Last week we explored the creation of the angels and why God created these spiritual beings. This week we will dive into what exactly is an angel.
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First of all, the English word “angel” comes from the Latin angelus, meaning “messenger of God.” The Latin stems from Greek ἄγγελος ángelos, which is a translation of the Hebrew mal’ākh, meaning “messenger,” or “delegate,” or “ambassador.” The Catechism of the Catholic Church puts it this way:
329 St. Augustine says: “‘Angel’ is the name of their office, not of their nature. If you seek the name of their nature, it is ‘spirit’; if you seek the name of their office, it is ‘angel’: from what they are, ‘spirit’, from what they do, ‘angel.’ ” With their whole beings the angels are servants and messengers of God. Because they “always behold the face of my Father who is in heaven” they are the “mighty ones who do his word, hearkening to the voice of his word”.
The word “angel” then simply describes what they do and not what they are. Angels are above all messengers and as we will see when we open up Sacred Scripture, they are messengers of God’s divine plan.
In terms of their nature, as St. Augustine noted in the above quote, angels are “spirits.” Succinctly put in the “Baltimore Catechism:”
37. What are angels? Angels are created spirits, without bodies, having understanding and free will.
John Paul II commented on this doctrine in a General Audience on July 30, 1986:
According to Sacred Scripture the angels, inasmuch as they are purely spiritual creatures, are presented for our reflection as a special realization of the “image of God,” the most perfect Spirit, as Jesus himself reminds the Samaritan woman in the words: “God is spirit” (Jn 4:24). From this point of view the angels are creatures closest to the divine exemplar. (emphasis added)
Just as God is by nature a pure spirit, the angels are pure spirits without a body. In this way they image God in a way that we humans do not.
Angels then are neither male nor female as they lack any anatomy at all. They can, however, assume the appearance of a human, but it is more like a “costume” than anything substantial. When they appear to humans they do so for our benefit and appear in a form that we can see with our eyes. Otherwise angels are invisible to our senses.
Because of their lack of bodies, angels do not occupy space like we do and move within our world without taking up space. The closest analogy to how angels move is like “electrons” or in “quantum leaps.” Angels “move instantaneously from one place to another without passing through any space or time in between” (Peter Kreeft, Angels and Demons, 69-70).
We often depict angels with “wings,” not because they possess wings, but because it represents their speed and symbolizes their role as messengers.
Typically angels make themselves aware to us, because of a particular message they need to convey. However, it is possible that we may encounter an angel without knowing it because an angel can appear in the form of a human and affect the material world around them. Miracles would be a clear sign that something supernatural is occurring and could indicate a presence of an angel (like the stories of guardian angels saving people from car wrecks).
Angels are immortal beings as well, each being created but never “dying” like humans do on earth. Since they are pure spirits, they do not possess anything that decomposes.
Additionally, God gave the angels great gifts, as the “Baltimore Catechism” cites:
38. When God created the angels He bestowed on them great wisdom, power and holiness. Angels have brilliant intelligences and do not have to study.
John Paul II expounded upon this doctrine in a General Audience on July 23, 1986:
The pure spirits have a knowledge of God incomparably more perfect than that of man, because by the power of their intellect, not conditioned nor limited by the mediation of sense knowledge, they see to the depths the greatness of infinite Being, of the first Truth, of the supreme Good. To this sublime capacity of knowledge of the pure spirits God offered the mystery of his divinity, making them thus partakers, through grace, of his infinite glory. Precisely as beings of a spiritual nature they had in their intellect the capacity, the desire of this supernatural elevation to which God had called them, to make of them, long before man, “partakers of the divine nature’ (cf. 2 Pt 1:4), partakers of the intimate life of him who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, of him who in the communion of the three Divine Persons, “is Love” (1 Jn 4:16). God had admitted all the pure spirits, before and to the eternal communion of love. (emphasis added)
Angels are created beings, making their intelligence finite, but they receive their knowledge instantaneously as they do not have to acquire knowledge by sense experience (touching, feeling, seeing).
The great gift of their intelligence will make the Fall of the Angels even more profound as all angels possess an amazing knowledge of who God is and what His plans were from the beginning of time.
Nine Choirs of Angels
Traditionally, angels are divided into what is called “nine choirs.” It is based on nine names of ranks of angels that is found in Sacred Scripture.
Saint Gregory the Great (540 – 604 AD) listed these “choirs” in a homily:
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.” (Hom. 34, In Evang.)
These “orders” or “choirs” of angels refer to their tasks as assigned to them by God. Peter Kreeft gives a great summation of these different roles:
The first three levels see and adore God directly:
The seraphim, the highest choir, comprehend God with maximum clarity, and therefore their love flames the hottest. (“Seraphim” means “the burning ones.”) Lucifer (“Light-bearer”) was once one of them. That’s why he’s still very powerful and dangerous.
The cherubim contemplate God too, but less in himself than in his providence…(“Cherubim” means “fullness of wisdom”.)
The thrones contemplate God’s power and judgements. (Thrones symbolize judicial, juridical power)
The next three choirs fulfill God’s providential plans for the universe, like middle management personnel:
The dominations or “dominions” (…”authority”), command the lesser angels below them.
The virtues receive their orders from the dominations and “run” the universe, so to speak, especially the heavenly bodies. (“Virtue” used to mean power, might, or energy.)
The powers serve the virtues by fighting against evil influences that oppose the virtues’ providential plan.
The last three choirs directly order human affairs:
The principalities care for earthly principalities, that is, cities and nations and kingdoms.
The archangels (such as Gabriel) carry God’s important messages to man.
Ordinary angels are the “guardian angels”, one for each individual.
This traditional ordering of angels is, strictly speaking, not official Church doctrine, but is an accepted Catholic belief based on Scripture. Saint Gregory (and others, like Saint Thomas Aquinas) found these different orders of angels throughout Scripture and sought to find a coherent way to arrange them.
For reference, here are the exact quotes from Saint Paul’s letters regarding the hierarchy:
Which he wrought in Christ, raising him up from the dead, and setting him on his right hand in the heavenly places. Above all principality, and power, and virtue, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come. (Ephesians 1:20-21, emphasis added)
For in him were all things created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or dominations, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him and in him. (Colossians 1:16, emphasis added)
The Old Testament adds Cherubim and Seraphim (in multiple places) and we see the “archangels” named in the New Testament (Gabriel, Michael) and in the Old Testament (Raphael and Michael are also referenced).
So practically speaking, only archangels and (ordinary) angels have direct dealings with humans. The rest of the angels are either with God or govern the world invisibly, though their effects can still be felt.
That is it for this week. Next week we will dive into the Fall of the Angels and discuss what exactly is a ghost.