An angel is a supernatural being who acts as a mediator between God and his creation, man. According to the creeds of monotheistic religions, angels are created by God himself to fulfill the role of "messengers". God is invisible and insensible to man, therefore, to convey his will, he created angels, for they embody in himself both the worldless transcendence of God and the created essence of man.
Mention of angels can be found in the sacred texts of Jews, Christians, Muslims and Zoroastrians. The angels are considered most fully and thoroughly in the Christian tradition: information about them is in the Gospel, Revelation and Epistle of the Apostle Paul. The angel Gabriel is one of the most frequently mentioned in the Gospel; he is essentially the personification of the Evangelism.
The origin of angels and their nature
The exact time God created the angelic powers is not indicated in Revelation. We can only assume that they were revealed earlier than the entire material world and earlier than man. Indeed, some angels, in particular Lucifer, fell away from God precisely because of jealousy for his new creation. They were indignant: how God can love creations from clay and mud more than perfect, fiery angels.
Angels are incorporeal, and therefore free from human needs, they need neither food, nor air, nor reproductive function, and life in them is supported by divine grace. Also, they are not in a specific space and time and can instantly change their location.
The angelic nature is ideal, perfect, because they are created in the image of God, but by the will of God they, like people, are endowed with reason and free will, which allowed, at the time, some angels to incline into the path of evil.
Thus, the angels were part of the global divine plan. They are an ideal, spiritual essence, then the world of things created is the sensory principle, and the totality of these spiritual and sensory principles is man.
Heavenly angelic hierarchy
The most expanded heavenly hierarchy was proposed by Pseudo Dionysius the Areopagite, in it he indicates 9 angelic ranks. Despite the fact that the angelic hierarchy is a unity, there are three angelic degrees in it: their gradation is associated with different levels of proximity to the grace of God.
The lower degrees receive divine grace and enlightenment through the higher. The highest, and thus closest to God, are the Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones. They accept God in their pure form and are able to contemplate it without intermediaries.
The middle degree is Dominance, Power and Power. They perform a kind of administrative function. Dominions rule all other angelic ranks, the Forces help people and work miracles, and the Authorities tame the evil forces.
The lowest angelic degree is the Beginnings, Archangels and Angels. The beginnings are mainly performed by managerial functions, the Archangels are the evangelists who bring the truths of Revelation to people (the angel Gabriel belongs to the Archangel rank), the Angels are the mentors of the human race, encouraging people to do virtuous deeds.
The Areopagite himself subsequently declared that such a classification is conditional and cannot fully reflect the whole picture, for this is known only to God. The rhetorical question is also the exact number of angels, it is enough just to recall the Okkamov maxim "how many angels dance at the end of one needle."
Angel Gabriel: who is this and what is his angelic mission?
Only 2 Archangel names are mentioned in the books of the biblical canon: Michael and Gabriel. In addition to them, in the non-canonical literature 5 more Archangels are indicated, close to the divine throne.
All Archangels perform specific functions:
- glorification of god;
- a war against the forces of evil and their leader Lucifer (such a mission is led by Michael);
- security function;
- intermediary function.
Angel Gabriel performs a basic, fundamental function - he is the main messenger of God, as indicated by the meaning of his name: "God is my strength." In the Christian tradition, he, together with Raphael and Michael, is in the form of saints.
It was Gabriel who was sent by God to the prophet Daniel in order to interpret his dream, to give him information about the end of Jewish captivity. He was also sent to Zechariah with the news that Elizabeth, his wife, would give birth to a son, whom they would call John the Baptist. When Zachariah, being in his advanced years, did not believe the angel, Gabriel punished him, saying that he would not utter a word to Zechariah until the angel's message came true.
The most famous biblical story related to Gabriel is the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary, that she is blessed among wives and carries the child of the Lord in her womb. This plot is a favorite topic of European painting and iconography. In most compositions, we can see an angel with a lily or a scepter in his left hand and with his right hand raised, symbolizing the gesture of blessing, Mary is depicted as a humble, heeding good news.
The central figure of such compositions is Angel Gabriel. Photos of such compositions (not all of the paintings and original icons are in the public domain) indicate the emphasis on the figure of an angel, bright, winged and majestic. But such a situation is characteristic only of early European creativity: after the 14th century, the emphasis shifted to the image of the Virgin Mary, while Gabriel, in turn, began to appear humble, sometimes even kneeling.
Prayers to Angels
Prayers expressing a request for an Archangel differentiate depending on functional Archangel features, for example:
- Archangel Michael is asked to defeat his base passions.
- Prayer to the angel Gabriel is directly related to his heraldic functions, they turn to him in order to find out their death hour. And it is worth remembering that not one of the angels owns global information, for example, the date of the second Coming of Christ, etc., only God knows this.
- Archangel Raphael can fulfill requests for moral and physical healing.
- The Holy Archangel Uriel is an enlightener, he can tell the asking person a solution to an urgent problem.
In conclusion, it should be noted that church canons are not forbidden to pray to the angels and worship them, however, angels are just a likeness of God, a product of his work, therefore, they cannot be an object of worship equal to Him. The 35th rule of the Laodicean Council decided that the worship of angels is a manifestation of heresy. There is a separate holiday dedicated to the 7 Archangels, ministers of the Holy Trinity, celebrated on November 8. The date is extremely symbolic: November is the 9th month, as an analogy of 9 angelic ranks. The celebration of the Archangel Gabriel separately falls on April 8, that is, on the second day after the celebration of the Annunciation.