Angels-THE FALL OF THE ANGELS

In theology, the Fall refers to humanity’s fall from grace into sin. The
Fall is responsible for original sin, meaning that everyone is born in
sin—and thus in need of salvation—because of Adam and Eve’s disobedience
of God’s command not to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden. Simply by being born into this
world, every human being inherits the sin of our distant ancestors.
Many contemporary theologians have reinterpreted the story of the
Fall less literally, but this is the essence of the biblical narrative.
Less well known is the story of the fall of the angels. For whatever
reason—some accounts say that Lucifer was jealous of God’s love of
Adam, but in any event it was some form of pride—Lucifer declared
himself as great as God and led a rebellion of angels against the celestial
order. Defeated, the Devil and his followers were tossed out of
heaven and subsequently have continued to war against God by
attempting to ruin God’s creation, the earth. Traditional theology
even portrays the serpent that conversed with Eve in the garden as
Satan in disguise, thus attributing to the fallen prince of angels
responsibility for humankind’s fall.
A less well known alternative narrative, which is best preserved
in the apocalyptic Book of Enoch, is that a group of angels lusted
after mortal women. They then fell after leaving their heavenly abode
and copulating with them. This story, which at one time was widely
known, eventually disappeared from popular folklore because it
clashed with the official church position (or what became the official
position by the late Middle Ages), which was that angels are beings of
pure spirit and thus do not engage in sexual intercourse. A brief allusion
to the Enoch tale can be found in Gen. 6:2–4, where it says that
the “sons of God” (which, when seen through the lens of the Book of
Enoch, are angels) took mortal women as wives.
One contemporary religious leader, Elizabeth Clare Prophet, has
reexamined these ancient stories of fallen angels—particularly the
Book of Enoch and other early works—and concluded that there were
actually two distinct celestial falls: that of Lucifer and the rebellious
angels and that of the angels who copulated with human women. This
bit of speculative theology, as well as the full passages from the relevant
apocryphal books, is contained in Prophet’s fascinating Forbidden
Mysteries of Enoch: Fallen Angels and the Origins of Evil.
Malcolm Godwin in Angels: An Endangered Species recounts four
additional versions of the fall of the angels. The first legend surrounds
the “shadow of God,” where the Devil at first is the dark aspect of God
turned toward humanity. This dark force eventually evolved in
Hebrew tradition to become a separate entity with his own free will,
and by the time of the New Testament, became Satan, direct opponent
to God.
The second legend was introduced by Origen (ca. 185–254), the
greatest biblical scholar of the patristic period. Origen asserted that angels were created with free will, and that
some eventually migrated away from the Original
Source (God). Those who drifted into the
lower air took on human bodies; those who
drifted farthest away became demons.
The War in Heaven is a third legend that
may account for the fall of the angels. On the
second day of creation a tremendous battle took
place between two factions of angelic beings.
The first group was created by God and given
the Grace to pursue goodness. The second was
equal in strength but were devoid of God’s
Grace, and thus had the ability to choose sin.
Michael, at the helm of the good angels, conquered
the sinners from heaven, among them
Lucifer, who took with him one-third of the
legions of angels.
A fourth alternative concerns the birth and
passion of Christ. Already banished from heaven
and given free reign to tempt and punish
mankind, Satan is confronted with the Divine
in the form of Jesus Christ. In essence, the fallen
angel commits the ultimate transgression by
attempting to befoul that which is most Divine.
Christ emerges victorious and Satan furiously resolves to increase his
devilish pursuits. In response Christ hurls him into hell and the
archangel Michael binds him fast.