Angels-CHRISTIANITY

Though only partially indoctrinated into the Christian faith, a belief
in angels has been an element of Christianity since its beginning.
Long before Christ (1000–600 B.C.), the prophet Zoroaster, or
Zarathustra, transformed the ancient Babylonian and Assyrian winged
messengers into archangels. Zoroaster developed a monotheistic religion
based on concepts of good and evil, the foundation of which was
a supreme God who radiated seven holy archangels representing seven
fundamental moral ideas. When the Jews were exiled from Babylon
they took with them Zoroastrianism, the official religion of King Darius
I of Persia, who helped them rebuild their temple in 519 B.C. Thus
the Zarathustrian lore on angels was incorporated into Judaism.
Centuries later, when members of the Jewish faith professed their
belief in Jesus Christ as the Messiah and Savior, they brought with
them to the new Christianity the Zarathustrian-influenced angelology
of early Judaic writings from the books of Daniel, Enoch, and Tobit.
(Angels are also mentioned many times in the biblical Old Testament,
but no hierarchy or philosophy regarding their nature is laid down.)
In the new faith angels were considered servants of Christ and the
Church, supplementing their former role as guardians of Israel.
In Christianity angels were appointed to preside over baptism and
repentance. The archangel Michael—who, in the Book of Enoch, leads the angelic troops that defeat the rebellious archangel Lucifer and his
followers and cast them into hell—was given charge over prayers and
supplications. The angels were also believed to be capable of bringing
humans to salvation by serving as models of the pure and unending worship
of God and Christ. As Christians turned from involvement with
earthly values, they hoped to move ever toward the angelic life, claiming
a promise to become as the angels in heaven after the Resurrection
(Luke 20:36; Matt. 22:30; Mark 12:25). St. Augustine of Hippo wrote
(ca. A.D. 400): “The angels have care of us poor pilgrims; they have
compassion on us and at God’s command they hasten to our aid, so that
we, too, may eventually arrive at our common fatherland.”
Early Christians further believed that angels joined them in taking
part in the Divine Service; that they helped celebrate feasts of
Christendom on earth; that they carried men’s prayers before God and
watched over Christians from heaven; and that they would lead the
souls of men to the next world at death. Indeed, angels were believed
to serve man at God’s request: “For he shall give his angels charge over
thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their
hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone” (Ps. 91:11–12). Martin
Luther, in Table Talk (ca. 1510), affirms, “An angel is a spiritual creature
created by God without a body, for the service of Christendom
and the church.”Angelic Cult
Early church fathers struggled with the question of whether, and
to what degree, angels should be a part of Christian doctrine. St. Paul
did not favor the veneration of angels, yet in A.D. 325 the Council of
Nicaea decreed that faith in angels was part of Church dogma. Just
eighteen years later, at the Synod of Laodicaea, the cult (veneration,
devotion, honor) of angels was declared idolatrous. Four and a half
centuries later, in 787, the Seventh Ecumenical Synod reestablished
the cult of angels, with certain limitations.
Angelic cult was most widespread during the Middle Ages, beginning
in the West with St. Benedict (543) and moving into the time of
Pope Gregory the Great (ca. 590). Current concepts of angels blossomed
with St. Bernard of Clairvaux (d. 1153). In 1259 St. Thomas
Aquinas, known as the “Angelic Doctor,” gave a series of lectures on
angels at the University of Paris. Those fifteen discourses over a period
of a week were written down and formed the foundation of Christian
ideas about angels for the next eight hundred years. Throughout the
Scholastic period (thirteenth through seventeenth centuries) theologians
studied the nature of angels, and angelic devotion continued to
grow—especially among Dominican, Franciscan, and Jesuit orders.By the end of the Renaissance, interest in angels was waning as
science moved into the forefront of thought. Martin Luther
(1483–1546) still relied on angels as his guides, but the Protestant
John Calvin (1509–64) considered speculation about angels a waste of
time. It was around this time, however, that Emanuel Swedenbörg
(1688–1772) developed his monumental works on angels, supposedly
received clairvoyantly from the heavenly beings themselves. Among
them are Heaven and Hell and Angelic Wisdom: Concerning Divine Love
and Wisdom. Swedenbörg greatly influenced the poet William Blake,
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and the nineteenth-century philosopher
Rudolf Steiner, among others.
The Catholic Church now teaches as part of its dogma that before
he created the earth God created a kingdom of invisible spirits—the
angels—who are personal beings and not more powers, and that, while
many angels have been named through the centuries, the only names
that may be used in angelic cult are the two occurring in the Bible,
Michael and Gabriel, and Raphael, who appears in the apocryphal
Book of Tobit. (A fourth angel, Uriel, “God is my light,” is named in
the apocryphal book 2 Esdras.) Masses and prayers in honor of the
three archangels have become an integral part of the Catholic
Church; suppliants invoke the angels in the prayer in the Communion
of the Sick, in the burial service of adults, in the blessing of
homes; and in the Litany of All Saints and novenas. Among the
Orthodox churches, the three archangels are honored in Liturgy
(Mass and Divine Office) and in observance of special feasts.
There is never a question, though, that Jesus Christ is superior to
angels; while angels are revered as God’s messengers and helpers, as
those who are allowed to be ever in his presence, they are not to be
worshipped by Christians. St. Augustine is credited with putting the
veneration of angels in its proper perspective: “. . . we honor them out
of charity, not out of servitude” (De vera religione 55.110; PL 34:170).
The Archangels
Central to Christianity are the biblical appearances of the
archangel Gabriel (whose name means “strength of God”) to the Virgin
Mary to tell her she will conceive and give birth to Jesus (Luke
1:26–32). (The Blessed Virgin herself is now considered to be one of
the highest angels, sitting at the throne of God and accompanied by
the baby angels, or cherubs.) Gabriel’s words to Mary, “Hail Mary, full
of grace, the Lord is with thee, blessed art thou among women,”
became one of the most prominent prayers in Catholicism. Gabriel
also appears to Zacharias to announce that his son will be called John
the Baptist (Luke 1:11–19). An angel believed to be Gabriel tells the shepherds by night of the Savior’s birth at Bethlehem (Luke 2:8–11).
He is also considered by the Catholic Church to be the angel who
comforted Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane. Catholics celebrate
the Feast of St. Gabriel on March 24.
The archangel Raphael’s guidance of young Tobias on his long
and dangerous journey in the Book of Tobit plants the seed for the
concept of guardian angels. Raphael is said to be one of the seven
angels that stand before the throne of God. He is also known as the
angelic physician—his name means “medicine of God”—since he
restored health to Tobias and gave his aged father back his sight by
instructing Tobias in using the entrails of fish as medicine. Raphael is
called upon today to protect travelers and to heal the sick. Many
claim that he makes hospital visits. The Feast of St. Raphael is celebrated
by Catholics on May 18.
It is the archangel Michael (known as St. Michael in the Catholic
Church), however, who has received the most attention by Christians.
Michael, whose name means “like God,” is considered the leader of
the angels, and is generally thought to be the angel who appeared to
Moses in the burning bush on Mount Sinai. St. Thomas Aquinas said
Michael defeated Satan in the Battle of Heaven, and will defeat the
Antichrist at the Apocalypse. Michael and other angels have
appeared to the saints for many centuries. Joan of Arc declared that
Michael was the young warlike angel who appeared to her and
announced her mission to save France. He was the only individual
angel honored in liturgical feasts before the ninth century, and devotion
to this powerful angel was evidenced by the fourth century in the
churches in and near Constantinople. The Feast of St. Michael and
the Angels was celebrated as early as the fifth century near Rome.
Michael is said to have appeared at Monte Gargano (near Foggia,
Italy) around the year 490, and at Mont-Saint-Michel (Manche,
France) in the year 708. St. Michael is still honored at those sanctuaries
today. The Archonfraternity of St. Michael Archangel was erected
by Pope Leo XIII in 1878. In modern times, Michael has been considered
the patron saint of Germany, as well as of grocers, sailors, soldiers,
and policemen. He is honored on Michaelmas, September 29 in the
Roman Catholic and Anglican churches, and November 8 in the
Greek, Armenian, and Coptic churches.
The Evil Angels
As fervently as God’s good angels are revered in Christianity, so
the evil angels are feared and despised. Catholicism teaches that the
devil (Satan) and the demons were angels who were created virtuous
by God but fell from grace by their own will, though the church does
not say how they so grievously sinned. In the summer of 1986, however,
Pope John Paul II said, “The fall consists in the free choice of those
spirits who were created, and who radically and irrevocably denied
God and His kingdom, usurping His sovereign rights and attempting
to subvert the economy of salvation and the very ordering of the
entire creation. . . . Thus the evil spirit tried to plant in human beings
the seed of rivalry, insubordination, and opposition to God. . . .”
Other accounts of the fall of Satan and his followers say it was
Satan’s pride in his own greatness and jealousy of God’s new creation,
man, that brought about the Battle of Heaven and the evil angels’ fall
from grace into eternal damnation. Most Christian churches today
teach that Satan is a very real presence in the word, ever seeking to
turn man from God through endless temptation to sin. His threat is as
great to the Christian as the guardian angel’s protection is a comfort.
In fact, says modern evangelist Billy Graham, people today are far
more obsessed with evil, especially with the occult and devil worship,
than they are with good. He wrote his book Angels: God’s Secret
Agents in 1975 to try and counter the fascination with evil and to offer
hope, comfort, and guidance to world-weary modern man.
The Order and Nature of Angels
Various theories about the way the angels are ordered in heaven,
their numbers, their appearance, and so forth have been postulated
throughout history. Dionysius the Pseudo-Areopagite, a Syrian who
lived about A.D. 500 and was for centuries erroneously believed to be
the same Dionysius converted by St. Paul at Athens (Acts 17:34),
developed the best-known hierarchy of angels in his book The Celestial
Hierarchy. His hierarchy consists of nine choirs of angels divided into
three triads. In descending order they are: seraphim, cherubim,
thrones; dominions, virtues, and powers; and principalities,
archangels, and angels. Others to develop angelic orders were Pope
Gregory the Great, the poet Dante, Saint Ambrose (fourth-century
bishop), and Clement of Alexandria. Judaic and apocryphal writings,
including the Sibylline Oracles and the “Shepherd of Hermes,” also
contain theories about the orders of angels. Modern writer Sophy
Burnham, in A Book of Angels, says all of this speculation shows “only
that we know nothing whatsoever about angels and cannot hope to.”
She further adds, “We do not know what angels are or whether they
stand in hierarchies in the skies. Nor whether they are assigned their
duties according to seniority. We know nothing of this other realm,
except that we are given brief, fleeting glimpses in our hearts.”
What about the nature of angels? Most Christian sources say they
beings of pure spirit and light, emanating a love that is far beyond
human experience. In his 1986 speech Pope John Paul II said angels
are “free and rational purely spiritual beings” and “the truth about
angels is inseparable from the central revelation, which is the existence,
majesty and glory of God that shines over the whole visible and
invisible creation.” Further, the pope said angels are “creatures of a
spiritual nature, gifted with intellect and free will, superior to man.”
The Catholic Saint Bridget (ca. 1303–73), who experienced
many heavenly visions, said if a person should see an angel in all his
beauty the mortal would be so ravished with delight that he would die
of love.