Why Bible Accurate Angels Are So Creepy

[Music] angels even if you haven't touched the bible you probably have an idea on what they look like they're those elegant heavenly beings with long white robes swan like wings and perhaps a halo on top for good measure we also know what angel babies or cherubs look like those small chubby cute infants clasping a bow and arrow the kind of thing you might see on a valentine's day card except well that's not what angels actually look like not according to the bible these are biblically accurate angels these horrifying abominations are more suited to an h.b lovecraft novel not really the bible so what are these things why do they look this way and how have we got angels so wrong okay so angels come from the old testament the first half of the bible for christians or the whole bible known as the tanakh for jews the old testament was written down in modern-day israel and palestine from about the 6th century bce to the 3rd century bce although many scholars believe the biblical stories themselves are much older we get the word angel from the greek angelos originally from the hebrew word malach which roughly translates to messenger these messengers appear in the old testament a number of times they carry god's messages from heaven and earth and sometimes act on his behalf for example you might recognize the angel of death in the passover story that slaughtered all the first sons of the egyptians or perhaps the angel that struck 70 000 israelites to death and the angel that single-handedly killed 185 000 assyrian soldiers in one night when they appear in the bible they are described as having wings in fact they look like any ordinary person in the later biblical texts such as daniel some even get names gabriel raphael and michael okay this all sounds familiar but they're not quite the nightmare material freak abominations we saw before the angels known as malach are not the only heavenly beings in the bible there's a hierarchy of them and depending on who you ask your classic humanoid angels are actually pretty far down the ladder in the middle ages a jewish scholar known as my modernities drew up a hierarchy of angels and if you look here your classic humanoid angels the malach are pretty low down but not quite as low as cherubim forget those chubby winged angels according to the bible cherubim are animal human hybrids the first time we see them is in the book of genesis right after adam and eve have been kicked out the garden their job is to guard the garden of eden from mankind our best description of cherubim comes to the book of ezekiel it opens with a prophet experiencing a profound vision in his vision ezekiel describes them as living creatures but they are later revealed in chapter 10 as cherubim his account is as follows in the middle of it was something like four living creatures this was their appearance they were of human form each had four faces and each of them had four wings their legs were straight and their soles of their feet were like the sole of a calf's foot and they sparkled like burnished bronze under their wings on their four sides they had human hands and the four had their faces and their wings thus their wings touched one another each of them moved straight ahead without turning as they moved as for the appearance of their faces the four had the face of a human being the face of a lion on their right side the face of an ox on their left side and the face of an eagle such were their faces their wings were spread out above each creature had two wings each of which touched the wing of another while two covered their bodies each moved straight ahead wherever the spirit would go they went without turning as they went in the middle of the living creatures there was something that looked like burning coals of fire like torches moving to and fro among the living creatures the fire was bright and lightning issued from the fire the living creatures darted to and fro like a flash of lightning the cherubim don't look like your average angel instead they look more like the mythical beasts in ancient mesopotamia especially the babylonian iamasu which is the wings of an eagle the body of a lion and the head of a king these would act as guardians to sacred places like temples or the palace or city walls and performed a similar role to the biblical cherubim they look similar to their egyptian cousin the sphinx or the hittite griffin many believed that these biblical angels were descendants of these mythological creatures from mesopotamia there would have been a lot of cultural exchange and the same sorts of mythical creatures would crop up across these regions cherubim and later christianity may have been imported from greek and roman myths borrowing from the shapes of cupid or pluto moving up the list we get these guys seraphim they have six wings two used for flying and the other pair for covering the angel's face and the third pair for covering the angel's feet they're described in the book of isaiah as follows seraphs were in attendance above him each had six wings with two they covered their faces and with two they covered their feet and with two they flew and one called the other and said holy holy holy is the lord of hosts and the whole earth is full of his glory in medieval christian theology seraphim is the highest choir of the angelic hierarchy they are the caretakers of god's throne again continuously singing holy holy holy all day every day so seraphim their name comes from the word seraph to burn so seraphim may mean something like the burning ones okay where do they come from going further into seraphine's name reveals its origins the hebrew word for a venomous serpent of the desert is saraf in ancient egypt the cobra was often referred to as the flaming one an image of which called urayus was worn by the pharaoh thus saraf may be the hebrew term for cobra and perhaps where our seraphim get their winged appearance from now we're getting to the strangest beings in the bible the ophanim or simply known as the wheels they're a pair of interlocking gold wheels with eyes around the outside and they hover and float in the sky in the same vision as before ezekiel describes them alongside the cherubim quote as i look to the living creatures i saw a wheel on the earth beside the living creatures one for each of the four of them as for the appearance of the wheels and the construction their appearance was like the gleaming of beryl and the four had the same form their construction being something like a wheel within a wheel when they moved they moved in any of the four directions without veering as they moved their rims were tall and awesome for the rims of all four were full of eyes all around when the living creatures moved the wheels moved beside them and when the living creatures rose from the earth the wheels rose wherever the spirit would go they went and the wheels rose along with them for the spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels the wheels are beings who are meant to carry god's throne making them some of the holiest and certainly the strangest beings in the bible where do these wheels come from well no one really knows this one conspiracy theorists believe that ezekiel is describing ufo due to its strange shape and movement or perhaps seeing that this all takes place in a trippy vision it could be the product of the prophet ingesting a psychedelic plant more grounded scholars interpret the wheels metaphorically a stand-in for god's unknowability or some other often quite elaborate interpretation but ultimately no one really knows much more about the wheels they're never mentioned anywhere else there is some confusion about whether these eldritch abominations known as cherubim seraphim or ophanim are really actually angels perhaps heavenly being is a better description of them whatever it may be the bible's view of heaven is not the exclusive domain of these beautiful winged humanoids if heaven is in fact real you'll likely be spending a literal eternity alongside these winged monstrosities instead hey thanks to the end of this video i enjoyed this one about angels and their creepy origins if you want more like comment but most will subscribe to this channel

Channel: hochelaga

Views: 8,723,342

Rating: 4.9172645 out of 5

Keywords: angels, angel, creepy, why are bible accurate angels so creepy, accurate, scary, bible, biblical, conspiracy, cherubim, seraphim, ophanim, ezekiel 1, hochelaga, terryfying, angelic

Id: 40KcrrfbJ6o

Length: 8min 52sec (532 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 31 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/evenios]

i guess thats why in the bible whenever someone saw an angel they said

do not be afraid

lol

[u/rogueelemental2001]

Why do the wings have to be feathered though? We have other examples of multi-winged creatures with many eyes, insects! I’ve often thought about how a monstrous insectoid being, much like a dragonfly or cockroach, would fit many of the biblical descriptions of angels...

[u/Klostergartenkraut]

Neon Genesis Evangelion did a good job with their angel designs!

[u/FeverishNewt]

Bayonetta is biblically accurate.

[u/CygnusX-1-2112b]

I feel like all descriptions of Angels in the Bible read like someone trying to describe some conceptual entiry that the human mind cannot comprehend like an edlrich god, like an ancient version of cosmic horror. Creatures so terrible, terrifying and powerful that the are indescribable, and are nearly apathetic to the humans they speak to, only serving the will of an even more powerful entity.

[u/FiendFriedFish]

What part of "Be not afraid" do you not understand, human?

[u/itstommygun]

Christian here. After actually reading the Bible over and over, I stopped believing angels were sweet looking creatures.

Every instance of people seeing them, scared the crap out of them.

They always had to start what they were saying with “do not be afraid” for a reason.

[u/wermad]

That's a machine elf

[u/GroovyBoomstick]

I know it's mentioned in the video, but the Ophanim does genuinely sound like how someone in ancient Mesopotamia would describe a UFO. It's bizarrely sci-fi.