Tag Archives: angels

I am Sending my Angel

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  • Moses receiving the Law on Mt. Sinai from the Logos

See, I am sending my angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared. (Exodus 23:20)

The Lord promises Moses that not just any angel but MY angel will lead the Chosen People to the Promised Land. This particular angel–named Metatron in Jewish folklore but sometimes also identified with Michael–would be the guardian angel of the people, just as each nation/language group–there were thought to be 70 or 72 such “nations”–had a guardian angel.

Christians understand this reference to MY angel, however, to be either the Holy Spirit or the Logos himself. (As Christians understand the Logos to be the divine Person speaking with Moses, it seems more consistent that the reference to “my angel” would be the Spirit rather than the Logos referring to himself in this way.) Almost all the appearances of “God” or “the Lord” in the Old Testament are understood to be the Logos, anticipating his coming among us; throughout the Gospel According to St. John, the point is made that no mortal has ever met or seen or experienced the Father–only the Son, who reveals the character of the Father by the Son’s self-revelation.

Prophets, such as Malachi, also refer to “God’s angel” in a way that Christians understand to be referring to the Logos. The angel who appeared in the fiery furnace in the book of Daniel is understood to be the Logos, the divine messenger sent to protect the three young men. As “angel” means “messenger,” it is one way that early Christians understood Christ: he is the divine messenger of the Father.

As theology became more sophisticated, Christians understood this understanding of Christ as an “angel” was inadequate. But many were reluctant to abandon theological language that had been in use since the earliest days. It was this adherence to a previous “orthodoxy” that came to be known as heresy–heresy meaning “choice” and it was a choice to reject the theological advances of the Church as she came to understand Christ more clearly.

Faithful adherence to Tradition or stubborn heretical obstinacy … a fine line divides these two attitudes. Only by faithful discernment, “listening,” can we distinguish between them as the Church adjusts her language so that the Gospel can be clearly understood in new times and places. The message must remain the same even as vocabulary changes.

Satan Disguises Himself

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Medieval Byzantine-style mosaic depicts Satan tempting Christ in the desert: “If you are the Son of God, make these stones into bread.” Christ answers: “Man does not live by bread alone.”


For such people are false prophets, deceitful workers who are disguising themselves as apostles of Christ. And no wonder, for Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. It is no great surprise, then, if his servants disguise themselves as servants of righteousness; for their end will be according to their works. (2 Cor. 11:13-15)

St. Paul warns the Corinthians that his enemies, who call themselves the super-apostles, are liars and deceivers who are not true apostles at all. They are servants of Satan, pretending to be something they are not just as Satan himself can pretend to be something he is not.

Evil apes respectability and weeds do their best to look like wheat. But whatever similarity they have to wheat is betrayed by what they taste like …. We therefore need the grace of God, a sober mind and watchful eyes, so that we do not eat weeds instead of wheat and make ourselves sick; nor to mistake the wolf for a sheep and be attacked; and not to mistake the death-dealing devil for a good angel and be devoured.

St. Curil of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures 4.1

Satan began as an angel of light. He was, in fact, the brightest of the angels. But he rebelled against God and became the enemy, the deceiver, the liar, and the pretender. Based on hints in the Old and New Testament, we think that about 1/3 of the angels joined his rebellion. Some early theologians thought that humans were created to replace the fallen angels in the Kingdom of God. But others say that Satan and his followers rebelled because they were jealous of the love and attention that the Holy Trinity gave to the human race.

Theologians who specialize in angels tell us that once an angel has chosen to be faithful to God or not, that angel cannot change their mind. That’s why we can trust our guardian angels to not suddenly “switch sides” and lead us away from God once we have begun to trust them and their guidance. We can hope that the fallen angels will be able to repent but we can’t depend on it.

In fact, it’s our ability to repent that makes us superior to the angels. We can repent because we have bodies and are not simply pure intellects as the angels are. But we must still guard ourselves. We can deceive and lie to ourselves, if not other people. We can think we are devout lovers of God but if we claim to love God but hate or ignore our fellow human beings, we do not actually love God.

The super-apostles in Corinth deceived themselves even more than they deceived their fellow Corinthians. Satan deceives himself more than he deceives any of us. Self-deception, in Russian called prelest, is the most dangerous trap we can fall into. That’s why frequent, thorough self-examination against objective standards is so important. There are many “Guides to self-examination” available, often based on the Ten Commandments or the eight Beatitudes or the Seven Virtues. The important thing is to use them and keep checking ourselves against them and admitting–going to Confession–when we have failed to live up to them.

Rather than lie to ourselves, we can embrace and walk in the light with the angels.

If I Speak With the Tongues of Angels But Have Not Love

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In addition to the Eucharist, Christians would meet for banquets known as “agapes” or “love feasts” in order to eat, pray, and share their goods together. This is a fresco of a female figure holding a chalice at an early Christian Agape feast, depicted in the Catacomb of Saints Marcellinus and Peter, Via Labicana, Rome. Perhaps the woman with the cup is the personification of Agape-Love herself. The Patriarch Job is often called the Long-Suffering because of his many afflictions; he shown wearing a crown because he is described as a king in the oldest manuscripts of the Book of Job.


If I speak in the tongues of humans or even of angels, and do not have love, I have become sounding brass rather than a resounding cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy … and do not love, I am good for nothing. (1 Cor. 13:1-2)

This chapter is a digression in the apostle’s instructions to the Corinthians, but it has become one of the most recognizable chapters in the New Testament. Chapters 12 and 14 of the epistle are about the Church but Chapter 13 is about the essential quality of Christian life: agape, translated simply as “love” is the clearest expression of Christian faith and practice.

St. Paul mentions angels a few times in this epistle (chapters 4, 6, and 11) but this is the only place where he refers to “the tongues of angels.” Perhaps he is thinking of the Testament of Job (written between 100 BC-100 AD), in which the daughters of Job are given the ability of ecstatic speech to make up for their not being allowed to inherit their father’s property on an equal footing with their brothers. The ecstatic speech of the daughters is described as the language of angels and cherubim.

Paul chooses speaking in tongues as his example because the Corinthians thought that it was the greatest of the gifts…. The tongues of angels are those perceived by the mind, not by the ear.

Theodoret of Cyr, Commentary on the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians

But this ecstatic speech is useless without love. Even prophecy, which St. Paul had earlier said was truly the greatest of the gifts, is useless without love.

Balaam prophesied even though he was not a prophet (Numbers 22-24). Even his donkey prophesied…. King Saul prophesied but was filled with an evil spirit (1 Samuel 16, 19).

Ambrosiaster, Commentary on Paul’s Epistles

Love is not just a quality of Christian life. Love is what is natural to divinity.

Since true charity loves all, if someone knows that he hates even one other person he should hasten to vomit up this bitter gall, in order to be ready to receive the sweetness of charity [Christ] himself.

St. Caesarius of Arles, Sermon 23.4

Many people have heard that there are four different words in Greek that are commonly all translated by the English word “love.” C.S. Lewis wrote a well-known book about these words, known as The Four Loves.