Angels.

thomas.berubeg

Wandering the World
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Where does the Idea (at least in Cristian faiths) that dead souls "graduate" and become Angels? or is this just something said to little kids on the death of a favorite grandparent as comfort?

I thought the Hebrew mythos claimed that Angels were an entirely different order of (inferior to humans?) beings?

just as a note, want to state that I am an atheist, I'm just curious about different mythologies. please no religious wars in this thread...
 
or is this just something said to little kids on the death of a favorite grandparent as comfort?
This I think. I don't know, never thought about it really :confused:
 
Yet another thing we can thank It's a Wonderful Life for:
"Every time a bell rings, an angel gets his wings."

Also, as befits many other threads around here:
"You're thinking of this place all wrong. As if I had the money back in a safe. Your money's not here. It's in Joe's house..."

I don't think bell ringing will be enough for our economy this time.:(


Spoiler :
Unfortunately I really don't know enough about this to help the OP. Somewhere along the line I think much of the modern West lost the idea of the existence of non-human spirits being "angels." It's always been true that people believe the soul gets into heaven and has an eternal existence - and in 20th century culture/media (if not earlier) this just became conflated with "angel."
 
Um... Christians don't become angels upon death. We will actually be exalted above angels in Heaven. Well, exalted probably isn't the right word. But yeah, angels are an entirely different order of being from humans.
 
Um... Christians don't become angels upon death. We will actually be exalted above angels in Heaven. Well, exalted probably isn't the right word. But yeah, angels are an entirely different order of being from humans.

Hmmmm... interesting... Thanks.

Actually, Isn't lucifer's fall because he resented humanity being "superior" to angels?
 
Actually, Isn't lucifer's fall because he resented humanity being "superior" to angels?
There isn't anything in Isaiah about that that I remember, and that's the usual passage (Is. 14:12) that people use for the story of Lucifer.
 
I don't know of any christian faith that says they they do. It seems to be a fairly recent popular misconception, often used by those unfamiliar with christian theology to mock it.

Angels are supposed to be an entirely different order of beings (or several different orders of very different types of beings), and are usually considered higher than humans currently are but lower than what we can become. Essentially, they are God's slaves while we are his children.


On the other hand, Jewish tradition sometimes claim that Enoch and Elijah (who were taken to heaven directly, without death) became the archangels Metatron and Sandalphon.



The biblical references to Lucifer actually refer to the kind of Babylon, not Satan, although they could perhaps be extended to satan typographically.

I think what you are thinking of is the the Islamic view of Satan. In that view, Satan was the greatest of the Djinni (which are of a similar status as angels but are made of incorruptible smokeless flames instead of pure light and which have free will like humans instead of the perfect obedience of Angels) and he loved God more than anyone. God had first commanded his creation to worship no one but him, but then he ordered the angels and Djinni to bow down to and serve Man, which was made from clay but bore the image of Allah. Satan could not see the image of god in these lesser beings and chose to adhere strongly to the earlier commandment and serve no one but God. Of course, by disobeying the later commandment he was also not serving God, which caused all sorts of problems. Pride was part of the sin too, as he considered humans to be inferior to him and did not like them being treated as greater.

Iirc, in the Islamic view all individuals also have a Djinn associated with them and having the same appearance, sort of like a guardian angel or a Roman Genius/Juno. While the soul leaves this world, the Djinn remains and may be seen as ghosts. There are some references in the bible indicating that a similar view (but in which djinni were called angels) was common among Jews at the time of Christ and that the disciples themselves may have believed in it. If I recall, the first people to see Jesus after his resurrection thought they were only seeing "his angel," but I might be confusing this with a time that thought one of the disciples had died. There isn't anything indicating that this view should be considered correct though.
 
Where does the Idea (at least in Cristian faiths) that dead souls "graduate" and become Angels? or is this just something said to little kids on the death of a favorite grandparent as comfort?

I thought the Hebrew mythos claimed that Angels were an entirely different order of (inferior to humans?) beings?

just as a note, want to state that I am an atheist, I'm just curious about different mythologies. please no religious wars in this thread...

It's just something to tell little kids.
 
I'd also read something connecting this with zoroastrianism... can't remember what, or how, but if anyone knows...
 
in islam angels are completely different from humans as well. they were the servants of god. while you humans(the ones in heaven at least) got be lazy and frolic about all day. and magister cullum was spot on with the lucifer thing.
 
Where does the Idea (at least in Cristian faiths) that dead souls "graduate" and become Angels? or is this just something said to little kids on the death of a favorite grandparent as comfort?

I thought the Hebrew mythos claimed that Angels were an entirely different order of (inferior to humans?) beings?

just as a note, want to state that I am an atheist, I'm just curious about different mythologies. please no religious wars in this thread...

Myth #1: Angels exist in heaven
Myth #2: When some people die, they go to heaven

Myths often get garbled up, cause.. well.. they're kinda hard to prove either way, and they're usually wrong anyway, so it's easy to mix em up.
 
My mom's university professor spake thusly: "A human is an intellectual being with a body, while an angel is an intellectual being without a body."
 
its an Angel Mr B.
 
I've never heard it told like that. I've heard that "so and so is now in heaven with the angels" which I'm pretty sure scripturally is also wrong because everyone remains dead in the ground until jesus comes back and then people get sent to heaven or hell.
 
I've never heard it told like that. I've heard that "so and so is now in heaven with the angels" which I'm pretty sure scripturally is also wrong because everyone remains dead in the ground until jesus comes back and then people get sent to heaven or hell.

Time, cause and effect kinda go out the window once you die, i'd think?
 
Time, cause and effect kinda go out the window once you die, i'd think?

well I don't really care if they believe they die and come back as a hybrid SUV, but they should at least be logically consistent.
 
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