The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (197 page)

nak renamed him A
gad
(Pañj
b
a
g
, ‘part of one's body'), and proclaimed him his successor rather than the disappointed
Sr
Chand.

 
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(Gk.,
angelos
, ‘messenger’). An intermediary between heaven and earth. In the early religious imagination of the Jews, the connection between heaven and earth was thought to be literal, as in the attempt to build a tower of Babel (Genesis 11. 1–9). For that reason,
Jacob
had a vision of angels ascending and descending a ladder between
heaven
and earth (Genesis 28. 12). It was only later (perhaps under Persian influence) that they developed their own means of propulsion with wings. There are various references to angels
(Heb.,
malakhim
, ‘messengers’) in the
Bible
. Later reflection named many (e.g.
Gabriel
,
Michael
,
Metatron
,
Raphael
,
Raziel
,
Uriel
): they carry prayers to God, they teach
Torah
to each embryo in the womb, and they accompany Jewish fathers as they walk home on the evening of
Sabbath
.
Jewish angelology was taken over by early Christianity. Catholic teaching includes few pronouncements on angels, but enjoins a cult similar to that of the
saints
. In Christianity, the notion of fallen angels is developed further. These refuse to return or acknowledge the sovereignty and love of God: they are not destroyed but have a limited scope of subversive activity.
In Islam, angels
(Arab.,
mal
’ika
, pl., of
malak
) are ‘messengers with wings’ (Qur’
n 35. 1, the
s
ra
of angels). They were created before humans, and protested to All
h at his plan to create human beings (2. 30–3), though they agreed to bow down to
Adam
(2. 34), except for Ibl
s (see
DEVIL
).
The angel of revelation is Jibr
l (
Gabriel
), who ‘brings down (the revelation) to your heart, by Allah's permission' (2. 97), and he is mentioned together with Mik
’
l (2. 98). The angel of death (32. 11) is not named, but tradition calls him ‘Izr
’il, while the angel who will announce the Day of Judgement is Isr
f
l. Two angels,
Munkar
and Nak
r, question people, on their first night in the grave, about Mu