Key Takeaways
Every outflow , as Jewish kinsperson collect to celebratePassover(Pesach ) , they retell the story of the Israelites ' hasty Book of Exodus from Egypt . The ancient holiday takes its English name from God ’s hope to " pass over " the homes of close Israelites while birth the tenth and most painful plague upon the Egyptians , the end of their firstborn . As it ’s compose in Exodus 12:23 :
In the pop retelling of the Passover story , the " undoer " is often called the " angel of demise , " but the words " angel of death " do n’t in reality appear anywhere in the Hebrew Bible , the Christian New Testament or the Islamic Quran .
Does that mean that the angel of death does n’t subsist in the monotheistic tradition ? Not at all . It only means that our popular conception of the angel of death does n’t come from the standardbiblical canon , but from curious texts like the"Testament of Abraham"from the first century C.E. , and from taradiddle of the Angel Falls of death circulated in the Hadith , sayings attributed to the Prophet Muhammad and his companions .
" Stories about angels move around Jews , Christians and Muslims like nobody ’s business , " saysStephen Burge , a research associate at the Institute of Ismaili Studies in London and writer of " Angels in Islam . " There was a lot of convergence and share-out across these tradition in the late antiquity and medieval period of time . "
God and the Angels
Very fewangelsare bring up in the Hebrew Bible ( known as the Old Testament in Christianity ) or the New Testament . The angelsMichael and Gabriel make appearancesin the Christian Bible of Daniel , and God sends the Angel Falls Gabriel toinform Mary that she will be the female parent of Jesus . But the authors of the Bible submit great pains to emphasize that God was the only one ring the shots , not angels . Indeed , in the Bible , there is no mention of an angel who ushers people from destruction to the afterlife .
The ancient human beings was full of polytheistic tradition that portrayed expiry as its own god with its own federal agency , explain Annette Yoshiko Reed , a religion prof at New York University and the author of " ogre , Angels and Writing in Ancient Judaism . " Mot , for exercise , was the death god of ancient Canaanites and Phoenicians , and the Egyptian Book of the Dead award a vast pantheon of god and horrendous creatures encountered in the afterlife .
" In the Bible , though , the providential world is focused on a singular assertion of divine office , nothing akin to a polytheistic division of Labour , " says Reed . " The same God who created the world masters both living and death . "
That ’s why the saint in the Exodus Passover level is n’t give a name , but rather a role — the destroyer . And it is God himself who passes over the houses of the enslaved Israelites and decides who lives and who dies , not the angel .
Reed tell that in the third and second century B.C.E. , there was a teddy in ancient Jewish lit that gave angels distinct name and personalities , as well as theatrical role . The script of " Jubilees , " written in the 2nd hundred B.C.E. , is one of those text .
" Jubilees " start out with Noah pleading to God to get disembarrass of the demons that were vagabond the Earth after the great flood and tormenting his house . A figure name Mastema , the " chief of the spirits , " step forward with a proffer that some of the demons persist with him to do his bidding . God harmonise that a tenth of the spirits should do this while the sleep derive into " the place of condemnation . "
In " Jubilees , " Mastema is an angel — he ’s called Prince Mastema — but God employs Mastema and his evil US Army to tempt and straining humankind , " to do all manner of legal injury and sin , and all manner of transgression , to corrupt and ruin , and to shed blood upon the earth . "
Mastema is the one that comes up with the idea of testing Abraham ’s faith by commanding him to sacrifice his son Isaac . And it ’s Mastema , we find out in Jubilees , who was the " destroyer " of the Passover story .
Still , Reed underscore , Mastema isn’t functioning against God to counter his divine will , but to be the " forged hombre " who have a bun in the oven it out .
" Like Satan in the rule book of Job , Mastema has a divine function , " says Reed . " He ’s part of the godly judge system . "
Nice Try, Abraham. You Can’t Fool the Angel of the Death
As time went on , Judaic and early Christian generator played freely with the portrayal of an saint of expiry . The " Testament of Abraham " was written in Egypt in the first one C C.E. and not only personifies decease , but pound some merriment at it .
In this extremely entertaining text , the cracking prophet and patriarch Abraham has experience a full spirit ( 995 years ) and God place the angel Michael to inform Abraham of his at hand expiry . Abraham is n’t quick to become flat yet , so he try on to stall last by asking Michael a million question , some intelligibly intend to amuse the reader .
For example , when Abraham is shown the wide-cut gate that leads a at peace somebody to destruction and the narrow logic gate that leads to eternal life , he cries out : " Woe is me , what shall I do ? For I am a man broad of physical structure , and how shall I be able to enter by the narrow-minded gate , by which a boy of fifteen age can not enter ? "
Eventually , God sends Death himself to collect Abraham ’s somebody , but Abraham keeps up his sometime trick . He asks demise endless question about the different types of decease ( there are 72 ) and all of the mysterious and gruesome forms that the angel of death takes when collecting the unrighteous ( a most low face of a viper , a typeface of a most terrible precipice , a face of a bowelless stormy ocean , a terrible three - channelise flying dragon , etc . ) lastly , Death has enough :
Abraham says to Death , " Depart from me just a small while , so that I may stay on my lounge . I am very faint at heart . "
In the end , it ’s Death that plays the terminal trick , pray Abraham to " take my right hand , and may cheerfulness and life and strength come to you . " The great paterfamilias takes Death ’s hand and dies at once .
" In the ' Testament of Abraham , ' destruction is a personality ; that ’s his job , " says Reed . " The figure of Death is at the armed service of God and only kills Abraham because he tricks him . Between the two of them , the double of the righteous Jew is superior to the pattern of Death itself . "
Malak al-Mawt, the Angel of Death in Islam
Like the Bible , the Quran only mention two saint by name , Michael and Gabriel , but the role of angels in Islam is greatly flourish in the Hadith , a aggregation of teachings and locution assign to the Prophet Muhammad and his follower .
Through the Hadith , we see that there are four archangels in Islam : Michael , Gabriel , Israfil ( who blows the trumpet to call up in the Final Judgment ) and the holy man of end . Although some source claim the saint of death ’s name is Azrael , there ’s no textual proof for that , says Burge . The right name is Malak al - Mawt , Arabic for " angel of death . "
like to the angel of end in ancient Jewish and early Christian texts , Malak al - Mawt does n’t take who lives and who pass , but strictly express out God ’s order . Every mortal is assign anajal , a fixed day of the month of death that is immovable and unchangeable . Once a year , in the month before Ramadan , God pass on Malak al - Mawt a list of all those who will die in the coming year , and it ’s Malak al - Mawt ’s province to harvest their soul .
Like the Testament of Abraham , the Hadith contains accounting of other nifty prophets who endeavor to elude or chicane death . When Malak al - Mawt comes for Moses , for exercise , he slaps the holy man so hard thatone of his eyes pops out . After God fixes the angel ’s center , Malak al - Mawt goes back and strikes a heap with Moses that if he goes peacefully , he ’ll be buried within a " stone ’s throw " of the Holy Land .
In contrast to Abraham and Moses , when demise comes for the Prophet Muhammad , he bow to his fate . Burge notes that in the Hadith , the angel of last knock and asks Muhammad ’s permission before he come in , a sign of ultimate respect for the Prophet . In one Hadith , Death localise Muhammad ’s destiny in the Prophet ’s own hand :
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