Angels and Demons (Jesus, Earth, Sodom, Gomorrah, beliefs)

[Scott1]

What sort of beings are they? What do they know and when do they know it? How did the demons go bad? And what do they have to do with us?

By Alfred J. Freddoso
Full article here.

[No*s]

Scott, the link is broken.

EDIT:

I mean specifically the one on the text "angels and demons"

[robtex]

Those darn demons. First they take down the links on this forum next thing you know they will converting believers into atheists........

Scott, if Angles are as apparent as God, (pure form) why use them at all as messengers? God is everywhere but he sends angels?

Does the church name any of these angels? If God made angels so much better (by the description in the article) than man...why bother making Man at all? Angels sound a lot more entertaining for a divine being to associate with .

Where (text wise) did the Catholic church first get the notion of the existance of this race? If a demon is a fallen angel is Lucifer a demon? Or did I misread that?

[lilithu]

Originally Posted by robtex

Scott, if Angles are as apparent as God, (pure form) why use them at all as messengers? God is everywhere but he sends angels?

Does the church name any of these angels? If God made angels so much better (by the description in the article) than man...why bother making Man at all? Angels sound a lot more entertaining for a divine being to associate with .

Where (text wise) did the Catholic church first get the notion of the existance of this race?

Can I comment even tho I'm not Catholic and am not Scott? I'm still not sure about the rules of this place. Oh well, I'm going to comment anyway, because I am curious to see how my own understanding of angels compares with the Catholic view.... or one Catholic's view.

My understanding is that angels are aspects of God. Thus they are of the same substance yet finite and thus perceivable by humans. Ignoring for the moment the idea of God incarnating as a human Jesus, a wholly (and holy) transcendant God would be difficult if not impossible for a human to perceive and relate to. So God sending an angel as a messenger to humans would be God sending one limited aspect of Godself so that humans can better relate. This also solves the question of God's omnipressence. Actually, now that I think about it, this also explains why God says "let us make man in our image." If there is only one God, why the plural?

Why would God bother with humans since there are angels? Because angels have no free will. They are so close to God, so attuned with God, that they cannot act separately from God's will. It would get boring being surrounded by a bunch of "mirrors" after a while, dontcha think? Humans are made in the image of God but we are not God, so we are something which is not so different that we can't relate yet different enough that we can ... be different.

(Don't ask me how Satan fell if angels don't have free will. I prefer the Jewish view of Satan in which he never fell.)

Where in the text are angels mentioned? Is that the question? They are mentioned quite a bit, I think. God and two angels... or is it three angels?...(as I'm trying to imply, there's little difference) come to tell Abraham that God will destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. Jacob wrestles with an angel/God. An angel announces to Mary that she has been chosen to bear the son of God. Revelations talks a lot about angels. Probably, Daniel does too since Revelations parallels so much of Daniel. And there are supposedly the approcryphal books like Enoch.

My understanding is that only two angels are specifically named in scripture - Michael and Gabriel. ("-el" means "of God" btw) Another is named in the approcrypha - I think it's Raphael. I don't know where all the other names come from, and there are a lot!


Scott, I truly am curious to see how much of what I've written agrees and disagrees with the Catholic view. From what I skimmed of the article, I got the impression that calling angels "aspects" of God isn't kosher (so to speak).

-lilith

[No*s]

Even though I'm Orthodox, I'm going to add a quick bit (and then I'm retreating again):

The fallen angels belief, including a fallen Satan, is a Jewish belief. Just because it wasn't preserved into Modern Judaism, doesn't mean that it didn't exist. One particular book to note is I Enoch which explains the issue in a rather overwhelming amount of detail (how much of that is symbolic and how much isn't is anyone's guess given that it's Apocalyptic). In Enoch, the angels rebel and fall. They subsequently have sex with human women.

The same thing is true in regard to the names for the various archangels. It was present in Ancient Judaism.

When the Temple was destroyed in 70 AD, most forms of Judaism went extinct. Basically, one group prevailed and descended into the modern variaty. As such, just because it isn't present now doesn't mean it wasn't taught by Essenes, Sadduccees, and so on. Many of the beliefs regarding angels were actually quite Jewish, but while they went extinct in mainstream Judaism, they did not go extinct in Christianity.

[may]

Originally Posted by SOGFPP

But who are these angels and demons? What sort of beings are they? What do they know and when do they know it? How did the demons go bad? And what do they have to do with us?

By Alfred J. Freddoso
Full article here.

The bible talks about an angel who tells people everywhere to worship God.(revelation 14; 6-7) so, does the angel shout from heaven so that everyone can hear it, no, rather Jesus followers on earth talk to others about God, and the angels guide them in their work. the angels make sure that those who really want to know about God have a chance to hear.so there are some good angels , who want to do Gods will.

[michel]

Quote[Scott, if Angles are as apparent as God, (pure form) why use them at all as messengers? God is everywhere but he sends angels?

Does the church name any of these angels? If God made angels so much better (by the description in the article) than man...why bother making Man at all? Angels sound a lot more entertaining for a divine being to associate with .

Where (text wise) did the Catholic church first get the notion of the existance of this race? ]
Lilithu
Why bother with man? without man in the equation, to 'mess things up properly, there would'nt be any point in angels

[may]

In the Bible, the two words used for "angel" are mal·’akh´ (Hebrew) and ag´ge·los (Greek). These both mean "messenger." They tell us something about one of the functions of angels. The angels serve as messengers, or couriers, between God and man.

However, the question remains: What are the angels doing today? Are they affecting us right now? Yes, they certainly are!

Recall that in his prophecy concerning "the conclusion of the system of things" Jesus foretold: "When the Son of man arrives in his glory [assuming Kingdom power], and all the angels with him, then he will sit down on his glorious throne. And all the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate people one from another."—Matthew 24:3; 25:31, 32.

[t3gah]

Originally Posted by http://www.catholiccollegestudents.org/fefreddoso.html

First, none of an angel’s acts depends on matter; hence, all of his acts are either intellectual acts of knowing and willing or else the consequences of such acts. This means, for one thing, that angels do not have sensory cognition or any powers which, like imagination and sensory memory, are linked to sensation. (A question: Does this entail that there is no such thing as angelic art? Even if there is no angelic music or painting or architecture, are there, for instance, pieces of fiction passed from one angel to another? And might there be some angelic counterpart to the other arts?)

Everyting in red is an assumption and bad one at that. Angels came down to earth after they noticed women during Noah's days. What did they notice? That the women were beautiful to look at. Sensory perception or cognition. What do you suppose those angels were imagining about those women?

They don't have imaginations or sensory memory? How are they able to make human bodies for themselves complete with working sexual organs? Why do they bother eating when they are in so-called human form? See the account of Lot.

No imagination? Why did they want to enter (possess) the pigs during the section of "Legion"? In fact, why did they want to possess people? What was the motivation to kill those pigs? What is the motivation to torment people? Sounds like sensory memory of something they've done before or knew what the actions would do to them emotionally.

Originally Posted by http://www.catholiccollegestudents.org/fefreddoso.html

Second, angels do not have ‘lower’ life-functions such as digestion, growth, or sexual reproduction. In fact, they cannot reproduce themselves in any way at all, since they do not have parts that can serve as angelic ‘genetic material’. But, then again, neither do they grow old or suffer from sickness and physical deterioration. (For instance, unlike some of us oldsters, angels do not need reading glasses of various strengths for different tasks!) Needless to say, angels cannot die or, as St. Thomas would put it, undergo corruption.

We people have no idea just what angels really are as there is no mention of composition in the scriptures. There is no mention of them having to eat in heaven. When the angels had bodies on earth they ate. Where did the food they ate go when they went back to heaven? Only those who have been to heaven know what's what.

God is mentioned to be a spirit, but that is no reason to assume that the angels are the same. In the book of Genesis God is remarked as saying that He is going to make man in 'our image'. We have no idea who the 'our' is. Accounts in the old testament with Moses and others seeing God tells of God having different humanlike body parts. Just because God is a spirit doesn't mean that those parts that were humanlike weren't spirit type humanlike body parts. Accounts in the gospels show that Jesus was the Word and was in the beginning with God which could explain the other part of we, meaning of 'our' in this case, as in the explanation of who was there, but that still doesn't tell us just what kind of materials angels are made of. What else could they be? Only God knows since no person has ever been to heaven.

Angels cannot die? Now this point goes back to sensory cognition. Jesus finds the person who's in the tomb area scaring people, slashing himself with stones and breaking out of the bonds they, the poeple put this person into. When Jesus approaches this person, the demons cry out not to be put into the pit or be put to death or see corruption, if I have the correct story here. Sounds like they are scared of something doesn't? Sounds like they know what it is to die? Sounds like an emotional outburst.

Originally Posted by http://www.catholiccollegestudents.org/fefreddoso.html

Third, if angels have some relation to places and to bodily things, then this relation is unlike anything else we know—with the possible exception of the very strange behavior attributed to the fundamental particles described by contemporary quantum physicists. Nonetheless, it is natural to believe—at least some pretty impressive ancient philosophers did—that the ‘intelligences’ do have some sort of power over bodies.

We know angels have relations with places as they, the angels, seem to know how to get around while on earth. We people do know how it could work because we think of far away places we'd like to go and then we go there. We are made by the same entity that made angels. It may be a bad assumption, but why wouldn't God give angels the same type of brain capacities and functions that he gave men? And then there is no explanation in some cases whether they, the angels, are in human form or not. Just actions are depicted. This fact or lack of explanation cannot be construed as evidence that the angels don't have bodies. It may be just a fact that is unimportant to the main point of the story being told. One case in point is when the farmers are told about the messiah's birth. Those angels are depicted to have appeared. A heavenly host. No description of what they looked like or were made of. Why? Unimportant for the point being made.

Fundamental particles makes the assumption that people know that these messengers are made out of something that's not corporeal. Jesus' body seemed pretty real to the apostles before he ascended to heaven. Why didn't he change into a spirit like the assumptions of the masses before going to heaven? When Jesus transfigures himself in the mountain before the three apostles, he doesn't change into three spirits. He changes into three persons. Moses, Elijah and himself.

Impressive ancient philosophers were needed to understand that these angels have intelligence to have some sort of power over bodies?! The point of angels coming down in human form with desires such as eating and having sexual relations is one indication from the scriptures which no one is in need of a philosophers interpretaton of the accounts. Then there's the portions of the scriptures that show demons (fallen angels) possessing persons and making them do all sorts of things or having a crippling effect on the persons who are possessed. Let the scriptures 'speak' for themselves and 'you will know the truth and the truth will set you free'.