Angelology

Although at first glance ṣîṣîṯ meet the definitional criteria of an amulet, there are just three passages in the early rabbinic literature which only indirectly suggest such interpretation. Yet, as it turns out, the tassels feature strong connections with the priestly clothes and given the protective role played by the latter inside the Tabernacle, ṣîṣîṯ can be interpreted as a lay functional equivalent of the sacerdotal garment. The present paper has three main purposes: first, to scrutinize the passages from bMenahot (41a, 43b and 44a) which are often taken as witnessing to the apotropaic function of fringes; second, to contextualize tassels in the network of the priestly objects: teḵēlęṯ, šaʻaṭnēz and ṣîṣ; third, to advance a careful hypothesis in regards with the implicit apotropaic potential of ṣîṣîṯ.

This is the pre-peer-reviewed version of the paper accepted for publication in “Review of Rabbinic Judaism”. Please cite the following:
Wojciech Kosior, “Like a Throne of Glory”. The Apotropaic Potential of Ṣîṣîṯ in the Hebrew Bible and the Early Rabbinic Literature, “Review of Rabbinic Judaism”, 21.2/2018.

While Aquinas’s primary notion of truth as adequation is applied to God and man in somewhat different ways, it is apparent that it is not applicable to the angels, at least not in the same way. However, since truth is a transcendental, and as transcendentals are convertible, one may claim that the transcendental systems that apply to various beings differ. In order to consolidate the universality of the transcendental system, the study aims to show the manner truth as adequation can be applied to the angels.

In the conclusion of his article entitled "The Angelic Spirit in Early Judaism," John R. Levison invited the scholarly community to use his work as "a suitable foundation for discussion of the angelic spirit" in early Christianity. 1 A few years later, in his study of angelomorphic christology, Charles A. Gieschen highlighted the need for similar work in the field of early pneumatology. 2 The case for angelomorphic pneumatology has been argued at length with respect to the Book of Revelation, the Shepherd of Hermas, and Clement of Alexandria. 3 This essay contributes to the discussion by pursuing the occurrence of the "angelic spirit" in the writings of Justin Martyr. 4

Archangels in Nubian Christianity played a very important role as protectors of people and intermediaries between them and the God. Therefore they were often presented in Nubian painting. The aim of this paper was to describe different scenes of archangels’ protections, with an attempt to enumerate several types of compositions and showing their iconological background.

La preponderancia de estudios sobre las series angélicas virreinales, y la creencia generalizada de que las representaciones de ángeles apócrifos constituyen una peculiaridad específica de la angelología virreinal, ha creado una relación tan estrecha entre ésta y los ángeles apócrifos, que se han llegado a considerar sinónimos. Sin embargo, tanto los textos como la presencia de estos ángeles en los conventos españoles del siglo XVII, ponen en evidencia que los ángeles apócrifos surgieron y se representaron en España mucho antes que en sus virreinatos americanos. Y que por tanto es aquí donde deben buscarse sus fuentes y su significado.

This paper has two main purposes: to outline the methodology underlying the tag ontology utilised in the Elyonim veTachtonim [hereinafter: EvT] inventory and to demonstrate the system of topic tags used to designate recurring subjects recognised in the accounts involving supernatural entities [hereinafter: SE]. The EvT database stores over 700 such accounts, which are annotated using a complex system of tags with several categories: class and type of SE, grammatical number, literary genre, topic, and the attitude of the SE towards humans. The tags facilitate information retrieval and, thanks to the partition of text into units, allow for the creation of data models. The topic tags are organised into a hierarchy of increasingly fine distinctions, arranged into several-tier structure. There are two main groups of topics: (1) the qualities and features of the SEs such as their appearance, knowledge, and skills and (2) the relationships between the SEs and humans ranging from cooperation to antagonism.
This paper is intended primarily for both present and future users of the EvT database who desire a more profound exposition of the system behind the inventory and would like to know the nuances of the classification process. The arrangement utilised in the project is highly flexible and as such can be deployed in different cultural contexts and applied to diverse media. This means that the present paper can also serve as a point of reference for scholars wishing to construe an analogical database within the framework of some other cultural and religious tradition.

This book discusses the occurrence of angelic imagery in early Christian discourse about the Holy Spirit. Taking as its entry-point Clement of Alexandria s less explored writings, Excerpta ex Theodoto, Eclogae propheticae, and Adumbrationes, it shows that Clement s angelomorphic pneumatology occurs in tandem with spirit christology, within a theological framework still characterized by a binitarian orientation. This complex theological articulation, supported by the exegesis of specific biblical passages (Zech 4: 10; Isa 11: 2-3; Matt 18:10), reworks Jewish and Christian traditions about the seven first-created angels, and constitutes a relatively widespread phenomenon in early Christianity. Evidence to support this claim is presented in the course of separate studies of Revelation, the Shepherd of Hermas, Justin Martyr, and Aphrahat.

L’Ars notoria, que l’on peut aussi appeler l’Art des notes, tient une place à part au sein du corpus de textes de magie rituelle attribués à Salomon qui pénètre en Occident à partir du XIIe siècle. Cette tradition bénéficie comme nulle autre d’une importante diffusion manuscrite, due pour l’essentiel à sa finalité : l’acquisition totale du savoir, au terme d’une préparation et d’un rituel de quelques semaines, voire de quelques mois, visant à solliciter les anges. Les clercs, en particulier dans le cadre universitaire, ont beaucoup copié ce curieux pseudépigraphe et contribué à ses multiples transformations, tant sur le plan textuel qu’iconographique.
Ce volume, qui inaugure la collection Salomon Latinus, propose pour la première fois une édition semi-critique des principales versions de cette forme de théurgie chrétienne, de la version la plus ancienne, la version A (XIIIe siècle), à la plus aboutie, la version glosée (XIVe s.).

The denial of angelic rule in the world to come (Heb 2.5) provides an important clue to the purpose of Christ's exaltation over the angels in Heb 1-2. The excessive reliance upon angels for national deliverance and personal protection within Second Temple Judaism posed a threat to the pre-eminence of Christ among Jewish Christians. Rather than seek 'help' from angels, the author exhorts his readers to hold firmly to their confidence in Jesus. For as messianic 'Son', only Jesus is able to 'help' them (Heb 2.18; 4.16) remain faithful through the perils of the coming eschatological judgment. New Test. Stud. , pp. -. Printed in the United Kingdom

Edited by Jay M. Hammond, Wayne Hellmann, and Jared Goff

Although Bonaventurian scholarship has seen a great expansion in the past forty years, there remains no English volume that provides a general yet detailed study of Bonaventure for scholars. The Companion to Bonaventure provides an invaluable guide to understanding him. Together the essays deliver a critical overview of the current research, the major themes in Bonaventure’s life and writings, and how they are being reinterpreted at the start of the twenty-first century. As a great 13th century scholastic luminary, Bonaventure exists as a vital contributor to the early Franciscan movement that swept across the theological and spiritual landscape of the High Middle Ages. The paradoxical simplicity and complexity of Bonaventure’s synthesis has made, and will continue to provide, a profound contributions to Franciscan and Christian reflection. This Companion will help in understanding why this is the case.

Contributors include: Joshua Benson, Jacques Bougerol, Ilia Delio, Christopher Cullen, Jared Goff, Jay M. Hammond, Zachary Hayes, J. A. Wayne Hellmann, Kevin L. Hughes, Timothy J. Johnson, David Keck, Gregory LaNave, Pietro Maranesi, Dominic V. Monti, and Marianne Schlosser.

At the origin of the Watchers tradition is the single enigmatic reference in Genesis 6 to the “sons of God” who had intercourse with human women, producing a race of giants upon the earth. That verse sparked a wealth of cosmological and theological speculation in early Judaism. Here leading scholars explore the contours of the Watchers traditions through history, tracing their development through the Enoch literature, Jubilees, and other early Jewish and Christian writings. This volume provides a lucid survey of current knowledge and interpretation of one of the most intriguing theological motifs of the Second Temple period.

Objective: To analyze the physical, economic, political and sociocultural components of the environment in Kuwait and determine if the country classifies as an obesogenic environment. Design: Observational, cross-sectional study following the ANGELO framework. Data from a popular online food delivery system was accessed and the nutrient composition for these foods was calculated. Setting: Kuwait Results: Meeting the majority of the characteristics required to be identified as such, Kuwait is found to have an obesogenic environment. Availability and accessibility to an almost unlimited amount of food, energy, trans fats and sugars are likely to be significant contributors to obesity and diet-related diseases. Conclusions: In tandem to the diet, harsh climate conditions, sociocultural practices and a lifestyle designed for decreased energy expenditure contribute to the creation of an obesogenic environment.

The study explores the eschatological reinterpretation of the Yom Kippur ritual found in the Apocalypse of Abraham where the protagonist of the story, the patriarch Abraham, takes on the role of a celestial goat for YHWH, while the text’s antagonist, the fallen angel Azazel, is envisioned as the demonic scapegoat. The study treats the application of the two goats typology to human and otherworldly figures in its full historical and interpretive complexity through a broad variety of Jewish and Christian sources, from the patriarchical narratives of the Hebrew Bible to early Christian materials in which Yom Kippur traditions were applied to Jesus’ story.

Milton’s angelology in Paradise Lost places him within a long scriptural and exegetical tradition in which angelic being elucidates human being. As God’s only other rational creations, angels are essential for understanding the nature and potential of embodied being in Milton’s monist materialist universe. Michael Schoenfeldt has examined the poem’s model of digestion as a capacity shared by humans and angels alike, finding in Paradise Lost an “alimental vision” that legitimates matter in part by legitimating human appetite. This critical framework emphasizes the substantial similarity and only accidental difference between humans and angels where monism and appetite intersect. Digestion is undoubtedly the model for matter’s potential for becoming in the cosmos, but as Raphael reminds Adam, love “is the scale / By which to heavenly love” humans may “ascend” (8.591–92). The natural expression of this love is erotic activity, but where monist materialism and erotic desire intersect, we find complications that a focus on digestion tends to obscure.

Eros is a foundational principle in the cosmos of Paradise Lost but is also a troubled one, as erotic desire and the problems of sex and gender are, like appetite and food, closely connected to both Satan’s and humanity’s falls. Despite the putative heteroerotic ideal in Eden, sexed bodies in the poem are often both a sign and a result of internal division, of ambisexual vitalist matter responding to lack or signaling a lapse in cosmic harmony. As most of the trouble accumulates around the female body, several contradictions emerge. Problematic sex is consistently heterosexualized (if not always precisely heterosexual), Edenic conjugality is both a lost ideal and clearly inferior to angelic sexual activity, the homoerotic desire circulating in the poem is at once superlative and foreclosed, and eros is both abundance and superfluity, the stuff of a self-generating monist materialist cosmos and a threat to divine hierarchy. Milton has placed these contradictions at the center of his epic poem not to resolve them but instead to highlight the imperfect, unfinished nature of paradisiacal existence and thus the importance of temperance for all rational, sensitive creation, angelic as well as human.

How is it that when people on earth encounter heavenly beings these consistently appear in human guise; yet, when, in turn, humans enter the celestial world these selfsame human visitors seem to take on qualities of angelic beings? Could it be that the properties of the very different environments profoundly affect the nature of both residents and visitors? To answer these questions this article looks at the various texts dealing with epiphanies and heavenly journeys and descents from the perspective of the spaces that form the settings of these narratives. The sample texts will shed light on the correlation between the nature of heavenly angelic/divine and earthly human beings, on the one hand, and the substances that both realms are thought to consist of, on the other. The analysis of the texts will enable us to indicate a structure through which to create a paradigm by which other narratives of human—divine encounters may be tested and understood. In addition, this paradigm will be able to better explain the mechanics of both boundary crossings and transgressions.

Pelagius de Majorque, ermite du XVe siècle, est un maillon important de l'histoire de la magie savante, à la croisée des traditions médiévale et renaissante, des mondes oriental et occidental. Cet article pose un premier jalon pour une étude plus poussée de la notion d'« auteur-magicien » forgée par Nicolas Weill-Parot. Si les magiciens les plus autonomes par rapport à la tradition sont souvent des spécialistes de la magie talismanique, le cas de Pelagius, situé dans son contexte, montre que la magie rituelle et la théurgie, bien que se définissant comme des savoirs révélés, ont été le théâtre d'un processus d'individualisation des invocateurs d'esprits. L'étude de l'Ars crucifixi, l'une des œuvres de Pelagius, montre toute la difficulté à situer ce curieux personnage dans une lignée clairement identifiée.

Pelagius of Majorca, a 15th century hermit, is an important link of the history of learned magic, between medieval and modern traditions, Eastern and Western worlds. This article is the beginning of a more complete study of the concept of « author-magician » exposed by Nicolas Weill-Parot. The most autonomous magicians compared to the tradition are often specialists in the talismanic magic ; nevertheless the case of Pelagius, situated in its context, shows that ritual magic and theurgy, although being defined as revealed knowledge, were the theatre of a process of individualization of spirits' invokers. The study of Ars crucifixi, one of the Pelagius'works, shows all the difficulty of locating this curious character in a clearly identified line.

In this article, I examine the interplay of transmission and exegesis in Zecha-riah's textual history, analyzing the strategies that early interpreters employed to create coherence in a difficult text. I use Zechariah's horse visions as examples, exploring their presentation in the early versions and the Book of Revelation. The following examination explores the form of Zechariah used by these ancient interpreters and the habits of read­ ing that are implied in their presentation of reused material. The evidence suggests that, by the late Second Temple period, the majority of readers conceptualized Zech 1:8 and 6:1-5 as coreferential visions and that this linking was representative of a larger strategy of coherence. This strategy is also part of a wider tradition of correlating Zechariah's horses with other heavenly figures in the Hebrew Bible, a tradition that is most prevalent in Targum Jonathan.

El artículo aborda el asunto del culto angélico a los Siete Príncipes en Nueva España, analizando, en primer lugar, la tradición teológica que lo respalda. Así mismo, analiza las bases del culto, que se sustenta en el Apocalipsis Nova de Amadeo de Portugal, místico franciscano, redactada bajo el supuesto dictado del arcángel Gabriel. Con todo ello, se detiene a estudiar la tradición visual de la imagen de los Siete Príncipes en el virreinato de Nueva España y se adentra en la tradición literaria novohispana que le dio respaldo. Los textos de Rafael de Bonafé, Alonso Alberto de Velasco y Andrés Serrano, sitúan en el centro de este culto angélico el tema de la evangelización como destino escatológico y, con ello, el papel protagonista de la monarquía hispánica y los jesuitas.

The article investigates, by way of close reading, the literary unit that opens the seventh among the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice. The study begins with a text-critical analysis of the poem based on its extant witnesses, including the many corrections contained in its best preserved copy (4Q403 1i 31–40). It then advances a new proposal concerning the poetic structure of the text, relying on linguistic and stylistic evidence.
The literary delineation allows one to discern the generic characteristics of the poem, which place it within the tradition of scriptural hymns. These form-critical insights form the basis for a renewed and nuanced appreciation of the theological message of the hymn.

In the modern world, angels can often seem to be no more than a symbol, but in the Middle Ages men and women thought differently. Some offered prayers intended to secure the angelic assistance for the living and the dead; others erected stone monuments carved with images of winged figures; and still others made angels the subject of poetic endeavour and theological scholarship. This wealth of material has never been fully explored, and was once dismissed as the detritus of a superstitious age. "Angels in Early Medieval England" offers a different perspective, by using angels as a prism through which to study the changing religious culture of an unfamiliar age.

Focusing on one corner of medieval Europe which produced an abundance of material relating to angels, Richard Sowerby investigates the way that ancient beliefs about angels were preserved and adapted in England during the Anglo-Saxon period. Between the sixth century and the eleventh, the convictions of Anglo-Saxon men and women about the world of the spirits underwent a gradual transformation. This book is the first to explore that transformation, and to show the ways in which the Anglo-Saxons tried to reconcile their religious inheritance with their own perspectives about the world, human nature, and God.

This paper takes a new approach to the contentious area of the etymology of Metatron, applying the lessons learnt from biblical folk-etymologies which have been shown to actively influence the writing of narratives. In the first section one such possible folk-etymology is proposed, based around the sequence TTR as a Divine Name in Metatron, along with some suggestions of how this could have influenced the narratives around the angel, and how this could have become part of the perceived nature of the angel. In the second section, texts from the Hekhalot literature are analysed to show that similar angelic etymologies which integrate a Divine Name into the angel’s name are commonplace during this period.

John Climacus's seventh-century ascetical and spiritual masterwork, the Ladder of Divine Ascent, drew on and reformulated the themes and trajectories of Chalcedonian ascetic spirituality in ways that would prove decisive for later Byzantine theologians. This paper seeks to elaborate the conceptualization of Climacus's spirituality through a sustained exploration of his treatment of angels and his understanding of the ascetic life as 'angelic.' In the monastic literature that Climacus inherited and that formed him, three tensions emerge with respect to the predication of "angelic" to ascetics: optimism and doubt about the possibility of a 'care-free' state, alternative conceptions of "liminal" progress, and opposition of individualism and community. Climacus not only holds together these tensions, but by coupling them with his own original ideas carefully develops the possibility of ascetic imitation of angels.

Angels are messengers. Their specifi c task is to bring messages from the heavens down to earth. From the Book of Genesis to the Gospel of Luke, biblical narratives abound with angels appearing to humans under the guise of human form, behaving like human beings and addressing them directly in a human language like alien visitors, or undercover agents. One might wonder, however, if angels, when they are not on missions, have lives of their own and a language of their own, and what they look and sound like when they talk to one another. One might in that case reasonably suppose that, granting that they do share a language, it does not quite resemble our own. This is precisely the sort of seemingly absurd question to which thirteenthcentury theologians dedicated themselves. Locutio angelica , the language of angels, was in a sense a scholastic invention, developed in great detail in numerous treatises devoted to the various forms and possibilities of angelic communication. Medieval theologians held angels to be entirely spiritual creatures whose language could only consist of an original form of immaterial communication, one not requiring the use of vocal signs. 1 They deployed a whole set of arguments to explain how immaterial beings could perform speech without properly speaking. It is as if they were trying to answer the question: What is [spoken] language without voice?

This paper presents the background, ambitions and the initial achievements of the Elyonim veTachtonim research project aimed at constructing an electronic database of accounts involving angels, demons and ghosts in early rabbinic literature. The first part summarises the history and transformations of the project together with its principles, textual range and purposes. It scrutinises the methodology behind the study by presenting a broader context including the cognitive theory of religion, formal analysis of myth and cognitive and statistic linguistics. The second part contains the technical analysis of the data mining process and provides a user's manual. The third part furnishes some early findings and observations based on both the qualitative and quantitative evidence gathered in the database: the domination of the pragmatic orientation, the correlation of particular entities and specific genres and the overwhelmingly negative attitude of demons towards humans. Finally, the fourth part points out the most important improvements which need to be made to the existing database and outlines some directions for development and possible applications.

Durante los siglos XVI y XVII surgieron dos nuevas propuestas iconográficas para la represen-tación de San Miguel arcángel, que no recogen los manuales de iconografía. Una de ellas, elaborada por Martín de Vos, le muestra con la mano derecha aureolada por el sol, y portando una palma en la mano izquierda. La otra, desarrollada en Andalucía por Francisco Pacheco y los seguidores de Zur-barán, le representa con indumentaria militar del siglo XVI, sosteniendo una rodela y un bastón de mando. Ambas imágenes responden a nuevos enfoques en la devoción de San Miguel propiciadas por la Contrarreforma. Las dos fueron incorporadas a las series angélicas, y alcanzaron gran popularidad tanto en España como en América. Palabras clave: San Miguel arcángel. Angelología del Barroco. Series angélicas. Alegoría. Lite-ratura angélica. During the 16th and 17th centuries two new iconographic designs appeared for the representation of San Miguel archangel that did not reflect the manuals of iconography. One of which, elaborated by Martín de Vos, shows him with his right hand ringed by the sun, and carrying a palm tree leaf in his left hand. The other, developed in Andalucía by Francisco Pacheco and the followers of Zurbarán, represented San Miguel with military attire of the 16th century, holding a shield and baton. Both images respond to new focuses in the devotion of San Miguel favored by the Counter-reform. Both were incorporated in the angelic series and achieved great popularity both in Spain and America.

A swift survey of Noah reviews clearly shows that the audience’s sensitivity was challenged in several regards: Noah was portrayed as a “religious extremist” and “borderline psychopath”, the Creator proved to be a “distant—unaware or uncaring—overseer”, while Aronofsky himself was said to have a “sinister purpose of leading people to believe that Christianity and Judaism are something they are not”. On a closer examination however, the above summarized pleas are not entirely relevant for two basic reasons. First, the movie consists of the ideas that have been in use since antiquity, rearranged and composed into a new-old story and it is equal to saying that all the arguments directed against Noah could be very well addressed to the Bible, Dead Sea Scrolls or Rabbinic midrashes. Second, the movie presents more often than not a “censored” version of the stories furnished by the classical literature itself and if to treat the sensitivity of the present day teenager as the touchstone of controversy, the classical variants are far more disturbing. The main purposes of the present paper are (1) to reconstruct several of such “censored” threads from Noah that play with the motive of love; (2) to juxtapose them with their equivalents transmitted in the classical sources; (3) to show that had Aronofsky and Handel followed the ancient texts more strictly, they would have produced a far more controversial and unsettling picture; (4) to discuss the possible sources of the controversies evoked by the movie.

[The Meaning of the Angels’ Position in Jesus’ Tomb in John 20:12]

Compared with the Synoptics, the Johannine angels assume a particular and significant position inside Jesus' tomb. The evangelist describes it precisely as one angel sitting at the place of Jesus' head and another at the place of Jesus' feet. Not all Johannine commentators pay attention to this detail, yet a comparison with the descriptions of the angels' positions in the different synoptic narratives demonstrates that they all reflect original editorial work on the part of each the evangelist. Consequently, these accounts can – and indeed do – convey particular ideological or theological stances typical of each gospel writer, including John. With regard to John 20:12, the article surveys proposals advanced by several Johannine commentators, beginning with some very obvious and prosaic explanations and ending with the most probable meanings behind the particular posture of Johannine angels. According to a strictly archeological-historical explanation, the position of the Johannine angles is no more than an indication that Jesus' burial place was not a tomb of kôkîm type. The article also presents allegorical interpretations, from St. Augustine to St. Thomas Aquinas; a religious-cultural exposition referring to the Egyptian goddesses Isis and Nephthys; a few very literal explanations accentuating the physical emptiness between the angels; and an intertextual exposition based on a targumic reading of Isaiah 6. At the end, as the most persuasive solution, the article proposes that the Johannine angels represent the cherubs of the Ark of the Covenant and the mercy seat. This intertextual and symbolic interpretation likewise explains Mary Magdalene's lack of fear and astonishment in her interaction with supernatural beings.

The late Luigi Enrico Rossi has taught us the importance of submerged literature. 1 His method is an efficient way to bypass the tyranny of Canon and of the mechanisms that made this canon persist through the ages. By tracing the threads of the 'mainstream' tradition, one is able to detect fine threads of earlier traditions, which had once existed in a full-fledged literary and social environment before being stripped of their context and absorbed into a different milieu. In this work of literary archaeology, a professional excavator can achieve much by tracing early relics and reconstructing the mythology, theology, or narratives that had once been woven around them. 2 This idea is as relevant to ancient Near Eastern literature or the Hebrew Bible as to classical literature.

This article pursues the intersection of angelology and Pneumatology in the writings of the so-called Persian Sage. The first part of the article takes its cue from the critique of Aphrahat's Pneumatology contained in a seventh-century letter by George, the monophysite bishop of the Arabs, and demonstrates that Aphrahat uses a cluster of biblical verses (Zech 3:9; 4:10; Isa 11:2-3; Matt 18:10) to support what is best designated as "angelomorphic Pneumatology." The second part of the article attempts to integrate Aphrahat's angelomorphic Pneumatology within the larger theological framework described by earlier scholarship, that is, in relation to Spirit Christology, and within a theological framework of marked binitarian character.

Abstract: This article is part of the scholarly revival in Angela of Foligno (c.1248-c. 1308) studies in relation to images. With the exhibition entitled "Dal visibile all’indicibile. Crocifissi ed esperienza mistica in Angela da Foligno" (Foligno, October 6th, 2012 – January 6th, 2013) and the publication of the catalogue, relations between Angela’s visions and her artistic context have been examined in greater depth. However, despite the excellent essays included in the book, there is still lacking a theoretical basis to explain Angela's devotional relationship with some images and, in particular, her reception of them. The main aim of these pages is therefore to develop that theoretical background and to interpret from such a basis the events that occurred in Assisi in front of
the so-called “vetrata degli angeli” (the stained glass window of the angels).

… Now observe a deep and holy mystery of faith, the symbolism of the male principle and the female principle of the universe … there is the line where the male and female principles join, forming together the rider on the serpent, and symbolized by Azazel .

A partir de un análisis de los tratados sobre brujería publicados por teólogos y ministros protestantes, el presente artículo se propone estudiar las particularidades del discernimiento de espíritus en relación al problema de la posesión espiritual en la Inglaterra de finales del siglo xvi y comienzos del xvii. En este tipo de literatura teológica, los padecimientos de los posesos eran interpretados de tres maneras diferentes: como el resultado de una invasión demoníaca, como una enfermedad de origen natural o como un fingimiento. De esta manera, se propone como hipótesis que existía un explícito rechazo a la posibilidad de que los cuerpos poseídos fuesen anfitriones de la divinidad o de alguno de sus ángeles, algo comúnmente aceptado dentro del paradigma del discernimiento contemporáneo. Esta negativa sería el resultado del modo en que el discurso demonológico inglés entendía áreas más amplias de la teología como la Providencia y su relación con el colectivo humano, los milagros y los carismas, y la santidad, así como también del carácter inherentemente polémico de la tratadística contra la brujería del periodo.

The Michael Figure in Rev 12 continues to intrigue biblical scholars, with special reference to his identity and role in the narrative of the war in heaven. This work is a contribution to the on-going scholarly discussion, especially from the exegetical perspective. The background study on the drakon-combat motif reveals that the drakon in Rev 12 mirrors the OT drakon more than the ANE drakon in their combat myths. Similarly, the background study on the Michael Figure reveals that in the book of Daniel, Michael exhibits the qualities of a divine Being. The name, Michael, in the light of the Hebrew OT and ANE cognate languages is best understood as a rhetoric interrogative sentence, "Who is like God?" This expresses the incomparability of God. Utilizing the historical-grammatical method of exegesis, this study demonstrates that Michael in Rev 12:7-12 is a divine Being. He is the same as the Male Child-Messiah and the Lamb in context. His role in the narrative of the war in heaven in Rev 12:7-12 is both military and judicial.

When defining his notion of "demon", Thomas Aquinas introduces some corrections to the Augustinian tradition, with the intention of moving away from the anthropologizing conceptions that dominated the previous millenium. But Aquinas' attempt at keeping the angels far from human beings, grants them at the same time an ontological weight that seems to bring them dangerously near to God. Of all the consequences of Aquinas' conception, I am particularly interested in the chain of implications derived from one of them: both from a metaphysical and gnoseological standpoint, angelic perfections are problematic when confronted to the factum of the Fall. Thus, I propose to analyse here the theological and philosophical grounds of Aquinas' chronology of the angelic drama. First, I will draw attention to some of the peculiarities of angelic natures; second, I will point out the main problems issuing from Aquinas' angelology concerning the instant of the Fall. Finally, I will present the solutions that can be gathered from Aquinas' text.