Angelus in Latin, angelos in Greek and in English you call them them angels. They have been credited with a lot of names. In essence, they are believed to be messengers of God. Reference to these messengers of God are made in a lot of ways. We generally associate angels with goodness and being good. When aunt Linda gave birth to a baby girl, mommy broke the news to the family saying, ? She has given birth to a baby angel...?. She sounded as if she was in heaven calling out to us to say, God has some messages to give you.



Every religion has the mention of supernatural beings, but angels predominantly appear in three monotheistic faiths, Christianity, Judaism and Islam. According to the Torah, the Hebrew bible, angels usually appeared to people in the form of humans. They had amazing beauty and could not be easily recognized as angels. Some of these beautiful angelic figures would fly in the air and many keep disappearing. Angels are generally referred to as pure and as bright as heaven. There is a belief that, these angels are made of fire -- this brings forth the concept of light. Some of the verses in the Deuterocanon mention angels in blue or red robes but nothing as such has been mentioned in the NIV or King Jame's Bible.

All of us grow up listening to our mothers telling us stories about angels and how they protect us from evil. She also tells us to pray to the Guardian Angel before going to sleep. As children, out of our fear of evil we do what she says but an urge to know more about this heavenly protector remains back. Years pass by and some of us were exposed to John Milton's Paradise Lost, either in high school or college, which gives us an introduction into the lives of the angels. Angels are definitely the messengers of God but there are a few who refused to obey him. Such disobedient angels have no place in heaven and that is how they got banished from heaven.

In the Abrahamic religions, such angels are called the fallen angels with Satan as their leader. Some religions also believe that these fallen angels would roam around earth until the day of Judgment when they shall finally be banished to hell. As far as the history of fallen angels is concerned, there are several reasons behind that. Some say that it was free will of the angels and others call it lust or pride. But many believe that the good angels became the fallen ones due to their disobedience.

According to the Holy Bible, angels usually execute the work given to them by God. They appear to the human beings to inform them about the future happening, be it good or bad. The Bible mentions many such incidents where an angel appears to inform the people of the future happenings. The most prominent among this is the appearance of the angel to the shepherds. This was to inform about the new born Christ, the would be savior of the world. This is also the reason behind the hanging of the statue of an angel inside the Christmas crib. Yet again a Christian view is the appearance of the the angel to Mother Mary to tell her that she will be the mother of the messiah.

As a kid we often look up to the sky imagining how an angel would look like. Is it fair and beautiful as mommy usually describes or is it the super man kind as we imagine it to be. As a grown up we are left with an amazement knowing that, not all angels are good. If we have the good Guardian angel to protect us from all troubles, we also have Satan, Lucifer and Beelzebub to harm us in all possible ways. But whatever may be, angels still hold a supreme position in all our minds and we look up to them in times of trouble. The ones chosen by God. The ones chosen to protect us from troubles. The ?supernaturals? who surround us.