"Far from the winged, white-robed embodiments of gentleness we might know from greeting cards, says Trelawny, the angels of the Bible, and specifically the Old Testament, are "horrifying abominations" who would be more at home in an H. P. Lovecraft novel. Angel, from the Greek angelos, which itself comes from the Hebrew mal'akh, means "messenger." That implies an innocuous-enough set of duties, but then, you may recall the story of Passover, with its angel who slaughtered the Egyptians' first-born sons; or the angel who "struck 70,000 Israelites to death";"
"Personal conceptions may vary, of course, but we can be fairly certain of one thing: most of them will bear no resemblance to the angels actually described in the Bible. Here to give us a sense of their appearance is Tommie Trelawny, creator of the YouTube channel Hochelaga, whose video above explains "Why Bible Accurate Angels Are So Creepy.""
Many people imagine gentle, winged figures, but biblical angelic beings often differ dramatically. The Hebrew term mal'akh means messenger, and several Old Testament angels carried out violent, devastating acts, including the killing of Egyptian first-borns and large numbers of Israelites and enemy soldiers. The Bible does not consistently describe wings for all angels; some humanoid angels resemble ordinary people, including Gabriel, Raphael, and Michael. Humanoid angels occupy a lower rank within a broader heavenly hierarchy that contains other, stranger orders of beings whose appearances can be terrifying rather than comforting.
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