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Up to the present time Roman Catholics generally regarded the angels as pure spirits, while
some Protestants, such as Emmons, Ebrard, Kurtz, Delitzsch, and others, still ascribe to them
some special kind of bodies. But even the great majority of the latter take the opposite view.
Swedenborg holds that all angels were originally men and exist in bodily form. Their position in
the angelic world depends on their life in this world. Eighteenth century Rationalism boldly
denied the existence of angels and explained what the Bible teaches about them as a species of
accommodation. Some modern liberal theologians consider it worthwhile to retain the
fundamental idea expressed in the doctrine of the angels. They find in it a symbolic
representation of the protecting care and helpfulness of God.
B. The Existence of the Angels.
All religions recognize the existence of a spiritual world. Their mythologies speak of gods, half-
gods, spirits, demons, genii, heroes, and so on. It was especially among the Persians that the
doctrine of the angels was developed, and many critical scholars assert that the Jews derived
their angelology from the Persians. But this is an unproved and, to say the least, very doubtful
theory. It certainly cannot be harmonized with the Word of God, in which angels appear from
the very beginning. Moreover, some great scholars, who made special study of the subject,
came to the conclusion that the Persian angelology was derived from that current among the
Hebrews. The Christian Church has always believed in the existence of angels, but in modern
liberal theology this belief has been discarded, though it still regards the angel-idea as useful,
since it imprints upon us “the living power of God in the history of redemption, His providentia
specialissima for His people, especially for the ‘little ones.’”[Foster, Christianity and Its Modern
Expression, p. 114.] Though such men as Leibnitz and Wolff, Kant and Schleiermacher, admitted
the possibility of the existence of an angelic world, and some of them even tried to prove this
by rational argumentation, it is quite evident that philosophy can neither prove nor disprove
the existence of angels. From philosophy, therefore, we turn to Scripture, which makes no
deliberate attempt to prove the existence of angels, but assumes this throughout, and in its
historical books repeatedly shows us the angels in action. No one who bows before the
authority of the Word of God can doubt the existence of angels.
C. The Nature of the Angels.
Under this heading several points call for consideration.
1. IN DISTINCTION FROM GOD THEY ARE CREATED BEINGS.
The creation of the angels has
sometimes been denied, but is clearly taught in Scripture. It is not certain that those passages
which speak of the creation of the host of heaven (Gen. 2:1; Ps. 33:6; Neh. 9:6) refer to the
creation of the angels rather than to the creation of the starry host; but Ps. 148:2,5, and Col.