Angels in the religious imagination of late antiquity

In the earliest Christian writings, the nature of angels appears difficult for humans to discern: unstable, intermediate, and shifting. Christian writers of the fourth and fifth centuries grappled with this basic instability by relying on both contemporary philosophical considerations of divine beings and the resources available in Jewish and Christian Scripture. Notions of angelic natures were tightly interwoven with ideas about the interiority of humans; because of this proximity, representations of angels were intertwined with Christian hopes---and fears---about humanity. This is evident in two areas of Christian tradition. First, it is manifest in the role that thought about angels played in the ascetic movement. While most ancient Christians expected a personal angel who might nudge them toward their better natures, for ascetic practitioners, the acquisition of this companion angel became proof of their moral accomplishment. Additionally, ascetics were often praised by urban Christian leaders as "living the life of the angels." Such a characterization had both constructive and destabilizing consequences for these renunciant Christians and the social order they were attempting to create. Second, early Christian speculation about angels also clarifies elements of ecclesiastical structure, both ritual and theological. Ancient Christian catechists asked catechumens to imagine angels at rituals. While once thought heavenly ritual specialists to be imitated, angels became spectators who departed heaven to observe Christian ritual on earth; thus, Christian catechists signaled their increasing confidence in the authority of the priest. With respect to theology, fourth-century writers concerned with Trinitarian issues rejected previous characterizations of the Son by the title "angel." Through novel strategies of reading the Old Testament, they created angels well-suited to be mediators to humanity, at a moment when the Son's mediating capacity was overshadowed by emphasis on his unity with God the Father. The fervent speculation among Christians regarding angels and their natures was short-lived. Dionysius's fifth-century Celestial Hierarchy---its structure, its approach to language, and its almost immediate acceptance as an apostolic work---had the effect of discouraging further speculation about the angelic world and its relationship to human beings. Although Christian writers after Dionysius lent their attention to angels, they most often did so by commenting on Dionysius's text, thus remaining within the parameters laid out by Dionysius.