Despite being a very strong belief in the Christian environment, especially in the Catholic, the angels are not figures born in this religion – and they are not exclusive for the faith of their practitioners.
In the Bible, the angels appear every time there is a need to narrate divine communication to the human being. In popular tradition, everyone has their own, as a protector, personal security. In the arts, painters and writers often portrayed them and included them in their works.
Literally, the word “angel” means “messenger”. “Come from the Latin” Angelus “which, at a time, derives from the Greek” Ángelos “, and this is the Hellenic form used to translate [do Antigo Testamento] The Jewish term “Malakh”, which means Messenger “, explains the BBC News Brazil the theologian Kenner Terra, pastor of the Branca Baters Church, PHD in Religion Sciences and author of the book Courage to be.
Complete the land that the figure refers to “someone who transmits some statements”. “In ancient Jewish and Christian traditions, the angels are messengers and celestial agents in the service of God,” he says.
In the texts that make up the Bible, these beings seem to perform various functions: they participate in wars, integrate celestial armies, protect people and peoples, bring divine messages, meet God’s projects, organize the cosmos and articulate the seasons.
“The angels are purely spiritual creatures, created by God, endowed with intelligence and free will, whose purpose is to serve the Lord”, defines the BBC News Brazil, the theologian, the writer and the Catholic father Alex Nogueira, author of the book Good morning, my Godand rector of the seminar of the divine main theology.
“Some classes of angels also have the very special mission of helping men on the road to salvation. They are messengers of God and, although invisible, are constantly present in the history of salvation, from the Old Testament to the mission of Christ and the Church.”
“The figure of someone who is announced and often appears as a supplier is present in several other religious cultures”, contextualizes the BBC News Brazil the researcher of the sacred texts Thiago Maerki, associate of the agiography company, from the United States.
Christianity
In the Christian tradition, several thinkers have tried to theorize on angels: there is even a branch of theology denominatengeology. Between the end of the fifth century at the beginning of the 6th century, a philosopher who identified himself with the pseudonym of Dionysus, the Areopagite – in reference to a converting of Athens mentioned in the biblical text of the apostle Paul – wrote works that became pillars to understand these creatures.
“It was one of the pioneers to propose a system, a specific hierarchy for angels,” says Maerki. “Your classification has become the best known.”
Dionysus tried to organize the belief and established a divine hierarchy for angels. According to his thought, there would be nine angelic orders. In the upper part there would be the Serafini, followed by the cherubs and the thrones. So dominations, virtues and powers would come. Finally, the principalities, the archangels and the angels. He explained that this organization did not refer to an alleged superiority: everyone would enjoy the same importance. This hierarchy explained which one would be closest to God.
Officially, the Catholic Church determines that on September 29 it is the Arcangels Day. It would be three: Gabriel, Miguel and Rafael. On 2 October, in turn, is the festival of the angels of the Holy Guardian.
“The terminology of the Archangel comes from the Greek and means” main angel “or” chief of angels “”, says the writer and researcher J. Alves to BBC News, author of the book, author of the book The saints of every day. According to him, the archangels would have been the “sent by God to fulfill a mission in the history of salvation”.
According to the Gospel, he is Gabriel, for example, who seems Mary who announces her pregnancy of Jesus.
Alves teaches that over the centuries of Christianity, theologians were dedicated to explaining what the functions of some angels would be. It was so consolidated that Miguel would be the “guardian of the people of God and warrior against evil”. Gabriel, the “messenger of the strength of God, who announces the mysteries of the incarnation”. And Rafael, the “doctor and the quilt, an expression of divine mercy”.
Other beliefs
Despite being a very strong belief in the Christian environment, especially in the Catholic, the angels are not figures born in this religion – and they are not exclusive for the faith of their practitioners.
“The belief in the existence of angels is common, but the liturgical and devotional dimension, like its parties, the specific prayers and the invocation of the archangels is much more characteristic than Catholicism”, sites.
But it started long before. “The belief in angels is before Christianity. In ancient Judaism, they appear in prophetic opinions and have been influenced by Persian angeology after the Babylonian exile”, comments Alves. “Mesopotamic and Egyptian cultures also spoke of messages and custodian beings.”
“The belief in heavenly beings in the service of the gods or a hierarchical structure in the divine environment has parallels in other cultures beyond the biblical world”, adds Terra. “In Persian culture, especially in Zoroastrism, for example, there is no talk exactly in angels such as Judaism and Christianity, but we find intermediate spiritual beings between Ahura Mazda, the supreme god and human beings, who are also classified in hierarchies.
“This tradition deeply influenced the biblical tradition and beliefs of the second Judaism of the temple,” he says.
It is a common vision of other experts. “The belief in spiritual messages already exists in ancient cultures”, confirms his father Nogueira. “The Mesopotamian, Egyptian and Persian peoples spoke of intermediate spirits between the divine and the men.” It reflected, however, that the “Catholic faith” would not derive from these traditions, but from the revelation of God to the people of Israel, recorded in the Scriptures “.
“The Christian faith drinks above all from Judaism, from which elements of the vast rabbinic tradition of Angels and Archangels”, says Alves.
“The angels are before the Bible and appear, for example, in Mesopotamia and Egypt. They did not have the names of the angels, but they had the same functions as the angels”, the hagiologist José Luís Lira, professor at the University of State of Acaraú and founder of the Brazilian Academy of Hagiology.
In the Abramitic traditions so called, that is, the set of beliefs enclosed by Judaism, Christianity and Islam, there are more similarities than differences between the meaning of these mystical beings.
“In Islam, the archangel Gabriel would also appear to the prophet Muhammad [o fundador do islã]”, Indicates lira.
Father Nogueira contextualizes that in Judaism they are often considered “servants and messengers of God”. In Christianity, “they also participate in the mystery of salvation in Christ”. And in Islam, “they perform similar functions, such as Gabriel who transmits revelation in Muhammad”.
“The angels play an important role in other non -Christian religions, such as Judaism and Islam”, the theologian Jonatas de Mattas Leal, doctor of the University of Andrews, in Michigan and Rector at the Latin American Adventist Theology Seminary, confirms the news of the BBC.
Leal says, for example, that Islam mentions four archangels: Izrail, Mikail, Israfil and Jibrail – the latter is the equivalent of Gabriel. And remember that “the idea of celestial beings who act as intermediaries” appears, in addition to zoroatrismo, also in the Babylonian, Roman and Greek ancestral mythologies.
Popular tradition
If the theologies and various institutional religiosity have tried to systematize and standardize the functions and roles of the angels, popular traditions have tried to transform the figure into a friendly doing: from private body guards to help everything.
“Popular religiosity usually translates ideas from daily needs and practices,” says Terra. “The belief in Guardian Angel, for example, has its roots in the Gospel of Matteo, in which Jesus says that the little ones have angels who contemplate the face of his father. This is the main text to defend the idea of Guardian Angel.”
Remember that the ancient Christian thinkers, such as Gregory of Nissa (330-394), Basilio de Cesarea (330-379) and Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), “have also defended the existence of angels who take care of the particular way of each person”.
Nogueira says that “devotion to the guardian angel” is the best example of the presence of the figure in the popular environment. “The Church teaches that each person has an angel designated by God to protect and guide. This has given rise to simple prayers, widespread among children, but also to a daily trust of the faithful in their protection”, contextualizes.
“In popular culture, expressions and analogies emerged to reach the sacred. The famous medieval discussion on” how many angels adapt to the tip of an needle “was, in fact, a literal question, but a philosophical way to reflect on the incorporated nature of the angels”, reflects the priest. “Other traditions, such as representing them with wings or in childhood forms, the” small angels “, reflect both the artistic influences and the popular imagination that tried to make the invisible visible”.
The faithful theologian underlines that “the Bible does not explicitly mention the idea that each person has a guardian angel”. “However, there are several occasions when people are personally delivered through the functioning of the protective angels”, it is folded. “The personal involvement of the angels in the New Testament is implicit [em diversas passagens]. “
“Biblically speaking, the possibility that each person has a guardian angel is open, although he did not say,” he concludes.
“The angels are in the images of our lady and even of the deceased newborns or those who die in the womb of her mother, often says she is an angel, who has gone straight to heaven,” says Hangiologist Lira.
Alves adds that the welcome to angels in popular religiosity was a phenomenon that occurred “with great affection”. “The devotion to the Angel Guardian dates back to the Middle Ages”, says the researcher, underlining that a liturgical party dedicated to the figure in 1608 was official.
Art and Culture
The figure has become a constant in artistic productions, composing screens and frescoes and integrate literary narratives. “There is a great tradition in iconography, in painting, to portray the angel always wrapped in brightness and wings”, observes Maerki.
“The figure of the guardian angel is present. Christian art has widely spread its image, modeling popular imagination”, illustrates Alves. “The angels also entered common language, in expressions such as” were saved by an angel “and” it seems an angel “and in anecdotes, such as the expression” sex of angels “, which derived the Byzantine discussions on their spiritual nature”.
In the contemporary world, Pop culture has also gained. There are no Brazilians of the last decades, for example, who does not know the character angel, known for having tried to defend all the middle grass in his adventures hindered in the universe of the Monica band, created by the comic artist Mauricio de Sousa.
Source: Terra
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