations tremble.
Muslims say that Muhammad is ‘the Holy One from Mount Paran’ referred to in Habakkuk 3:3. He is also allegedly mentioned in Deuteronomy 33:2: ‘The LORD came from Sinai and dawned over them from Seir; He came with myriads of holy ones.’ Muslims claim that Moses came from Sinai, Jesus from Seir and Muhammad from Mount Paran, and that the myriads referred to are the ten thousand soldiers who joined him in one of his battles. This misinterpretation originated with a nineteenth-century geographer who identified Paran with Mecca and Teman with Medina.
In fact Paran is 1,000km away from Mecca; evident from the narrative of the Israelites’ wanderings (Dt 1:1). How could the Israelite spies leave Paran (Nu 13:3), explore the whole of Canaan (21-22), cut some grapes (23) and bring them back to Paran fresh (27) in a mere 40 days if they were really on a 2,000km round trip from Mecca?
Now.. we have already seen that there are two equally acceptable meanings behind the NIV usage of Holy Ones... angels or saints, so the issue here is not the identity of the myriads, but of the ONE who is leading them.
There is absolutely no contradiction to the fact that it is YAHWEH Himself. The entire context of the verse is a blessing on the people of Israel as they are about to go in and possess the land. God their God, will go in with them. It is He alone who gave the insturction, the law as given by Moses. It is to Him alone that knees should bow (and even Muslims would agree with this.. if these verses point to Muhammed, then they are asking all people to bow to Muhammed as the giver of the Law). That this blessing is for the 12 tribes of Israel, as well as prophetic, is seen in that the tribes are each mentioned by name. Finally, the end verses speak of the relationship between Israel and the Lord
Blessed are you, Oh Israel, Who is like you?
A people saved by the Lord?
He is your shield and you helper
And your glorious sword
Your enemies will cower before you,
And you will trample down their high places
Does this sound like a prophecy of defeat at the hand of Muhammed and His soldiers?