All three religions
also share the belief in the presence of an evil force, a disobedient angel, an
adversary of God—a satan in Hebrew—who wreaks havoc on the human plane.
In both the Koran and the Bible, angels are sent to strengthen believers,
succor them here and in eternity, undertake military assistance, punish
disbelievers, intercede for humans, act as GUARDIAN ANGELS, and mete out God’s
judgment on the last day. Angels represent God, but are not to be worshiped for
themselves.
Angels in Judaism
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| The archangel Gabriel is a messenger in .Judaism. |
Judaic angelology acknowledges angels as both
intermediary and intercessory. Angel lore was heavily influenced by ZOROASTRIANISM,
to which part of the Jewish population was exposed during the Babylonian captivity
in the seventh century B.C.E. In pre-exilic times angels belonged to popular
rather than prophetic Judaic religion, but after the exile angels sprang into
prominence and played crucial roles in visionary experiences such as those
described in the Tanakh, the Old Testament, by ISAIAH, EZEKIEL, ELIJAH, ZECHARIAH,
DANIEL,
and in apocryphal works like the book of ENOCH.
The Enochian writings in particular feature an elaborate scheme of heaven and
the hierarchy of angels.
During the Babylonian captivity, a complete
system of angels, both good and bad, was developed; it shares many parallels
with Zoroastrian concepts. Heaven is composed of different levels, above which
rests Yahweh on his throne. The heavens below him are filled with a great
multitude of angels who do his bidding, and who have specific duties to keep
the universe organized and functioning. Many angelic duties overlap or even
conflict among angels, with different angels or order of angels performing the
same tasks. In between angels and man are hosts of DEMONS.
Talmudic times saw
the developments of angelology and demonology, both complex and both containing
entities and beliefs inherited from cultures throughout the Mediterranean:
Egyptian, Graeco-Roman, and Gnostic, in addition to Babylonian. Magi-cal and
mystical practices for dealing with these entities focused on the power of NAMES.
Magical practices sought to borrow power from entities in order to protect
against others or to effect some action in the world. Mystical practices, such
as in the MERKABAH tradition and later the KABBALAH, also employed names of
power to interact with angels and demons.
In
Scripture the function of angels is to glorify God (such as in the visionary
accounts mentioned above) and act out God’s commands and will. Angels, appearing
either as men or as an ANGEL OF THE LORD reveal the presence and might of God
in the world. Angels punish on God’s command but they also protect. But angels or
those interpreted to be angels are themselves punished by God if they displease
him.
The references to angels in the Old Testament
did not prevent the aristocratic Jewish intellectual Sadducees in ancient
Israel from denying the existence of angels. However, the majority of Jews from
post-exilic times onward had not only affirmed the existence of angels but also
developed additional ideas about them as intermediaries who are accessible to
humans and can be called upon for help. In Talmudic times, prayers to angels
appealed to their intercessory abilities. As angelology developed along more
magical lines, prayers were converted into magical incantations.
In mysticism, the
angels of the Merkabah especially those closest to God are powerful, remote
beings often hostile to humans, many of whom stand as barriers between man and
God. According to tradition, when God thinks about creating man, he first creates
a company of angels and then asks their advice. The angels oppose the creation
of man, and God destroys them by burning them. He creates a second company who
also oppose the idea, and he destroys them as well. A third company of angels
agree to the creation of man. But after mankind becomes so corrupted that God
decides to destroy everything by sending the Flood, the angels remind him of
the original advice and say, “Lord of the Universe, did not the first company
of angels speak aright?” God replies that he has promised to carry and sustain
man; thus NOAH repopulates the earth. Similarly, angels oppose the delivery of
the Law to MOSES and the passing of the SEFER RAZIEL book of cosmic secrets to
ADAM, but they are unsuccessful on both accounts. In 3 ENOCH, they object
unsuccessfully to Rabbi Ishmael (the purported author of the text) entering the
heights of heaven and participating in the angels’ devotional rights.
Myriads of angels infinite in
number attend every-thing in creation. (See MEMUNIM.) Numerous individual
angels are recognized, including seven archangels who can be compared to the
six Bounteous Immortals AMARAHSPANDS of Zoroastrianism. In the KAB-BALAH, there
are 10 orders of angels assigned to the 10 sephiroth of the TREE OF LIFE, the
system set forth in the primary Kabbalistic work, the Sefer Yetzirah. Guardian
angels assigned to every person from birth to death are derived in part from
the Persian FRAVASHIS, beings who also are guardians of place, similar to the GENII.
The identities of the individual angels often
blur with different names given for the same being. Long lists of angels are
given in literature; works such as 3 Enoch and the Sefer Raziel contain
detailed descriptions of cosmic workings, the angels assigned to them, and in
the case of the Sefer Raziel procedures for invoking those angels.
Angels in Christianity
In the New Testament, the roles of intermediary
and intercessor of God are taken over by JESUS; angels play supporting roles.
Gabriel announces to Mary her impending pregnancy. Angels proclaim the birth of
Jesus to shepherds. Joseph is visited by an angel in his dreams: to be
instructed to marry Mary despite her pregnancy; to take his family to Egypt
after the birth of Jesus to avoid the persecutions of Herod; and to return to
Israel from Egypt when it was safe to do so.
After Jesus begins his ministry, angels
recede in importance. They are not the channels of miracles, for he has taken
over that role as well. Jesus mentions angels but does not emphasize them in
his preaching. He states that not even the angels will know when the
tribulation will come; when the Son of man returns he will be surrounded by
angels.
Angels are involved as secondary figures in
some of Jesus’ key experiences. After Jesus rejects Satan during his temptation
in the desert, angels come and minister to him. One or two angels are at his
tomb (“Why do you seek the living among the dead?” Luke 24:5).
Forty days after
Jesus’ crucifixion, during which he appears and speaks numerous times to his
apostles, Jesus ascends to heaven; two angels disguised as men speak to his
awestruck apostles:
And when he [Jesus] had said this, as they were looking on, he was
lifted up, and a cloud took him out of their sight. And while they were gazing
into heaven as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white robes,
and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven?
This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as
you saw him go into heaven.”
Angels figure in the
subsequent acts and lives of the apostles. For example, when Peter and other
apostles are imprisoned by the Sadducees, an Angel of the Lord appears at night
and opens the prison doors and leads them out.
In his epistles, St. PAUL
writes about angels and devils, giving emphasis to the superiority of Jesus
over angels, and the role of devils (demons) as enemies of the faithful.
The early church
fathers accepted angels but opposed anything that might encourage idolatry. St.
AUGUSTINE said that while Christ did not die for the angels, his redemption
nonetheless benefited them, helping to repair the damage of their ruin (a
reference to the WATCHERS). In 325, the Council of Nicaea incorporated angels
into the dogma of the Christian Church, stimulating art and theological and
philosophical commentaries on them for centuries to come.
Angels
figure prominently in the lore of the saints. Legends and hagiographies of the
early saints and martyrs include references to angels. They appear in DREAMS
AND VISIONS; act as guides; dictate messages, instructions, and revelations;
and serve as support in times of trial. Their presence symbolizes the saints’
holiness. In many cases of hagiographies, angels may have been more a literary
device to explain inspired thought or a means by which to inspire the faithful.
Many saints, however, had genuine visionary experiences of angels.
The Christian monastic tradition the
withdrawal from the world in order to dedicate one’s life to God— developed in
the early centuries after the death of Jesus. St. Pachomius was a
fourth-century Egyptian Copt who, after his conversion to Christianity while in
the Roman army, spent years in retreat with another hermit. He was praying
alone in the desert of Tabenna when an angelic figure spoke to him and told him
to found a monastery according to the rule the angel would give. His companion
helped him to build what would become the first Christian cloister. A wall surrounded
the humble structure as a symbol of the monk’s separation from the world, and
no stranger was allowed beyond a certain point, leaving “the inner sanctum”
unsullied. Pachomius’s “Angelic Rule,” one of the major monuments of early
Christian literature, was innovative in one major fact: It was a binding
commandment, akin to a law. After living as a novice for a number of years,
each monk accepted the rule as an unalterable canon of life.
Christian monasticism was most profoundly
influenced by St. Augustine, whose teachings on angels coincided with monastic
spirituality. According to Augustine, monks are a group chosen for the heavenly
city. The terrestrial church has only a partial vision of God, whereas the
celestial church enjoys the full vision of God. As the counterparts of the
angels, monks occupy a special place at the heart of the church universal. They
bear witness to the bliss that awaits the pure of heart; their penances and
ascetic practices pre-pare them for the incorporeal life of angels.
Early monks frequently defined their vocation
as the angelic life, insofar as they were detached, pure, and devotional.
Poverty, chastity, and obedience were rooted in angelic reality, as angels had
no bodily needs and served God unceasingly. Indeed, in accordance with Christ’s
words that the blessed will be “like the angels in heaven.”
Celibacy is especially important in the
process of sanctification, or becoming angel-like. In his tract Holy Virginity,
Augustine praises virginity as vita angelica, the angelic
life, “a sharing in the life of the angels and a striving for endless
immortality here in this perishable flesh.” Practicing continence dedicated to
God means “reflecting on the life of heaven and of the angels amid this earthly
mortality.” Thus, whoever has taken a vow of celibate chastity, whether a man
or woman, must “live on earth the life of the angels,” and begin to be on this
side of the grave what other Christians “will be only after the resurrection.”
Augustine saw further resemblances to the angelic life in the way the celibate
direct their senses and their efforts to “what is eternal and immutable,” and
in their zeal for performing works of virtue, “so that they show to earth how
life is lived in heaven.” Following from this, Augustine developed the theme of
the “heavenly life,” vita caelestis, a psychology of living on earth
with one’s eyes turned upward. The contemplation of God practiced in the
monastery would in time proceed to freedom from passion; the monks like angels
would be immersed in happiness derived from divine truth and beauty while still
in this world.
This striving toward
the angelic was emphasized by many who followed Augustine. In the ninth
century, the works of PSEUDO-DIONYSIUS were translated, and the hierarchy of
angels became a model for the ascent of the soul.
The monastic
literature of angelology and contemplation reached its apex in the 12th century
with St. Bernard of Clairvaux. The waning of monastic culture after 1200 (with
the rise of new orders like the Francis-cans and Dominicans, who were not
cloistered) brought a lessening of interest in Augustinian angelology.
The great medieval
scholar St. THOMAS AQUINAS, who favored Aristotlean philosophy, wrote
extensively on angels, defining their nature and activities, confirming the
existence of guardian angels, and commenting on the Dionsyian hierarchy.
Others, however, such as the Rhineland mystic Meister Eckhardt, saw angels less
as role models and more as messengers.
The
PROTESTANT REFORMATION that began in the 16th century dramatically
changed and split Christian angelology. The Protestants accepted the existence
of angels as helpers and messengers, but they increasingly emphasized the
demonic: Satan and his legions were a terrible threat. John Calvin expressed
great skepticism that guardian angels existed, and dismissed the Pseudo-Dionysius
writings as “babble.” Calvinist thought has wielded considerable influence on
Protestant philosophy into contemporary times.
Angels have retained
a stronger place in Catholicism, although the church officially recognizes only
three angels by name: Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael. The general presence of
angels in spiritual life is more readily acknowledged than in Protestantism.
Modern popes have talked of angels. Saints such as Padre Pio have underscored the
importance of enlisting the help of one’s guardian angel. Various DEVOTIONAL
CULTS put angels in the proper context of spiritual living.
A renaissance of
popular interest in angels began in the late 20th century and spawned a popular
angelology. This view portrays angels as more than messengers and
administrators of God’s will, but as personal companions, healers, and helpers.
The modern angel is a being who is always good and benevolent, in contrast to
the biblical angel who metes out punishment and justice when God so commands.
Popular angelology has brought angels down to earth: They have personal names,
beautiful humanlike appearances and characteristics, and they have personal
conversations with their human charges. In many respects, the modern angel is
like an idealized human being. While it is likely that intuition, inspiration,
and imagination have taken on angel faces, extraordinary visionary experiences
also occur, including dream encounters that parallel many accounts of earlier
times.
Angels in Islam
The Koran establishes angels as the second of five articles of
faith, along with divine unity, messengers (prophets), revealed books, and the
day of resurrection. Surah 35.1 describes angels as having subtle and luminous
bodies with two, three, four, or more wings. They can assume various forms;
they are endowed with perfect knowledge and have power over their acts. Their
ministry is to glorify God; they manifest themselves to the prophets and their
spiritual heirs (wasi) to signify a divine communication to them.
Attempting to explain any more about angels strays from the proper road.
Scholars and holy men who applied angelology to metaphysics, psychology, cosmology,
and mystical practice often provoked alarm, incomprehension, and even open
hostility from the legalists. Nonetheless, a rich angelology emerged from the
prophets, mystics, and philosophers outside of Islamic orthodoxy, and among
Shiites and some sects of Sufism.
General beliefs hold that
angels are created of light and are endowed with life, speech, and reason. They
are sanctified from carnal desire and the disturbance of anger. They do not
disobey God, and do whatever he commands of them. They are distinctly different
from DJINN and genii. They are inferior to human prophets because all the
angels were commanded to prostrate themselves before Adam (Surah 2.32).
According to Sufi
teacher Abdul Karim Jili, the highest angel is identified with the Spirit
mentioned in the Koran. He is made from God’s light the Muhammadan light—and
“from him God created the world and made him His organ of vision in the world.”
He is the divine command, chief of the kerubim (CHERUBIM), the axis of
creation. He has eight major forms, great angels who bear the throne of God.
All other angels are created from him “like drops from the ocean.” He is also
the eternal “prophetic light” from which all prophets derive their inner being;
the breath or spirit sent to Mary to conceive Jesus; and MUHAMMAD in his
perfect manifestation.
The archangels and angels created from the
highest angel preside over the principles of the universe. Four archangels, or
kerubim, are named in the Koran. From the great angel’s heart comes Israfil,
the mightiest of the angels who will sound the trumpet at the last day; from
his intelligence comes Gabriel (Jibril), treasurer of divine knowledge and
revelations, who dictated the Koran to Muhammad; from his judgment comes Azrael
(Azrail or Izrail), the ANGEL OF DEATH, and from his himma (spiritual
aspiration) comes Michael, who metes out the fate of all things. From
his thoughts come all the celestial and terrestrial angels who are “the souls
of the spheres and of mankind.” From his imagination comes the very stuff of
the universe itself, which is “Imagination within Imagination within Imagination.”
From his soul or ego comes both the sublime and contemplative angels and the
Satan and his hosts.
Two other angels
(though not Koranic) are known by name, Munkar and Nakir, who visit the graves
of the newly buried as soon as the funeral party departs. They are charged with
examining the dead person with regard to belief.
Other angels who have
special functions are Rid-wan, the angel in charge of heaven, sometimes called
the “treasurer of the Garden,” even the “door-keeper of the Garden,” which may
connect in some way to the cherubim in Genesis keeping the way of the tree of
life with a flaming sword.
A main duty of angels is to
praise the Lord and intercede for humans, asking God to forgive them: “the
angels celebrate the praise of their Lord, and ask for-giveness for the
dwellers on earth” (Surah 42.3). In addition, a guardian angel looks after each
person all through life, with duties of giving assistance against unbelievers,
and having the ability to intercede if necessary: “Each hath a succession of
angels before him, who watch over him by God’s behest” (Surah 13.12) and “He is
the supreme guard over his servants, and sendeth forth guardians who watch over
you, until, when death overtaketh any one of you, our messengers receive him
and fail not” (Surah 6.61). When God so orders, angels are sent as military
warriors to aid in battle.
Every believer is attended by two RECORDING ANGELS,
called the kiramu’l katibin. One has its station on the right, the one
who contemplates and dictates; the other has its station on the left, the one
who records. Like the angels of Jacob’s vision, sometimes the recording angels
come down to humans. The Koran adds: “it is said that among their number are those
to whom the human being is entrusted and whom the Holy Book calls ‘Guardians
and Noble Scribes’” (82.10–11). The recording angels are acknowledged daily in
the Muslim prayer ritual, the salat.
Both Satan and Devil are named in the Koran.
Satan originally was a good angel, but declined to share in the worship of Adam
and so was expelled from Par-adise. He is often mentioned with the adjective
“the Stoned,” which may refer to the jamrah, the throwing of stones at
three shayatin (djinn) during the pilgrim-age rites.
On the day of Resurrection the four bearers
of God’s throne—similar to the four living creatures in Isaiah— will be raised
to eight. They shall “bear the Throne and those round about it, proclaim the
praises of their Lord, and believe in Him” (Surah 40.7); “Upon the day when the
Spirit and the angels stand in ranks” . . .
“thou shalt see angels encircling about the
throne” (Surah 68.77).
The death of Muhammad in 632 officially
brought an end to prophecy, for no other prophets can follow Muhammad. However,
traditions of esoteric prophecy continued in Shia and Sunni philosophies,
centered around imams, teachers or holy guides. There are four types of
prophets. One is the nabi or prophet who has revelations only for
himself and is not obliged to pro-claim what is received. Another is the nabi
who hears the voice of the angel while dreaming, but does not see the angel in
a waking state and also is not obliged to proclaim his vision to anyone. Third
is the nabimursal, the prophet-messenger who has the vision or perception
of an angel in both sleeping and waking states. This prophet may be sent to
bring light to others. Fourth are the seven great nabimursal messengers
Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Jesus, and Muhammad—whose mission (risalah)
is to proclaim a shari’ah, a new divine law. The Shiites hold that only
the shari’ah or legislative kind of prophecy ended with Muhammad’s
death, whereas the esoteric prophecy continues.
The prophet/messenger’s waking visions of
angels differ from sense perception; they take the form of an inner vision
called wahy, or divine communication in which the angel/intelligence
imparts a knowing to the human intellect. The angel-intelligence is identified
with the Angel of Revelation, the Holy Spirit or the angel Gabriel, and also is
called the Pen (qalam) because it is the intermediary between God and
humankind that actualizes knowledge in the heart, as the pen mediates between
writer and paper. Knowledge through God is only actualized through the angels,
according to Surah 42.50–51: “It is not vouchsafed to any mortal that God
should speak to him save by communication from behind a veil, or by sending a
messenger.”
The visionary experience also
can be likened to a veil that lifts between two mirrors, the divine mirror and
the mirror of the heart. The veil is lifted by hand, as the philosophers try to
do, or by blowing wind or by an angel through divine grace. The mirror is a
metaphor for the imagination, upon which angels can impress symbols that help
further the ascent of the soul to the Origin.
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