Angels

(Latin angelus; Greek aggelos; from the Hebrew for "one going" or "one sent"; messenger).

The word is used in Hebrew to denote indifferently either a divine or

human messenger. The Septuagint renders it by aggelos which also has both

significations. The Latin version, however, distinguishes the divine or

spirit-messenger from the human, rendering the original in the one case by

angelus and in the other by legatus or more generally by nuntius. In a few

passages the Latin version is misleading, the word angelus being used where

nuntius would have better expressed the meaning, e.g. Isaiah 18:2; 33:3, 6.

It is with the spirit-messenger alone that we are here concerned. We have to

discuss

the meaning of the term in the Bible,

the offices of the angels,

the names assigned to the angels,

the distinction between good and evil spirits,

the divisions of the angelic choirs,

the question of angelic appearances, and

the development of the scriptural idea of angels.

The angels are represented throughout the Bible as a body of spiritual beings

intermediate between God and men: "You have made him (man) a little less than

the angels" (Psalm 8:6). They, equally with man, are created beings; "praise ye

Him, all His angels: praise ye Him, all His hosts . . . for He spoke and they were

made. He commanded and they were created" (Psalm 148:2, 5: Colossians

1:16, 17). That the angels were created was laid down in the Fourth Lateran

Council (1215). The decree "Firmiter" against the Albigenses declared both the

fact that they were created and that men were created after them. This decree

was repeated by the Vatican Council, "Dei Filius". We mention it here because

the words: "He that liveth for ever created all things together" (Ecclesiasticus

18:1) have been held to prove a simultaneous creation of all things; but it is

generally conceded that "together" (simul) may here mean "equally", in the

sense that all things were "alike" created. They are spirits; the writer of the

Epistle to the Hebrews says: "Are they not all ministering spirits, sent to minister

to them who shall receive the inheritance of salvation?" (Heb. i, 14).

Attendants at God's throne

It is as messengers that they most often figure in the Bible, but, as St.

Augustine, and after him St. Gregory, expresses it: angelus est nomen officii

("angel is the name of the office") and expresses neither their essential nature

nor their essential function, viz.: that of attendants upon God's throne in that

court of heaven of which Daniel has left us a vivid picture:

I behold till thrones were placed, and the Ancient of Days sat: His

garment was white as snow, and the hair of His head like clean

wool: His throne like flames of fire: the wheels of it like a burning

fire. A swift stream of fire issued forth from before Him: thousands

of thousands ministered to Him, and ten thousand times a hundred

thousand stood before Him: the judgment sat and the books were

opened. (Daniel 7:9-10; cf. also Psalm 96:7; Psalm 102:20; Isaiah

6, etc.)

This function of the angelic host is expressed by the word "assistance" (Job, i, 6:

ii, 1), and our Lord refers to it as their perpetual occupation (Matt., xviii, 10). More

than once we are told of seven angels whose special function it is thus to "stand

before God's throne" (Tob., xii, 15; Apoc., viii, 2-5). The same thought may be

intended by "the angel of His presence" (Is., lxiii, 9) an expression which also

occurs in the pseudo-epigraphical "Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs".

God's messengers to mankind

But these glimpses of life beyond the veil are only occasional. The angels of the

Bible generally appear in the role of God's messengers to mankind. They are His

instruments by whom He communicates His will to men, and in Jacob's vision

they are depicted as ascending and descending the ladder which stretches from

earth to heaven while the Eternal Father gazes upon the wanderer below. It was

an angel who found Agar in the wilderness (Gen., xvi); angels drew Lot out of

Sodom; an angel announces to Gideon that he is to save his people; an angel

foretells the birth of Samson (Judges, xiii), and the angel Gabriel instructs Daniel

(Dan., viii, 16), though he is not called an angel in either of these passages, but

"the man Gabriel" (9:21). The same heavenly spirit announced the birth of St.

John the Baptist and the Incarnation of the Redeemer, while tradition ascribes to

him both the message to the shepherds (Luke, ii, 9), and the most glorious

mission of all, that of strengthening the King of Angels in His Agony (Luke

22:43). The spiritual nature of the angels is manifested very clearly in the account

which Zacharias gives of the revelations bestowed upon him by the ministry of an

angel. The prophet depicts the angel as speaking "in him". He seems to imply

that he was conscious of an interior voice which was not that of God but of His

messenger. The Massoretic text, the Septuagint, and the Vulgate all agree in

thus describing the communications made by the angel to the prophet. It is a

pity that the "Revised Version" should, in apparent defiance of the above-named

texts, obscure this trait by persistently giving the rendering: "the angel that

talked with me: instead of "within me" (cf. Zach., i, 9, 13, 14; ii, 3; iv, 5; v, 10).

Such appearances of angels generally last only so long as the delivery of their

message requires, but frequently their mission is prolonged, and they are

represented as the constituted guardians of the nations at some particular crisis,

e.g. during the Exodus (Exod., xiv, 19; Baruch, vi, 6). Similarly it is the common

view of the Fathers that by "the prince of the Kingdom of the Persians" (Dan., x,

13; x, 21) we are to understand the angel to whom was entrusted the spiritual

care of that kingdom, and we may perhaps see in the "man of Macedonia" who

appeared to St. Paul at Troas, the guardian angel of that country (Acts. xvi, 9).

The Septuagint (Deut., xxxii, 8), has preserved for us a fragment of information on

this head, though it is difficult to gauge its exact meaning: "When the Most High

divided the nations, when He scattered the children of Adam, He established the

bounds of the nations according to the number of the angels of God". How large

a part the ministry of angels played, not merely in Hebrew theology, but in the

religious ideas of other nations as well, appears from the expression "like to an

angel of God". It is three times used of David (II K., xiv, 17, 20; xiv, 27) and once

by Achis of Geth (I K., xxlx, 9). It is even applied by Esther to Assuerus (Esther,

xv, 16), and St. Stephen's face is said to have looked "like the face of an angel"

as he stood before the Sanhedrin (Acts, vi, 15).

Personal guardians

Throughout the Bible we find it repeatedly implied that each individual soul has its

tutelary angel. Thus Abraham, when sending his steward to seek a wife for Isaac,

says: "He will send His angel before thee" (Genesis 24:7). The words of the

ninetieth Psalm which the devil quoted to our Lord (Matt., iv, 6) are well known,

and Judith accounts for her heroic deed by saying: "As the Lord liveth, His angel

hath been my keeper" (xiii, 20). These passages and many like them (Gen., xvi,

6-32; Osee, xii, 4; III K., xix, 5; Acts, xii, 7; Ps., xxxiii, 8), though they will not of

themselves demonstrate the doctrine that every individual has his appointed

guardian angel, receive their complement in our Saviour's words: "See that you

despise not on of these little ones; for I say to you that their angels in Heaven

always see the face of My Father Who is in Heaven" (Matt, xviii, 10), words

which illustrate the remark of St. Augustine: "What lies hidden in the Old

Testament, is made manifest in the New". Indeed, the book of Tobias seems

intended to teach this truth more than any other, and St. Jerome in his

commentary on the above words of our Lord says: "The dignity of a soul is so

great, that each has a guardian angel from its birth." The general doctrine that

the angels are our appointed guardians is considered to be a point of faith, but

that each individual member of the human race has his own individual guardian

angel is not of faith (de fide); the view has, however, such strong support from the

Doctors of the Church that it would be rash to deny it (cf. St. Jerome, supra).

Peter the Lombard (Sentences, lib. II, dist. xi) was inclined to think that one

angel had charge of several individual human beings. St. Bernard's beautiful

homilies (11-14) on the ninetieth Psalm breathe the spirit of the Church without

however deciding the question. The Bible represents the angels not only as our

guardians, but also as actually interceding for us. "The angel Raphael (Tob., xii,

12) says: "I offered thy prayer to the Lord" (cf. Job, v, 1 (Septuagint), and 33:23

(Vulgate); Apocalypse 8:4). The Catholic cult of the angels is thus thoroughly

scriptural. Perhaps the earliest explicit declaration of it is to be found in St.

Ambrose's words: "We should pray to the angels who are given to us as

guardians" (De Viduis, ix); (cf. St. Aug., Contra Faustum, xx, 21). An undue cult

of angels was reprobated by St. Paul (Col., ii, 18), and that such a tendency long

remained in the same district is evidenced by Canon 35 of the Synod of

Laodicea.

As Divine Agents Governing The World

The foregoing passages, especially those relating to the angels who have charge

of various districts, enable us to understand the practically unanimous view of the

Fathers that it is the angels who put into execution God's law regarding the

physical world. The Semitic belief in genii and in spirits which cause good or evil

is well known, and traces of it are to be found in the Bible. Thus the pestilence

which devastated Israel for David's sin in numbering the people is attributed to an

angel whom David is said to have actually seen (II K., xxiv, 15-17), and more

explicitly, I Par., xxi, 14-18). Even the wind rustling in the tree-tops was regarded

as an angel (II K., v, 23, 24; I Par., xiv, 14, 15). This is more explicitly stated with

regard to the pool of Probatica (John, v, 1-4), though these is some doubt about

the text; in that passage the disturbance of the water is said to be due to the

periodic visits of an angel. The Semites clearly felt that all the orderly harmony of

the universe, as well as interruptions of that harmony, were due to God as their

originator, but were carried out by His ministers. This view is strongly marked in

the "Book of Jubilees" where the heavenly host of good and evil angels is every

interfering in the material universe. Maimonides (Directorium Perplexorum, iv and

vi) is quoted by St. Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theol., I:1:3) as holding that the

Bible frequently terms the powers of nature angels, since they manifest the

omnipotence of God (cf. St. Jerome, In Mich., vi, 1, 2; P. L., iv, col. 1206).

Hierarchical organization

Though the angels who appear in the earlier works of the Old Testament are

strangely impersonal and are overshadowed by the importance of the message

they bring or the work they do, there are not wanting hints regarding the

existence of certain ranks in the heavenly army.

After Adam's fall Paradise is guarded against our First Parents by cherubim who

are clearly God's ministers, though nothing is said of their nature. Only once

again do the cherubim figure in the Bible, viz., in Ezechiel's marvellous vision,

where they are described at great length (Ezech., i), and are actually called

cherub in Ezechiel, x. The Ark was guarded by two cherubim, but we are left to

conjecture what they were like. It has been suggested with great probability that

we have their counterpart in the winged bulls and lions guarding the Assyrian

palaces, and also in the strange winged men with hawks' heads who are

depicted on the walls of some of their buildings. The seraphim appear only in the

vision of Isaias, vi, 6.

Mention has already been made of the mystic seven who stand before God, and

we seem to have in them an indication of an inner cordon that surrounds the

throne. The term archangel occurs only in St. Jude and I Thess., iv, 15; but St.

Paul has furnished us with two other lists of names of the heavenly cohorts. He

tells us (Ephes., i, 21) that Christ is raised up "above all principality, and power,

and virtue, and dominion"; and, writing to the Colossians (i, 16), he says: "In Him

were all things created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether

thrones or dominations, or principalities or powers." It is to be noted that he uses

two of these names of the powers of darkness when (ii, 15) he talks of Christ as

"despoiling the principalities and powers . . . triumphing over them in Himself".

And it is not a little remarkable that only two verses later he warns his readers

not to be seduced into any "religion of angels". He seems to put his seal upon a

certain lawful angelology, and at the same time to warn them against indulging

superstition on the subject. We have a hint of such excesses in the Book of

Enoch, wherein, as already stated, the angels play a quite disproportionate part.

Similarly Josephus tells us (Be. Jud., II, viii, 7) that the Essenes had to take a

vow to preserve the names of the angels.

We have already seen how (Daniel 10:12-21) various districts are allotted to

various angels who are termed their princes, and the same feature reappears still

more markedly in the Apocalyptic "angels of the seven churches", though it is

impossible to decide what is the precise signification of the term. These seven

Angels of the Churches are generally regarded as being the Bishops occupying

these sees. St. Gregory Nazianzen in his address to the Bishops at

Constantinople twice terms them "Angels", in the language of the Apocalypse.

The treatise "De Coelesti Hierarchia", which is ascribed to St. Denis the

Areopagite, and which exercised so strong an influence upon the Scholastics,

treats at great length of the hierarchies and orders of the angels. It is generally

conceded that this work was not due to St. Denis, but must date some centuries

later. Though the doctrine it contains regarding the choirs of angels has been

received in the Church with extraordinary unanimity, no proposition touching the

angelic hierarchies is binding on our faith. The following passages from St.

Gregory the Great (Hom. 34, In Evang.) will give us a clear idea of the view of the

Church's doctors on the point:

We know on the authority of Scripture that there are nine orders of

angels, viz., Angels, Archangels, Virtues, Powers, Principalities,

Dominations, Throne, Cherubim and Seraphim. That there are

Angels and Archangels nearly every page of the Bible tell us, and

the books of the Prophets talk of Cherubim and Seraphim. St.

Paul, too, writing to the Ephesians enumerates four orders when he

says: 'above all Principality, and Power, and Virtue, and

Domination'; and again, writing to the Colossians he says: 'whether

Thrones, or Dominations, or Principalities, or Powers'. If we now

join these two lists together we have five Orders, and adding

Angels and Archangels, Cherubim and Seraphim, we find nine

Orders of Angels.

St. Thomas (Summa Theologica I:108), following St. Denis (De Coelesti

Hierarchia, vi, vii), divides the angels into three hierarchies each of which

contains three orders. Their proximity to the Supreme Being serves as the basis

of this division. In the first hierarchy he places the Seraphim, Cherubim, and

Thrones; in the second, the Dominations, Virtues, and Powers; in the third, the

Principalities, Archangels, and Angels. The only Scriptural names furnished of

individual angels are Raphael, Michael, and Gabriel, names which signify their

respective attributes. Apocryphal Jewish books, such as the Book of Enoch,

supply those of Uriel and Jeremiel, while many are found in other apocryphal

sources, like those Milton names in "Paradise Lost". (On superstitious use of

such names, see above).

The number of angels

The number of the angels is frequently stated as prodigious (Daniel 7:10;

Apocalypse 5:11; Psalm 67:18; Matthew 26:53). From the use of the word host

(sabaoth) as a synonym for the heavenly army it is hard to resist the impression

that the term "Lord of Hosts" refers to God's Supreme command of the angelic

multitude (cf. Deuteronomy 33:2; 32:43; Septuagint). The Fathers see a

reference to the relative numbers of men and angels in the parable of the hundred

sheep (Luke 15:1-3), though this may seem fanciful. The Scholastics, again,

following the treatise "De Coelesti Hierarchia" of St. Denis, regard the

preponderance of numbers as a necessary perfection of the angelic host (cf. St.

Thomas, Summa Theol., I:1:3).

The evil angels

The distinction of good and bad angels constantly appears in the Bible, but it is

instructive to note that there is no sign of any dualism or conflict between two

equal principles, one good and the other evil. The conflict depicted is rather that

waged on earth between the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of the Evil One,

but the latter's inferiority is always supposed. The existence, then, of this inferior,

and therefore created, spirit, has to be explained.

The gradual development of Hebrew consciousness on this point is very clearly

marked in the inspired writings. The account of the fall of our First Parents (Gen.,

iii) is couched in such terms that it is impossible to see in it anything more than

the acknowledgment of the existence of a principle of evil who was jealous of the

human race. The statement (Gen., vi, 1) that the "sons of God" married the

daughters of men is explained of the fall of the angels, in Enoch, vi-xi, and

codices, D, E F, and A of the Septuagint read frequently, for "sons of God", oi

aggeloi tou theou. Unfortunately, codices B and C are defective in Ge., vi, but it

is probably that they, too, read oi aggeloi in this passage, for they constantly so

render the expression "sons of God"; cf. Job, i, 6; ii, 1; xxxviii, 7; but on the other

hand, see Ps., ii, 1; lxxxviii, & (Septuagint). Philo, in commenting on the

passage in his treatise "Quod Deus sit immutabilis", i, follows the Septuagint.

For Philo's doctrine of Angels, cf. "De Vita Mosis", iii, 2, "De Somniis", VI: "De

Incorrupta Manna", i; "De Sacrifciis", ii; "De Lege Allegorica", I, 12; III, 73; and for

the view of Gen., vi, 1, cf. St. Justin, Apol., ii 5. It should moreover be noted that

the Hebrew word nephilim rendered gigantes, in 6:4, may mean "fallen ones".

The Fathers generally refer it to the sons of Seth, the chosen stock. In I K., xix,

9, an evil spirit is said to possess Saul, though this is probably a metaphorical

expression; more explicit is III B., xxii, 19-23, where a spirit is depicted as

appearing in the midst of the heavenly army and offering, at the Lord's invitation,

to be a lying spirit in the mouth of Achab's false prophets. We might, with

Scholastics, explain this is malum poenae, which is actually caused by God

owing to man's fault. A truer exegesis would, however, dwell on the purely

imaginative tone of the whole episode; it is not so much the mould in which the

message is cast as the actual tenor of that message which is meant to occupy

our attention.

The picture afforded us in Job, i and ii, is equally imaginative; but Satan, perhaps

the earliest individualization of the fallen Angel, is presented as an intruder who is

jealous of Job. He is clearly an inferior being to the Deity and can only touch Job

with God's permission. How theologic thought advanced as the sum of revelation

grew appears from a comparison of II K, xxiv, 1, with I Paral., xxi, 1. Whereas in

the former passage David's sin was said to be due to "the wrath of the Lord"

which "stirred up David", in the latter we read that "Satan moved David to number

Israel". In Job. iv, 18, we seem to find a definite declaration of the fall: "In His

angels He found wickedness." The Septuagint of Job contains some instructive

passages regarding avenging angels in whom we are perhaps to see fallen

spirits, thus xxxiii, 23: "If a thousand death-dealing angels should be (against

him) not one of them shall wound him"; and xxxvi, 14: "If their souls should

perish in their youth (through rashness) yet their life shall be wounded by the

angels"; and xxi, 15: "The riches unjustly accumulated shall be vomited up, an

angel shall drag him out of his house;" cf. Prov., xvii, 11; Ps., xxxiv, 5, 6; lxxvii,

49, and especially, Ecclesiasticus, xxxix, 33, a text which, as far as can be

gathered from the present state of the manuscript, was in the Hebrew original. In

some of these passages, it is true, the angels may be regarded as avengers of

God's justice without therefore being evil spirits. In Zach., iii, 1-3, Satan is called