Angels in Judaism

The figure of "the angel of the LORD" (מלאך יהוה) has been perceived by generations of exegetes and interpreters as obscure and perplexing. Almost every appearance of this figure in the Hebrew Bible complies to the following pattern:

1. The narration introduces the angel of the LORD;
2. He behaves as if he were a deity, e.g. promising fertility (Genesis 21:18), annihilating an army with a single blow (e.g. 2 Kings 19:32–36), or merely delivering a speech in which the angel presents himself as God (e.g. Exodus 3:2–4);
3. The interlocutors of this figure address and revere him in a way reserved exclusively to a deity.

As such, the incident leaves the reader with the question whether it was an angel or the deity who had just appeared.[5]

There are instances in the Bible where angels have the ability to heal an individual from impurity; however, the question may arise whether seraphim are angels. For example, in the book of Isaiah, Isaiah sees seraphim praising the Lord. Their voices were so powerful that they make the pivots on the thresholds shake and filled the temple with smoke. (Book of Isaiah 6:3–4) All of this power made Isaiah feel unworthy and unclean so he cried out:

"Woe is me; I am lost!

For I am a man of impure lips And I live among a people Of impure lips; Yet my own eyes have beheld The Sovereign LORD of Hosts.

Then one of the seraphs—who had taken a live coal from the altar with a pair of tongs—flew over to me, touched it to my lips, and declared, "Now that this has touched your lips, Your guilt shall depart

And your sin be purged away.

— Isaiah 6:5–6[6]

In the Book of Zechariah, Joshua was standing before the angel of the Lord, and God. (Zechariah 3:3) He was "dressed in filthy clothes" when standing before them. The angel then commanded him to take off his filthy clothing and gave him "festal apparel" and a clean turban to put on. At the removal of Joshua's filthy clothing, the angel proclaimed, "See, I have taken your guilt away from you." (Zechariah 3:4–5) Thus, the removal of Joshua's filthy clothing was like healing him from his guilt.[7]

In the Book of Zechariah, Zechariah hears from the LORD that He had been angry with his ancestors due to their evil deeds.[8] He promised them that if they "return[ed] to [Him], [He] would return to [them]." Then the angel of the Lord prayed to the Lord and said, "O GOD of Hosts! How long will You withhold pardon from Jerusalem and the towns of Judah, which You placed under a curse seventy years ago?"

In the Bible there are some references to angels acting as warriors, and protectors of all that is good. One of these references is The Book of Daniel which contains four apocalyptic visions. However, in Daniel 10:13, it makes reference to a sort of battle between the prince of the kingdom of Persia and the speaker who is believed to be Gabriel. Here Gabriel tells Daniel that the chief of princes, Michael, helped him in the opposition he was facing from the prince of the kingdom of Persia. Thus, both angels are acting as warriors for the good against the bad opposition from the prince of the kingdom of Persia. In addition, in Daniel 12:1, the speaker, Gabriel says that the angel Michael is the protector of the Israelite people and is a great prince.[9]

In many passages from the Tanakh, angels are utilized as messengers; indeed, there is no specific Hebrew equivalent for the English word "angel". Angels seem to have the appearance of ordinary humans; they are typically men and do not have wings in the mortal realm. The presence of an angelic messenger versus a human messenger must be determined by the context of the passage.[10]

Regardless, messenger angels are a highly important part of preserving and strengthening the link, as well as necessary distance, of God to humans. The nature of the knowledge that angelic messengers carry is always heavenly; that is to say, it is divine, and only by sanction from God can it be transmitted to humans, and only for necessary reasons. When an angel delivers the knowledge of God, his own identity is effaced by that of his Lord; that is, he speaks directly for God.[11]

Examples of this role can be seen in numerous famous passages from the Old Testament, including the three mysterious men in the story of Abraham and the destruction of Sodom in Genesis 18:1–19:23, as well as the angel who informs Samson's mother of the nature of the baby she carries in Judges 13:3–5. In these examples, the angels are disguised, their identities unimportant in relation to the heavenly magnitude of the knowledge they possess; they are entirely defined by their jobs.[11]

Angels in the roles of teachers become especially important in Jewish apocalyptic literature, in such books as Daniel, Zechariah, and 4 Ezra, which feature enigmatic and terrifying prophetic visions experienced by unknowing humans who need heavenly guidance to understand what they have witnessed; no longer does prophecy come with full or immediate understanding.[12] Rather, a type of commentary or explanation of the vision is provided through the figure of an interpreting angel, whose teachings dispel the ignorance of the prophet and allow him to better understand, and thus better propagate, the knowledge of the end times that his vision contains.[13]

Such knowledge of the apocalypse had both heavenly and earthly implications, and assumed a great deal of importance to the oppressed people of Israel at the time, who needed explanations for why God would let them go through so much hardship; thus, the knowledge was "good."[14] Because of the bizarre features of the visions contained in such apocalyptic literature, interpreting angels assume the roles of teachers rather than just messengers; instead of just conveying information, they must explain it.[13]

As teachers, they convey the full might and authority of heaven, while being able to comfort their distressed human charges in a more relatable way than if the prophets were directly spoken to by God. Thus, angels as teachers function as relatable interpreters and testaments to God's power, while also increasing His transcendence.[13] Most of all, they were important in establishing human prophets in their proper role as comforters, with "good" knowledge, to the people of Israel.

In 4 Ezra, the interpreting or teaching angel is Uriel. When Ezra expresses his distress about issues that would be similarly preoccupying Jews of his time—namely, why God would allow His chosen people to suffer under the oppression of the Gentiles—Uriel is sent from heaven by God to help relieve his ignorance. In the passage, Ezra argues with Uriel about matters of justice in a way that he never could with God; however, the angel argues back with a series of riddles that eventually show Ezra the misguidedness of his thinking (4 Ezra 3:1–4:21). Importantly, Uriel does not simply transmit information or "speak at" Ezra; the two are engaged in an animated dialogue that reflects that of a teacher and a student, with the former guiding the latter to a realization.[13] Ezra could never argue with God the way he argues with Uriel; however, this argument and its accompanying emotional catharsis is partially what leads him to discover the truth and main message of the passage on his own.

In Daniel, angels also assume the roles of interpreters and teachers, notably in their abilities to explain visions concerning the eschaton, and help human prophets unknot knowledge from it. In Daniel, it is the archangel Gabriel who is sent down from heaven by God to explain Daniel's perplexing visions and help relieve some of his distress (Daniel 8:16–17). In Daniel 7–12, the good knowledge that is transmitted to Daniel and thus to the rest of the population, is that the earthly events that have been so oppressing the Jewish people are being mirrored in heaven, and that justice will eventually reign in the form of a final battle pitting the armies of heaven against evil forces, which will be vanquished.[15]

However, Daniel is only aware of this information due to the assistance of Gabriel, who teaches him the correct interpretation of his vision, and encouraging him when he falters (Daniel 8:15–27). This role of angels is mirrored in Zechariah, where angelic interpretation and teaching is necessary to unravel the bizarre visions that the prophet witnesses. In the passage, the angel literally walks through Zechariah's visions with him, explaining and teaching him as they go along so that Zechariah properly understands God's intended meaning (Zechariah 1:9–5:11).[10]

The Talmud names four angels who would later be known as archangels, surrounding God's throne:

As the Holy One blessed be He created four winds (directions) and four banners (for Israel's army), so also did He make four angels to surround His Throne—Michael, Gabriel, Uriel and Raphael. Michael is on its right, corresponding to the tribe of Reuben; Uriel on its left, corresponding to the tribe of Dan, which was located in the north; Gabriel in front, corresponding to the tribe of Judah as well as Moses and Aaron who were in the east; and Raphael in the rear, corresponding to the tribe of Ephraim which was in the west.[16]

The Babylonian Talmud contains a reworked ancient tradition of the myth of the fallen angels – here, this narrative is invested with new significance and accordingly, these are the distinguished rabbis who are portrayed as the heavenly messengers' offspring. The most explicit presentation of this notion is found in bShabb 112b. The text recounts the sages' halakhic discussion in which Rabbi Hizkiya praises Rabbi Yohanan's competencies by exclaiming "this is not a human!". Right after his remark a following passage appears.

Rabbi Zeira said that Rava bar Zimuna said: If the early generations are characterized as sons of angels, we are the sons of men. And if the early generations are characterized as the sons of men, we are akin to donkeys. And I do not mean that we are akin to either the donkey of Rabbi Ḥanina ben Dosa or the donkey of Rabbi Pinḥas ben Yair, who were both extraordinarily intelligent donkeys; rather, we are akin to other typical donkeys.[17]

Although on the façade this appears to be a humorous allegory, this passage represents a broader tradition of associating angels and rabbis that manifests in other passages dispersed in the Babylonian Talmud. This tendency has two components, and, on the one hand, the text compares the sages to angels in various respects such as knowledge (e.g., the sages should be good teachers playing the function of the angel of the Lord in bHag 15b, some of their halakhic decisions are labeled as angelic in origins in bPes 33a), or appearance (e.g., according to bShabb 25b Rabbi Yehudah bar Ilai's Sabbath attire resembles the garments of the angel of the Lord, in bQidd 72a the Babylonian scholars are compared to the ministering angels). On the other hand, the Babylonian Talmud portrays the angels as highly reminiscent of the rabbis themselves: they are proficient halakhists (e.g., in bMenah 41a an angel disputes the laws of fringes with Rabbi Kattina, in bAbodZar 20b the angel of death betrays his deep familiarity with the rules of ritual slaughter), linguists (e.g., in bBBat 75a Gabriel and Michael scrutinize the semantics of the term kadkod known from Isa. 54:12), and teachers (e.g., in bMeg 3a–b and bSanh 44b an angelic prince admonishes Joshua for neglecting his Torah studies). On the whole, the quantitative data show that the sages are frequently juxtaposed with angels, and the main dimension of comparison is their intellectual proficiency. When it comes to the mapping of specific rabbinic competencies onto the angels, the most popular is the ability to engage in halakhic scrutiny and teaching. In sum, this presentation of the sages as angels can be taken as an expression of the sense of elitism entertained by the Babylonian sages.[18]

Maimonides, in his Mishneh Torah, counted ten ranks of angels in the Jewish angelic hierarchy, beginning from the highest:[19][20][21][22]

The Zohar, in Exodus 43a, also lists ten ranks of angels, beginning from the highest:[24]

Jacob Nazir, in his Maseket Atzilut, also listed ten ranks of angels, beginning from the highest:[24]

Abraham ben Isaac of Granada, in his Berit Menuchah, also listed ten ranks of angels, beginning from the highest:[24]

Eliyahu de Vidas, in his Reshit Chochmah, also listed ten ranks of angels, beginning from the highest: