The Kidadl Team, which “is made up of people from different walks of life, from different families and backgrounds,” posted 48 Facts About Angels That Will Make You Truly Enchanted.
They note, “Angels are spiritual beings…The Bible and other holy scriptures have mentioned angels and described their appearance and powers” and calls Angels, “heavenly beings…are spiritual beings of heaven.”
Specific to my context, they note, “According to the Bible, angels were created much before God created man. We also know that they were created at the same time the Earth was formed.” This is based on a hidden assumption about the age of the Earth but, in short, the Bible does not state, “angels were created much before God created man” but only that sons of God are sometimes Angels then Job 38:7 has them witnessing the creation of the Earth (the LXX has them as Angelos) but that’s about as much as we can say in terms of chronology—it’s about as much as the Bible says.
I’m unsure what they mean by that “Many tales from the holy scripture have described the resurrection of God’s messengers. This includes Jesus Christ himself, the famous Archangel Michael, and many others” since I’m unaware of any resurrection of Michael.
They noted, “Although most tales, movies, books, and dramas portray angels appearing in human form, they do not have any true physical form.” Interestingly, I included a chapter titled “Movies and TV Shows on Loyal Angels and Fallen Angels 161” in my book What Does the Bible Say About Angels? A Styled Angelology.
As for “appearing in human form” but “do not have any true physical form” well, that’s exactly backward: they are depicted as “appearing in human form” in the Bible with no indication that such isn’t their natural appearance, their ontology, no indication that they change form/shape or take on bodies or the appearance of them.
The articles notes “They can appear in various forms. Some tales portray them as spiritual beings from the heavenly Jerusalem in the form of a beautiful human figure with radiating white or bluish light rays, also called halos. Although we do not know the exact reason for such halos, we can assume that this denotes their spiritual being and imparts positivity.” Biblically, there’s no indication “They can appear in various forms” nor even that they do so “in the form of a beautiful human” nor have halos.
Also “Many scriptures claim that angels live among us in the form of humans” which pertains to “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares” (Heb 13:2).
They rightly note, “According to the scripture, angels in heaven do not marry” with in heaven being the accurate qualifying term. Many take Jesus out of context and claim that He said Angels don’t get married, don’t have genders, etc. but He specifically spoke of “Angels of God in heaven” (Matthew 22:30) which is why those who did are considered sinners, having “left their first estate,” as Jude put it.
Regarding “fallen angels, who are cast out of heaven” they have it that “There are about 200 angels who have been cast out” which they get from the pseudopigraphic text 1 Enoch/Ethiopic Enoch. From some uncited source, they assert “Some of these sons of God are Allocen, Abaddon, Andras, Amy, Amon, Apollyon, Berith, Botis, Buer, Forcas, Gadreel, Gusion, Lahash, Marbas, Naamah, and many more.”
We’re told “They are also called the ‘Watchers’” which comes from the pseudepigraphic era, the Second Temple Era (516 BC-70 AD).
The claim “none of the scriptures, including the Bible or the Abrahamic scriptures, have mentioned fallen angels” which seems to be an issue of terminology—or so I would hope. Perhaps the term “fallen” does not appear in the Bible with regards to them by there is occasion to interpret stars to be a symbolic reference to Angels (“stars are the angels” Rev 1:20):
Dan 8:10 notes that the “little horn…grew great, even to the host of heaven. And some of the host and some of the stars it threw down to the ground and trampled on them.
Rev 12:4 has the Dragon/Satan/Devil who with “His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth.”
Jude refers to “angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day.”
2 Pet 2:4 notes “God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell [actually Tartarus] and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment.”
It’s noted that “The Christian and Pagan mythologies have mentioned several fallen angels, including Chemosh, Moloch, Dagon, Beelzebub, Belial, and Satan. Lucifer, who was the son of God, was cast out of heaven due to his rebellion, and therefore, became Satan.”
Chemosh, Moloch and Dagon are Pagan idols and if such idols represent false gods and the false gods are fallen Angels/demons then, fair enough.
Beelzebub and Belial would be akas for Satan as is Lucifer but he isn’t a son of God since he’s not an Angel, he’s a Cherub (Eze 28:14). They go on to note “Angels are messengers of God” and since Cherubim are not messengers then, by definition, they’re not Angels—they and Seraphim have different job titles, different job functions and look different from one another thus, these are three different categories of being.
Thy claim “Some scriptures define angels as having two wings, while others tell us about the presence of six wings on them, which helped the angels fly between heaven and Earth” but Angels don’t have wings, Cherubim have four and Seraphim have six.
Thus, when they claim “The Bible mentions the different kinds of angels…Archangels, Cherubims, and Seraphims” that’s just a basic level category error based on violating the law of identity—if anything, the kinds of Angels, proper, are the Angel of the LORD, Archangels, and regular Angels.
It’s noted, “Other rankings of angels include Dominions, Thrones, Virtues, Archangels, Powers, and Principalities.” Yes, things are listed but since nothing is specified about them in the Bible we know not which category of being belongs in what rank.
They note “Angels do not physically hurt humans. As they have no physical form, they are unable to inflict any pain on humans” yet, this is simply inaccurate on various levels—as we have seen and even if, for example, “the angel of the Lord went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians” (2 Kin 19:35) only by metaphysically causing death (as it were).
They note, “the Bible has mentioned a number of significant wars that are fought between the angels and the demons. There are tales of war between Satan and God’s angels, including the mighty archangel Michael” but there’s only one, “war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back” (Rev 12:17).
Thus, overall the article is an interesting mishmash but sadly, based on common misconceptions.
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