“Is there such a thing as a Jewish Angel?”
On Sunday, I will be visiting St. Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral to answer this very question. Outside of “do Jews believe in Heaven and Hell”, this particular question is the one get asked most often by Jews. The answer, as it is for most things, is yes and no.
If you are thinking of the cute images of cherubic of pudgy boy babies dressed in white with adorable tiny wings, the answer is a resounding no. But, if you are imaging the cherubs, or keruvim, like the ones adorned the Ark of the Covenant, with fierce warrior bodies and flaming swords, than the answer is yes.
The Hebrew word for angel is malach, meaning messenger. As we learn in this week’s Torah portion, Vayeitzi, angles are sent to earth, often in the guise of a human being, to fulfill a specific divine mission. Jacob sees this vision in the form of a ladder, escorting angels in a constant stream from the heavens to earth and back again. In next week’s Torah portion, Vayishlach, Jacob will encounter another angel with whom he was wrestle and from who he will be given a new name, Israel.
Encounters with angels are common motifs in the biblical narrative. Abraham and Sarah encountered them a few weeks ago when they received the prophecy of the birth of Isaac. But it is not all good news that they bring, in the Book of Exodus we will see in the last and scariest of all the plagues, the Angel of Death, who takes the lives of all the first born children of Egypt. Later in Ezekiel, we have the horrifying vision of the End of Days when four-faced angels guard the Holy Temple.
But, my favorite angels are the angels of Shabbat, the ones whom we sing about it in the prayer Shalom Aleichim, who allow us to find peace on our weekly day of rest. These angels are there, as I often say, to give us backrubs so that we can forget about worries and get down to the business at hand, truly taking care of the needs of our souls. It is these angels I think about most often, not cute cherubic figures, but fierce guardians of what we hold most dear. May you be visited by this variety this Shabbat and every Shabbat henceforth.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Alex