samedi 29 septembre 2012

Saint MICHEL ARCHANGE



Saint Michel

Saint Archange

Saint Michel, Saint Gabriel et saint Raphaël. Les anges, serviteurs et envoyés de Dieu, sont très présents dans la Bible, depuis celui qui réconforte Agar au désert (livre de la Genèse 16. 7) jusqu'à celui qui mesure la Jérusalem céleste (Apocalypse 21. 17). Parmi eux, trois sont particulièrement personnifiés. Ce sont des archanges, comme des chefs des anges, selon les termes de saint Paul (1ère Thessaloniciens 4. 16) et de Jude (Jude ch. 9). Michel, ("qui est comme Dieu?") est le prince des anges. Il joue un rôle décisif (Apocalypse 12. 7 à 9). Gabriel ("Force de Dieu") est le messager par excellence (Luc 1. 19 et suivants). Raphaël ("Dieu a guéri") accompagne le jeune Tobie et est la figure bienveillante de la Providence de Dieu. La littérature apocryphe a abondamment brodé sur ces trois personnages.

"Trois ou sept?"

"La tradition catholique ne connaît que trois archanges par leur nom. La Bible en évoque sept. Au livre de Tobie, Raphaël dit de lui-même: "Je suis l'un des sept anges qui se tiennent toujours prêts à pénétrer auprès de la Gloire du Seigneur". La vision de Zacharie complète le livre de Tobie en parlant de "sept-là qui sont les yeux de Yahvé et qui vont par toute la terre". ( Les yeux sont alors symboles de l'omniscience et de la vigilance divines.)

Si les livres de la Bible ne parlent pas des quatre compagnons anonymes de Michel, Gabriel et Raphaël, les écrits apocryphes n'épousent pas leur silence. Avec fantaisie, ils nomment ceux qui étaient appelés à rester dans l'ombre de leur Créateur, si on peut parler d'ombre dans le monde de la Gloire céleste. 

Par sa discrétion à la suite des livres bibliques, l'Église a préféré suggérer que le mystère de l'Invisible n'est pas épuisé et que le Paradis nous réserve de nouvelles connaissances."
(source: diocèse de Coutances)

...combattant céleste descendant sur la terre des hommes, il était légitime de le choisir comme protecteur du pays et de ses armées; déjà en 709, l'évêque d'Avranches, saint Aubert, fonda une chapelle qui deviendra l'abbaye du Mont Saint-Michel, où viendront en pèlerinage, entre autres, Charlemagne, saint Louis, Louis IX, pour demander la protection pour la France. Dans la même ligne, après la deuxième guerre mondiale, les troupes aéroportées le choisirent comme saint patron, voyant dans l'ange "ailé" qui descend du ciel comme un ancêtre, certes plus agile encore, du parachutiste contemporain... (diocèse aux armées françaises)

Fête des saints Michel, Gabriel et Raphaël, archanges. Au jour de la dédicace d’une basilique édifiée très anciennement sous le titre de saint Michel sur la voie Salarienne, à six milles de Rome, l’Église célèbre les trois archanges dont la sainte Écriture révèle les missions et qui , jour et nuit au service de Dieu, contemplent sa face et ne cessent de le glorifier.

Martyrologe romain

L’admiration, que leur fidélité nous inspire, rejaillit jusqu’à Toi. La splendeur de ces créatures spirituelles nous laisse entrevoir comme Tu es grand et combien Tu surpasses tous les êtres

Préface des saints anges

SOURCE : http://nominis.cef.fr/contenus/saint/978/Saint-Michel.html

Saint Michel Archange

et tous les saints Anges

Le 8 mai, l'Église honore l'archange saint Michel en souvenir de son Apparition sur le mont Gargan. La fête du 29 septembre fut établie un peu plus tard pour rappeler la Dédicace de la basilique construite par l'ordre et en honneur du glorieux Archange, au lieu même de cette apparition.

Avec saint Michel, l'Église, en ce jour, honore tous les bons Anges, dont il a été le chef et le modèle au jour de la révolte de Lucifer et des mauvais anges. D'après nos Saints Livres, ils sont divisés en neuf Choeurs et en trois Hiérarchies: Les Anges, les Archanges et les Vertus; les Puissances, les Principautés et les Dominations; enfin, plus haut encore, les Trônes, les Chérubins et les Séraphins. Leur occupation est de contempler Dieu, de L'aimer, de Le louer et d'exécuter Ses Volontés pour la conduite de l'univers et pour le salut des hommes. Aussi les voyons-nous chargés de différentes missions sur la terre, auprès des personnes, des familles, des paroisses, des diocèses, des royaumes, de l'Église entière.

Ceux dont l'Écriture fait une mention particulière sont, outre saint Michel, l'archange Gabriel, à qui semble avoir été confié le soin de tout ce qui regarde le mystère de l'Incarnation, et l'Archange Raphaël, qui conduisit et ramena si merveilleusement le jeune Tobie. – Saint Michel a été fait non seulement Prince des anges, mais aussi Prince des âmes qui doivent remplir les places demeurées vides par la chute des démons. Son nom marque sa fidélité, car il signifie: Qui est semblable à Dieu!

Les Saints lui attribuent la plupart des apparitions mentionnées dans l'Ancien Testament. C'est lui, disent-ils, qui retint la main d'Abraham prêt à immoler son fils Isaac; c'est lui qui apparut à Josué et le rendit maître de Jéricho par la chute de ses tours et de ses murailles; c'est lui qui dirigea l'arche de Noé par-dessus les eaux du déluge; c'est lui qui lutta contre Jacob et le bénit; c'est lui qui donna la loi à Moïse sur la montagne du Sinaï; qui rendit David victorieux de Goliath et le préserva de la persécution de Saül, etc. Il a été le protecteur de la Synagogue; il est le protecteur de l'Église.

L'Histoire nous rapporte tant de merveilles de cet Ange sublime, qu'on ne peut douter qu'il ne soit, dans les desseins de Dieu, l'un des principaux instruments de Sa puissance et de Sa bonté. L'assistance que la France a souvent reçue de lui le fait regarder comme le protecteur spécial de ce royaume.

Abbé L. Jaud, Vie des Saints pour tous les jours de l'année, Tours, Mame, 1950

SOURCE : http://magnificat.ca/cal/fr/saints/saint_michel_archange_et_tous_les_saints_anges.html

SAINT MICHEL, ARCHANGE

Michel veut dire : qui est semblable à Dieu ? et toutes les fois, ainsi le dit saint Grégoire, qu'il s'agit de choses merveilleuses, c'est Michel qui est envoyé, afin de laisser comprendre par ses actions comme par son nom que nul ne saurait faire ce que Dieu se réserve d'accomplir. De là vient qu'on attribue à saint Michel beaucoup d'actions extraordinaires. D'après Daniel, c'est lui qui, au temps de l’antéchrist, doit se lever pour défendre les élus en sa qualité de protecteur et de défenseur. C'est lui qui combattit contre le dragon et ses anges, et qui, en les chassant du ciel, remporta une grande victoire. C'est lui qui se disputa avec le diable au sujet du corps de Moïse, que le diable voulait produire au grand jour, afin que le peuple juif l’adorât à la place de Dieu. C'est lui qui reçoit les âmes des saints et qui les conduit jusqu'à la joie du paradis. C'était lui qui était autrefois le prince de la synagogue, mais qui est maintenant établi comme prince de l’Eglise. C'est lui, dit-on, qui frappa l’Égypte des sept plaies, qui partagea les eaux de la mer rouge, qui dirigea le peuple hébreu dans le désert, et qui l’introduisit dans la terre promise. C'est lui qui porte l’étendard de J.-C. au milieu des bataillons angéliques. C'est lui qui, par l’ordre du Seigneur, foudroiera l’Antéchrist résidant sur le mont des Olives. C'est encore à la voix de l’archange Michel que les morts ressusciteront. C'est lui enfin qui, au jour du jugement, présentera la croix, les clous, la lance et la couronne d'épines de Notre-Seigneur.

La sainte solennité de la fête de saint Michel, archange, se nomme Apparition, Dédicace, Victoire et Mémoire. Les apparitions de cet ange sont nombreuses. La première eut lieu sur le mont Gargan. C'est une montagne de la Pouille située auprès de la ville de Siponto (Aujourd'hui Manfredonia, au royaume de Naples). L'an du Seigneur 390, il y avait, dans Siponto, un homme, qui, d'après quelques auteurs, se nommait Gargan, du nom de cette montagne, ou bien cette montagne avait pris le nom de cet homme. Il possédait un troupeau immense de brebis et de boeufs; et un jour que ces animaux paissaient sur les flancs du mont, un taureau s'éloigna des autres pour monter au sommet, et ne rentra pas avec le troupeau. Le propriétaire prit un grand nombre de serviteurs afin de le chercher ; le trouva enfin au haut de la montagne, vis-à-vis l’entrée d'une caverne. Irrité de ce que ce taureau errait ainsi seul à l’aventure; il lança aussitôt contre lui une flèche empoisonnée; mais à l’instant la flèche, comme si elle eût été poussée, par le vent, revint sur celui qui l’avait lancée et le frappa. Les habitants effrayés vont trouver l’évêque et demandent son avis sur une chose si étrange. Il ordonna trois jours de jeune et leur dit qu'on devait en demander l’explication à Dieu. Après quoi saint Michel apparut à l’évêque, en lui disant : a Vous saurez que cet homme a été frappé de son dard par ma volonté : car je suis l’archange Michel, qui, dans le dessein d'habiter ce lieu sur la terre et de le garder en sûreté, ai voulu donner à connaître parce signe que je suis l’inspecteur et le gardien de cet endroit. » Alors l’évêque et tous les citoyens allèrent en procession a la montagne : comme ils n'osaient entrer dans la caverne, ils restèrent en prières devant l’entrée. — La seconde apparition (Cf. Mabillon, Actes des saints; — Robert de Torigny, Chronique de saint Michel, année 708; — Aubert, évêque d'Avranches) eut lieu ainsi qu'il suit, vers l’an du Seigneur 710. Dans un lieu appelé Tumba, près de la, mer, et éloigné de six milles de la ville d'Avranches, saint Michel apparut à l’évêque de cette cité : il lui ordonna de construire une église sur cet endroit, et d'y célébrer la mémoire de saint Michel, archange, ainsi que cela se pratiquait sur le mont Gargan. Or, comme l’évêque était incertain de la place sur laquelle il devait bâtir l’église, l’archange lui dit de la faire élever dans l’endroit ou il trouverait un taureau que des voleurs avaient caché. L'évêque étant encore embarrassé sur les dimensions qu'il devait donner à cette construction, reçut l’ordre de lui donner les proportions que les vestiges des pieds du taureau auraient tracées sur le sol. Or, il se trouvait là deux rochers qu'aucune puissance humaine ne pouvait remuer. Saint Michel apparut alors à un homme et lui donna l’ordre de se transporter là et d'enlever ces deux rochers. Quand l’homme y fut arrivé, il remua le roc avec une telle facilité qu'il semblait n'avoir pas la moindre pesanteur. Lors donc que l’église fut bâtie, on y apporta du mont Gargan une partie du parement que saint Michel y plaça sur l’autel, ainsi qu'un morceau de marbre sur lequel il se posa. Mais comme on était gêné de n'avoir point d'eau dans ce lieu, de l’avis de, l’ange, on perça un trou dans une roche très dure et il en sortit une si grande quantité d'eau qu'aujourd'hui encore, elle suffit à tous les besoins. Cette apparition en ce lieu se célèbre solennellement le 17 des calendes de novembre. On raconte qu'il se fit encore là un miracle digne d'être rapporté: Cette montagne est entourée de tous les côtés par les eaux de l’Océan ; mais cieux fois, le jour de saint Michel, la mer se retire et laisse le passage libre: Or, comme une grande multitude de peuple se rendait à l’église, une femme enceinte et prête d'accoucher se trouvait sur le chemin avec les autres, quand tout à coup, les eaux reviennent ; la foule saisie de frayeur s'enfuit au rivage, mais la femme grosse ne put fuir, et même fut prise par les flots de la mer. Alors saint Michel préserva cette femme, de telle sorte qu'elle mit au monde un fils au milieu de la mer; elle prit son enfant entre ses bras et lui donna le sein, et la mer lui laissant de nouveau un passage, elle sortit pleine de joie avec son fils.

La troisième apparition est celle qu'on rapporte avoir eu lieu du temps de saint Grégoire. Ce pape avait institué les litanies majeures, à cause de la peste inguinale ; et comme il adressait de ferventes prières pour le salut du peuple, il vit sur un château qui s'appelait autrefois la Mémoire d'Adrien, l’ange du Seigneur essuyant un glaive ensanglanté et le remettant dans le fourreau. Saint Grégoire comprit par là que ses prières avaient été exaucées du Seigneur. Il fit donc construire en ce lieu une église en l’honneur des Anges : de là vient le nom de Château-Saint-Ange que porte aujourd'hui ce fort. Or, cette apparition se célèbre le 8 des ides de mai, en même temps que celle du Mont-Gargan, qui eut lieu lors d'une victoire que l’archange fit remporter par les Sypontins.

La quatrième apparition est celle des Hiérarchies des Anges eux-mêmes. La première se nomme Epiphanie, c'est-à-dire l’apparition supérieure ; la moyenne se nomme Hyperphanie, c'est-à-dire moyenne apparition ; la dernière s'appelle Hypophanie, c'est-à-dire apparition inférieure. Le mot hiérarchie vient de hierar, qui signifie sacré, et de archos, prince, équivalant à principauté sacrée. Chaque hiérarchie renferme trois ordres ; la première contient les Séraphins, les Chérubins et les Trônes; la moyenne renferme, d'après la distribution de saint Denys, les Dominations, les Vertus et les Puissances ; la dernière, suivant le même auteur, renferme les Principautés, les Anges et les Archanges. Cet ordre et cette distribution offrent une certaine analogie avec ce qui se voit chez les puissances de la terre. Car, parmi les ministres d'un monarque, il y en a dont les fonctions se rapportent immédiatement à la personne royale; comme sont les chambellans, les conseillers et les assesseurs, qui représentent la première hiérarchie. D'autres ont des charges pour gouverner le royaume, sans être attachés spécialement à telle ou telle province, comme les généraux d'armée et les juges de la cour. Ils représentent les ordres de la seconde hiérarchie.. D'autres enfin sont placés à la tête d'une partie du royaume, comme les prévôts, les baillis et les fonctionnaires inférieurs. Ils représentent les ordres de la troisième hiérarchie. Les trois premiers ordres de la première hiérarchie sont ceux qui se tiennent auprès de Dieu et qui le contemplent. Pour cela, trois qualités leur sont nécessaires : 1° un amour éminent; ce qui appartient au chœur des Séraphins, dont le nom veut dire enflammés; 2° une connaissance parfaite : elle est la part des Chérubins, dont le nom signifie plénitude de science; 3° une compréhension perpétuelle ou jouissance : ce qui convient aux Trônes, dont la signification est siège, parce que ce sont les sièges de Dieu et le lieu de son repos, tandis qu'il les fait se reposer en lui. Les trois ordres de la hiérarchie moyenne sont à la tête de la communauté humaine en général et la gouvernent. Cette action de gouverner consiste en trois choses: 1° à présider ou à Ordonner: cela regarde le choeur des Dominations, qui ont la prééminence sur les inférieurs; les dirigent dans l’accomplissement du service de Dieu, et leur transmettent tous les ordres, ce que semble indiquer ce passage du prophète Zacharie (II) où un ange dit à un autre ange : « Courez, parlez à ce jeune homme et lui dites... » ; 2° à agir : c'est le propre des Vertus, pour lesquelles il n'y a rien d'impossible à exécuter de ce qu'on leur commande, parce que à eux fut donné le pouvoir d'accomplir toutes choses, telles difficiles qu'elles soient, de ce qui regarde le service de Dieu, et c'est la raison pour laquelle on leur attribue les miracles ; 3° à lever tous les obstacles et les empêchements : ce qui est du ressort des Puissances, qui doivent tenir à l’écart des puissances ennemies : qualité signalée au livre de Tobie (ch. VIII). Où il est dit que Raphaël alla lier le démon dans le désert de la Haute-Egypte. Les trois ordres de la dernière hiérarchie ont des fonctions déterminées et limitées. Quelques-uns, en effet, parmi eux, sont à la tête d'une province. Ce sont ceux de l’ordre des Principautés : tel le prince qui était à la tête des Perses. Il en est question dans Daniel (ch. X). D'autres sont préposés pour gouverner une communauté, comme une ville, par exemple : et ce sont les Archanges ; quelques autres dirigent une personne en particulier, et ceux-là ont reçu le nom d'anges. C'est pour cela qu'on les dit chargés d'annoncer des choses minimes, parce que leur ministère est limité à un seul homme. On dit que les Archanges annoncent les grandes choses, parce que le bien général l’emporte sur celui d'un particulier. Dans le partage des fonctions des ordres de la première hiérarchie, saint Grégoire et saint Bernard sont d'accord avec saint Denys, parce qu'ils reconnaissent dans ces chœurs la jouissance qui consiste dans l’amour, quant aux Séraphins; dans la connaissance plénière, quant aux Chérubins, - et dans la possession continue, quant aux Trônes. Mais dans les fonctions qu'ils assignent aux deux ordres de la seconde et de la troisième hiérarchie, savoir aux Principautés et aux Vertus, ils semblent partagés d'opinion. En effet, saint Grégoire et saint Bernard considèrent la chose à un autre point de vue, en ce sens que la seconde hiérarchie possède la prééminence, et la dernière le ministère. La prééminence dans les Anges est de trois sortes : car les Anges ont la prééminence sur les esprits angéliques, et ce sont ceux qu'on appelle les Dominations : ils ont la prééminence sur les hommes de bien, ce sont les Principautés : ils ont la prééminence sur les démons, et on les appelle alors les Puissances. Leur rang et le degré de leur dignité sont ici évidents. Leur ministère est de trois genres : il consiste dans les oeuvres, dans l’instruction, soit des grandes soit des petites choses. Le premier est rempli par les Vertus, le second par les Archanges, le troisième par les Anges.

La cinquième apparition est celle qu'on lit dans l’Histoire tripartite (Livre II, c. XIX). Auprès de Constantinople se trouve un endroit où autrefois était adorée la déesse Vesta, et sur l’emplacement duquel a été érigée, depuis, une église en l’honneur de saint Michel. Ce lieu a reçu le nom de Michaelium. Un homme, nommé Aquilin, était atteint d'une fièvre très forte, causée par des éruptions cholériques sanguinolentes (Les textes ne s'accordent pas ici. Une version porte rubris choleris mota, et les ms. disent rubris coloribus nota, ce qui voudrait dire connu sous le nom de couleurs rouges, ou bien qui se manifestait par des taches rouges. On voit plus bas reparaître le mot cholericis, qui indiquerait la première version comme la meilleure). Dans un accès les médecins lui donnèrent une potion qu'il vomit, et à la suite il rejetait le manger et le boire. Réduit à la dernière extrémité, il se fit conduire à l’église de saint Michel, dans la pensée qu'il y mourrait ou qu'il y serait guéri. Saint Michel lui apparut et lui (lit de faire une potion composée de miel, de vin et de poivré, dans laquelle il devait tremper tout ce qu'il mangerait, et qu'il serait délivré de sa maladie. Il le fit et fut entièrement guéri, quoique, d'après les règles de la médecine, il semble que l’on ne doit pas donner des remèdes échauffants aux cholériques.

Secondement. La solennité de saint Michel a le nom de Victoire. On trouve un grand nombre de victoires remportées par saint Michel archange et parles anges. La première est celle que l’archange Michel fit remporter aux Sipontins; de la manière suivante, quelque temps après la découverte rapportée plus haut. Les Napolitains, encore païens, guerroyèrent avec une armée en bon ordre contré les Sipontins et les Bénéventins (Naples est cependant éloignée de cinquante milles de Siponto). Ces derniers, de l’avis de l’évêque, demandèrent une trêve de trois jours, afin de pouvoir vaquer au jeûne et invoquer à leur secours leur patron saint Michel. Or, la troisième nuit, l’archange apparaît à l’évêque, lui dit que les prières ont été exaucées, promet la victoire, et ordonne d'attaquer l’ennemi à la quatrième heure du jour. Lorsqu'on en vint aux mains, le mont Gargan est ébranlé d'un immense tremblement; la foudre ne cesse de sillonner les airs, et un brouillard épais couvre le sommet entier de la montagne, de sorte que 600 ennemis tombent percés sous le fer des chrétiens et par la foudre. Le reste reconnut la puissance de l’archange, abandonna l’idolâtrie et se soumit à la foi chrétienne aussitôt après. La seconde victoire est celle que l’archange Michel remporta quand il chassa du ciel le dragon, c'est-à-dire Lucifer avec tous ceux de sa suite. Le fait est raconté dans l’Apocalypse : « Il se livra un grand combat dans le ciel, Michel y combattit avec ses anges; etc.,» Lucifer voulait s'égaler à Dieu, l’archange Michel, le porte-étendard de l’armée céleste, vint et chassa du ciel ce Lucifer avec sa suite entière, et le repoussa dans l’air caligineux pour qu'il y restât jusqu'au jour du jugement. Il ne leur fut pas permis d'habiter le ciel, ni la partie supérieure de l’air, parce que c’est un endroit clair et agréable, ni de rester sur la terre avec nous, parce qu'ils nous incommoderaient trop ; mais ils résident dans l’air, entre le ciel et la terre, afin qu'en regardant au-dessus d'eux et en voyant la gloire qu'ils ont perdue, ils en ressentent de la douleur, et qu'en regardant en bas et en voyant l’humanité au ciel d'où ils sont tombés, ils en soient souvent tourmentés d'envie. Cependant Dieu permet souvent qu'ils descendent auprès de nous pour nous éprouver, et il a été montré à quelques saints personnages qu'ils voltigent souvent autour de nous comme des mouches. Ils sont innombrables, et l’air en est rempli comme -par ces insectes. C'est ce qui fait dire à Haymon : « Ainsi que l’ont avancé les philosophes et nos docteurs, l’air qui nous environne est rempli de démons et d'esprits malins, comme le rayon de soleil l’est des plus minces atomes. » Quoiqu'ils soient en aussi grand nombre, cependant, d'après le sentiment d'Origène, leurs bataillons diminuent quand nous les avons vaincus ; en sorte que celui d'entre eux qui a été vaincu par un saint ne peut plus le tenter pour le vice à l’égard duquel il a été vaincu. La troisième victoire est celle que les anges remportent tous les jours contre les démons,quand ils nous délivrent des mauvaises tentations en combattant pour nous contre nos ennemis. Or, ils nous délivrent de la tentation en trois manières : 1° en maîtrisant la puissance du démon (Apocalypse) 2° l’ange qui lie le démon et le jette dans l’abîme (Tobie (VIII), le diable lié dans le désert), ce qui n'est autre chose que la puissance du démon enchaînée; 3° en refroidissant la concupiscence, effet signalé dans la Genèse (c. XXXII) où il est dit que l’ange toucha le nerf de Jacob et il se sécha aussitôt; 4° en rappelant à notre souvenir la passion de Notre-Seigneur. L'Apocalypse l’indique en disant (VII) : « Ne frappez ni la terre, ni la mer, ni les arbres avant que nous ayons marqué au front les serviteurs de notre Dieu. » Et dans Ezéchiel (IX) : « Marquez un Thau sur le front des hommes qui gémissent. » La lettre Thau a la forme d'une croix, et ceux qui en ont été marqués n'ont plus à craindre les coups de l’ange. Il est encore écrit au même livre : « Celui sur lequel vous verrez le Thau, ne le tuez point. » — La quatrième victoire est celle que l’archange Michel doit remporter sur l’antéchrist quand il le tuera. « Alors est-il dit dans Daniel (XII), Michel, le grand prince s'élèvera ! lui qui est le protecteur et le soutien des êtres, il se posera vigoureusement contre l’antéchrist. Après quoi l’antéchrist (d'après la glose sur ce passage de l’Apocalypse (XIII) : « Je vis une des têtes de la bête, blessée à mort ») simulera qu'il est mort, et pendant trois jours il se cachera; puis il apparaîtra en disant qu'il est ressuscité. Par des procédés magiques, les démons le prendront et le transporteront dans les airs, et tout le monde, dans l’admiration, l’adorera. Enfin il gravira le mont dés Olives, ainsi que le dit la glose sur ce passage de la IIe épître aux Thessaloniciens (II) : « Le Seigneur Jésus le détruira par le souffle de sa bouche », et tandis qu'il sera dans son pavillon, et sur le trône qui lui aura été préparé en ce lieu, d'où le Seigneur est monté au ciel, Michel viendra et le tuera. C'est de ce tombât et de cette victoire qu'il est question, d'après saint Grégoire, dans ces paroles de l’Apocalypse (XII): « alors il se donna une grande. bataille dans le ciel. » Paroles qui ont rapport aux trois batailles de saint Michel : à celle qu'il livra contre Lucifer quand il le chassa du paradis ; à celle qu'il livre aux démons qui nous incommodent, et à celle enfin dont il est ici question, et qui sera livrée à la fin du monde contre l’antéchrist.

Troisièmement, cette solennité se nomme Dédicacé parce que l’archange Michel révéla que cet endroit; sur le mont Gargan, avait été dédié par lui-même à pareil jour (Siméon Métaphraste; — Bréviaire romain). Quand les Sipontains furent revenus après le carnage de leurs ennemis sur lesquels ils avaient remporté une victoire si éclatante, ils conçurent des doutes s'ils devaient entrer dans cet endroit ou en faire la dédicace. Alors l’évêque envoya consulter à cet égard le pape Pélage, lequel répondit : « Si c'était un homme qui dût faire la dédicace de cette église, il le faudrait faire certainement au jour où la victoire a été accordée. Si au contraire saint. Michel est d'un avis opposé, il faut là-dessus s'enquérir de sa volonté.» Quand le pape, l’évêque et les citoyens de Siponto, eurent passé trois jours dans la prière et le jeûne, saint. Michel apparut à l’évêque en ce jour et lui dit : « Vous n'avez pas besoin de dédier l’église que j'ai édifiée. Je l’ai dédiée comme je l’ai bâtie moi-même. »

Il lui ordonna de s'y rendre le lendemain avec le peuple, d'y faire leur prière et qu'on ressentirait alors qu'il était leur patron spécial. Ensuite il lui donna un signe auquel il reconnaîtrait que l’église avait été consacrée : c'était d'y monter du côté de l’orient par un sentier de traverse : ils y devaient trouver les pas d'un homme empreints sur le marbre. Le lendemain matin l’évêque et tout le peuple vinrent, à cet endroit et étant entrés dans une grande crypte, ils trouvèrent trois autels, dont deux étaient placés, au midi et le troisième qui se trouvait du côté de l’orient était magnifique et enveloppé d'une couverture rouge. La messe y fut célébrée solennellement et tous ayant. reçu la. sainte communion, revinrent chez eux remplis d'une joie extraordinaire. L'évêque y établit des prêtres et des clercs pour célébrer continuellement l’office divin. Il coule dans cette caverne une source d'eau limpide et fort agréable au goût. Le peuple en boit après la communion et divers malades en sont guéris. Alors le souverain pontife, ayant appris ces merveilles, établit qu’en ce jour on célébrerait par tout l’univers la fête de saint Michel et de tous les esprits bienheureux.

Quatrièmement cette solennité a reçu le nom de Mémoire : Nous y faisons en effet la mémoire de tous les saints anges en général. Ils ont droit à nos. louanges et à nos honneurs pour plusieurs motifs. Ils sont nos gardiens, nos directeurs, nos frères et nos concitoyens : ce sont eux qui portent nos âmes au ciel; ils présentent nos prières à Dieu, ce sont les plus nobles soldats du roi éternel, et les consolateurs des affligés. 1° Vous devons les honorer, parce qu'ils sont nos gardiens. A chaque homme sont donnés deux anges, un mauvais pour l’exercer, et un bon pour le garder. L'homme est gardé par un bon ange dès le sein de sa mère, dès sa naissance, et aussitôt qu'il voit le jour, et il l’est encore quand il est devenu grand. Or, dans ces trois états, l’homme a besoin de la garde de l’ange : car quand il est tout petit dans le sein de sa mère, il peut être tué et être damné; hors du sein de sa mère, avant l’âge adulte il peut être empêché de recevoir le baptême; parvenu à l’âge adulte, il peut être entraîné à commettre différents péchés; le diable séduit la raison de l’adulte par ses artifices; il allèche sa volonté par des caresses, il opprime sa vertu par la violence. Il était donc nécessaire qu'il y eût un bon ange chargé de garder l’homme pour l’instruire, le protéger contre les tromperies, l’exhorter, et le pousser au bien malgré les caresses et enfin le défendre de toute pression contre la violence. On peut assigner quatre résultats que l’homme obtient de la protection de son ange gardien. Le premier, c'est de faire avancer l’homme dans l’acquisition de la grâce l’ange le fait en trois manières : 1° en écartant tout ce qui empêche d'opérer le bien. Ceci est indiqué dans l’Exode (XII) où il est dit que l’ange frappa les premiers-nés de l’Egypte. 2° En chassant la paresse, comme il est dit dans le livre du Prophète Zacharie (IV): « L'ange du Seigneur me réveilla comme un homme qu'on réveille de son sommeil. » 3° En le conduisant dans la voie de la pénitence et en le ramenant: ce qui est signifié par l’ange qui conduisit et ramena Tobie (V). Le second, c'est de l’empêcher de tomber en faute : ce que l’ange fait de trois manières : 1° En empêchant par avance que le péché ne soit commis, cè qui est indiqué au livre des Nombres (XXII) où il est dit que Balaam qui allait pour maudire Israël en fut empêché par un auge. 2° En reprenant du péché passé afin de s'en corriger : comme au livre des Juges (II) où l’on voit que quand l’ange reprit les enfants d'Israël de leur prévarication, ils élevèrent leurs voix et se mirent à pleurer. 3° En faisant pour ainsi dire violence afin de quitter le péché actuel : ainsi que cela est signifié dans la violence apportée par l’ange pour chasser Loth et sa femme de Sodome, c'est-à-dire, de l’habitude du péché. Le troisième, c'est de s'élever après la chute: l’ange l’obtient en trois manières : 1° En excitant à la contrition : fait signalé dans le livre de Tobie (XI) où d'après les ordres de l’ange ; le jeune Tobie enduisit du fiel du poisson (ce qui signifiait la contrition) les yeux de son père, c'est-à-dire, les yeux du coeur. 2° En purifiant les lèvres pour se confesser dignement, comme Isaïe (VI) eut les lèvres purifiées par un ange. 3° En faisant accepter avec joie la satisfaction : d'après ce passage de saint Luc (XV) qu'il y aura une plus grande joie dans le ciel pour un seul pécheur qui fait pénitence que pour quatre-vingt-dix-neuf justes restant dans la persévérance. Le quatrième résultat, c'est que l’homme ne succombe ni si souvent, ni en tant de maux, chaque fois que le diable l’y porte et l’y entraîne. Ce que l’ange fait, de trois manières : «En mettant un frein à la puissance du démon. 2 ° En affaiblissant la concupiscence. 3° Et en gravant dans nos coeurs le souvenir de la passion de Notre-Seigneur. Ce qui a été dit ci-dessus suffit pour le prouver.

Secondement, nous devons les honorer parce qu'ils sont nos directeurs. Car tous les anges, dit l’épître aux, Hébreux (I), sont des esprits qui tiennent lieu de serviteurs et de ministres. Tous ont une mission par rapport à nous ; les supérieurs sont envoyés à ceux du second rang, ceux-ci aux derniers, et ces derniers à nous. Or, cette mission est bien en rapport : 1° Avec la bonté de Dieu. Car cette divine bonté est manifeste en tant qu'elle veut et aime notre salut quand elle envoie et nous transmet les plus nobles esprits qui lui sont intimement unis, pour nous donner les moyens d'être sauvés. 2° Avec la charité des anges; parce que c'est la fin d'une charité parfaite de désirer ardemment le salut des autres. C'est pourquoi Isaïe dit

« Me voici, Seigneur, envoyez-moi. » Or, les anges peuvent nous aider parce qu'ils nous voient privés de leurs secours et attaqués par les mauvais anges. S'ils sont envoyés vers nous, c'est que la loi de la charité angélique l’exige. 3° Avec l’indigence de l’homme: car les bons anges sont envoyés : 1° Pour enflammer notre coeur d'amour. Le char de feu qui les porte en est la figure. 2° Pour éclairer l’intelligence dans la connaissance de ses devoirs. Ceci est figuré dans l’ange de l’Apocalypse (X) qui avait un livre à la main. 3° Pour fortifier notre faiblesse jusqu'à la fin. Ce qui est indiqué dans le IIIe livre des Rois (XIX) où on lit qu'un ange porta à Elie un pain cuit sous la cendre et un vase d'eau. Alors ce prophète mangea et marcha, après s'être fortifié par cette nourriture, jusqu'à Oreb, la montagne de Dieu. Troisièmement, nous devons les honorer parce qu'ils sont nos frères et nos concitoyens. Tous les élus, en effet, sont appelés à faire partie des chœurs des anges ; quelques-uns des supérieurs, quelques autres des inférieurs un certain nombre sont choisis pour rester avec ceux qui occupent une place intermédiaire, selon leurs mérites ; mais la bienheureuse Vierge est au-dessus de tous. Saint Grégoire paraît n'être pas de ce sentiment dans une de ses homélies. a Il y en a, dit-il, qui ne conçoivent que peu de choses, mais qui cependant ne laissent pas d'en faire part à leurs frères : ceux-ci sont mis au rang des Anges. Il v en a qui parviennent à comprendre et à manifestera ce qu'il y a de plus sublime dans les secrets du ciel ; ils sont au rang des Archanges. Il y en a qui opèrent des miracles prodigieux et dont les oeuvres sont marquées au coin de la puissance ; ils sont avec les Vertus. Il yen a qui, par la force de leurs prières. et par l’effet de la puissance qu'ils ont reçue, mettent en fuite les esprits malins ; ils 'sont avec les Puissances. Il y en a qui, par les vertus qu'ils ont reçues, surpassent les élus en mérite, et sont à la tète de ceux qui sont élus comme eux ; ils partagent alors les prérogatives des Principautés. Il y en a encore qui exercent un tel empire en eux-mêmes sur tous les vices, qu'en raison de cette pureté, ils reçoivent des hommes le nom de Dieux; ainsi qu'il est dit à Moïse: « Voici que je t'ai établi le Dieu de Pharaon » (Exode, VII) : ceux-là sont avec les Dominations. Il y en a d'autres dans la personne desquels le Seigneur, comme sur son trône, juge les actes des autres, et qui, en gouvernant la sainte Eglise, jugent devoir être admis au nombre des élus la plupart de ceux qui la composent et dont les actions pourraient être attribuées à la faiblesse ; ce sont ceux qui se trouvent avec les Trônes. Il y en a qui sont remplis plus que d'autres de l’amour de Dieu et du prochain et qui ont mérité de partager le rang des Chérubins, parce que chérubin veut dire plénitude de science et que, d'après saint Paul, la plénitude de la loi c'est l’amour. Il s'en trouve encore qui, enflammés par l’amour de la contemplation des choses du ciel, tendent de tous leurs efforts vers leur créateur, ne désirent plus rien de ce qui est ici-bas, se rassasient de l’amour seul de l’éternité, méprisent tout ce qui est de la terre, s'élèvent en esprit au-dessus de ce qui appartient au temps, aiment et brûlent, en même temps qu'ils trouvent le repos dans leur amour, qui brûlent en aimant, qui embrasent par le feu de leurs paroles, et dont le langage a la vertu d'embraser de suite de l’amour de Dieu ceux auxquels ils s'adressent, et alors ils n'ont pu être appelés ailleurs que dans le chœur des Séraphins. »

Quatrièmement, on doit honorer les anges parce qu'ils portent nos âmes au ciel ; ce qu'ils font en trois manières : 1° En leur préparant la voie (Malach., III). « Je vais vous envoyer mon ange qui préparera ma voie devant ma face.» 2° En les portant au ciel sur la voie qui a été préparée (Exod., XXIII) : « Je vais envoyer mois ange qui te gardera en route et qui t'introduira dans la terre que j'ai promise à tes pères. » 3° En les plaçant dans le ciel (Luc, XVI) : « Il arriva que le pauvre mourut et fut emporté par les anges dans le sein d'Abraham. »

Cinquièmement, nous devons honorer les Anges; parce qu'ils présentent eux-mêmes nos prières à Dieu : 1° Ils offrent eux-mêmes nos prières à Dieu, comme il est dit au livre de Tobie (XII) : « Lorsque vous priiez avec larmes et que vous ensevelissiez les morts, j'ai présenté moi-même vos prières au Seigneur. » 2° Ils s'interposent en notre faveur, ainsi qu'on le voit au livre de Job (XXXIII) : « Si l’ange choisi entre mille parle pour l’homme et qu'il annonce au Seigneur l’équité de cet homme, Dieu aura compassion de lui. » Le prophète Zacharie dit encore (I) : « L'ange du Seigneur parla ensuite et dit : Seigneur des armées, jusqu'à quand différerez-vous de faire miséricorde à Jérusalem et aux villes de Juda contre lesquelles votre colère est émue ? Voici déjà la soixante et dixième année de leur ruine. » 3° Ils nous apportent les ordres de Dieu. Daniel (IX) rapporte que Gabriel vola vers lui pour lui dire: « Dès le commencement de votre prière, j'ai reçu cet ordre de Dieu (la Glose), et je suis venu pour vous découvrir les choses dont le Seigneur m’a chargé de vous instruire, parce que vous êtes un homme de désirs. » Saint Bernard parle ainsi sur ces trois fonctions des anges dans son livre sur le Cantique des Cantiques: « L'ange court du bien-aimé à la bien-aimée, offrant les voeux, rapportant les présents. Il émeut celle-ci et apaise celui-là. » Sixièmement, il faut les honorer parce qu'ils sont les nobles soldats du roi éternel, d'après ce qu'il est dit dans Job (XXV) : « Peut-on compter le nombre de ses soldats? » Parmi les soldats du roi, nous en voyons qui demeurent à sa cour, l’accompagnent et se livrent à des chants en son honneur pour le distraire; quelques-uns gardent les villes et les places fortes du royaume ; d'autres combattent ses ennemis; il en est de même des soldats de J.-C. dont nous venons de parler ; toujours à la cour céleste, c'est-à-dire au ciel empirée, ils accompagnent le Roi des rois, et. en son honneur ils chantent constamment des cantiques de liesse et de gloire en disant: « Saint, saint, saint : Bénédiction, gloire, sagesse, action de grâces, honneur, puissance et force à notre Dieu dans les siècles des siècles. » (Apoc., VII.) D'autres sont préposés à la garde des villes, des banlieues, des campagnes et des camps. Ce sont ceux qui sont établis pour nous garder, qui sont les gardiens des vierges, des continents, des mariés et des communautés religieuses : « Jérusalem, est-il dit au ch. XIII d'Isaïe, j'ai établi des gardiens sur tes murs. » D'autres enfin combattent les ennemis de Dieu, c'est-à-dire les démons. « Il y eut, dit l’Apocalypse, un grand combat dans le ciel, c'est-à-dire d'après une explication, dans l’église militante. Michel et ses anges combattaient avec le dragon. » Septièmement enfin, on doit honorer les anges, parce qu'ils sont les consolateurs des affligés. « L'ange, dit Zacharie (I), m’adressait de bonnes et consolantes paroles.» L'ange dit à Tobie (V) : « Ayez bon courage. » Ils exécutent cette fonction de trois manières : 1° en donnant de la vigueur et de la force. Daniel était tombé de frayeur, quand l’ange le toucha et lui dit (X) : « Ne craignez pas; la paix soit avec vous : reprenez vigueur et soyez ferme. » 2° En préservant de l’impatience. « Le Seigneur, dit le Psaume XC a ordonné à ses anges de vous garder dans toutes vos voies ; ils vous porteront sur leurs mains, de peur que votre pied ne heurte contre la pierre. » 3° En calmant et affaiblissant la tribulation elle-même : Daniel l’indique (III) quand il rapporte que l’ange du Seigneur descendit avec les trois enfants dans la fournaise et excita au milieu d'elle un vent frais et une douce rosée.

La Légende dorée de Jacques de Voragine nouvellement traduite en français avec introduction, notices, notes et recherches sur les sources par l'abbé J.-B. M. Roze, chanoine honoraire de la Cathédrale d'Amiens, Édouard Rouveyre, éditeur, 76, rue de Seine, 76, Paris mdccccii

SOURCE : http://www.abbaye-saint-benoit.ch/voragine/tome03/146.htm

SAINT MICHEL ARCHANGE

Anniversaire de la dédicace de la basilique dédiée à St Michel sur la via Salaria au Vème siècle et détruite lors des guerres gothiques au VIème siècle.

Depuis, ce jour, bien que conservant son titre de dédicace, est la fête principale de l’archange, même s’il n’a plus aucun caractère, ni au niveau des textes ni des rubriques, de fête de la dédicace.

Dans le sacramentaire Léonien, 5 messes sont consacrées ce jour à St Michel.

Fête attestée depuis le Vème siècle.

(Leçons des Matines)

AU PREMIER NOCTURNE.

Du Prophète Daniel.

Première leçon. Je regardais jusqu’à ce que des trônes furent placés, et un vieillard s’assit ; son vêtement était blanc comme la neige, et les cheveux de sa tête blancs comme une laine pure ; son trône comme des flammes de feu ; ses roues, un feu brûlant. Un fleuve de feu et rapide sortait de sa face ; des milliers de milliers d’Anges le servaient, et dix milliers de centaines de milliers d’Anges assistaient devant lui ; le jugement se tint, et des livres furent ouverts. Je regardais à cause de la voix des grandes paroles que cette corne prononçait ; et je vis que la bête fut tuée et que son corps périt, et qu’il fut livré pour être brûlé par le feu.

R/. Il se fit un silence dans le ciel lorsque le dragon combattait contre l’Archange Michel. * La voix de milliers de milliers d’Anges fut entendue, disant : Salut, honneur et puissance au Dieu tout-puissant. V/. Des milliers de milliers d’Anges le servaient, et dix milliers de centaines de milliers d’Anges assistaient devant lui. * La voix.

Deuxième leçon. Le vingtquatrième jour du premier mois, j’étais près du grand fleuve qui est le Tigre. Et je levai mes yeux, et je vis ; et voici un homme vêtu de lin, et ses reins ceints d’un or très pur ; et son corps était comme une chrysolithe, et sa face comme l’aspect de la foudre, et ses yeux comme une lampe ardente ; et ses bras et ses parties basses jusqu’aux pieds, comme une apparence d’airain étincelant, et la voix de ses paroles, comme la voix d’une multitude. Or, moi Daniel, je vis seul la vision, et les hommes qui étaient avec moi ne la virent pas ; mais une terreur extraordinaire se saisit d’eux, et ils s’enfuirent dans un lieu caché. Mais moi, étant demeuré seul, je vis cette grande vision ; et il ne resta pas en moi de force ; mais même mon visage fut changé en moi, et je séchai, et je n’eus aucune force.

R/. L’Ange se tint devant l’autel du temple, ayant un encensoir d’or à la main ; et une grande quantité de parfums lui fut donnée : * Et la fumée des parfums monta de la main de l’Ange, en présence du Seigneur. V/. En présence des Anges je vous chanterai des hymnes ; j’adorerai vers votre saint temple, et je glorifierai votre nom, Seigneur. * Et la fumée.

Troisième leçon. Et j’entendis la voix de ses paroles ; et, en l’entendant, j’étais couché tout consterné sur ma face, et mon visage était collé à la terre. Et voici qu’une main me toucha, et me dressa sur mes genoux et sur le plat de mes mains. Et la voix me dit : Daniel, homme de désirs, entends les paroles que je te dis, et tiens-toi sur tes pieds ; car je suis maintenant envoyé vers toi. Et lorsqu’il m’eut dit ces paroles, je me tins debout, tremblant. Et il me dit : Ne crains pas, Daniel, parce que dès le premier jour où tu as appliqué ton cœur à comprendre, afin de t’affliger en présence de ton Dieu, tes paroles ont été entendues ; et je suis venu à cause de tes discours. Or le prince du royaume des Perses m’a résisté durant vingt et un jours : et voilà que Michel, un des premiers princes, est venu à mon secours, et moi, je suis demeuré là près du roi des Perses. Mais je suis venu afin de t’apprendre ce qui doit arriver à ton peuple dans les derniers jours, parce que la vision est encore pour ces jours.

R/. En présence des Anges je vous chanterai des hymnes ; j’adorerai vers votre saint temple, * Et je glorifierai votre nom, Seigneur. V/. A cause de votre miséricorde et de votre vérité : parce que vous avez élevé au-dessus de nous la grandeur de votre nom saint. * Et je glorifierai. Gloire au Père. * Et je glorifierai.

AU DEUXIÈME NOCTURNE.

Sermon de saint Grégoire, Pape.

Quatrième leçon. Nous disons qu’il y a neuf ordres d’Anges. En effet, nous savons positivement par le témoignage de la sainte Écriture, qu’il y a : des Anges, des Archanges, des Vertus, des Puissances, des Principautés, des Dominations, des Trônes, des Chérubins et des Séraphins. Qu’il y ait des Anges et des Archanges, presque toutes les pages sacrées l’attestent ; quant aux Chérubins et aux Séraphins, il en est souvent question, comme on le sait, au livre des Prophètes. De plus, l’Apôtre saint Paul énumère les noms de quatre ordres dans ce passage de son Épître aux Éphésiens : « Au-dessus de toute Principauté, de toute Puissance, de toute Vertu, de toute Domination. » [1] Il dit encore en écrivant aux Colossiens : « Soit les Trônes, soit les Puissances, soit les Principautés, soit les Dominations. » [2] En joignant donc les Trônes aux quatre ordres dont il a parlé aux Éphésiens, on a cinq ordres ; et si l’on y ajoute les Anges et les Archanges, les Chérubins et les Séraphins, on trouve qu’il existe réellement neuf ordres d’Anges.

R/. Celui-ci est l’Archange Michel, le prince de la milice des Anges : * Le culte qu’on lui rend est une source de bienfaits pour les peuples, et sa prière conduit au royaume des cieux. V/. C’est l’Archange Michel, glorieusement élevé dans le paradis, c’est celui à qui rendent honneur tous les citoyens de la cité angélique. * Le culte.

Cinquième leçon. Or, il faut savoir que cette dénomination d’Anges désigne leur fonction et non leur nature ; car si ces bienheureux esprits de la céleste patrie sont toujours des esprits, ils ne peuvent pas toujours être appelés des Anges ; ils sont Anges seulement lorsqu’ils annoncent quelque chose. C’est pour cela qu’un Psaume dit en parlant de Dieu : « Lui qui, des esprits, fait ses Anges. » [3] Comme s’il disait explicitement : ceux qu’il a toujours comme esprits, il en fait ses Anges quand il veut. Or, ceux qui portent les messages les moins importants sont appelés simplement du nom d’Anges, et on nomme Archanges ceux qui annoncent les plus grands mystères. Et voilà pourquoi ce n’est pas un Ange quelconque, mais bien l’Archange Gabriel, que Dieu envoya à la Vierge Marie. Comme il s’agissait du plus grand de tous les messages, il convenait que le plus grand des Anges remplît ce ministère. En outre, ces Archanges reçoivent des noms particuliers, qui expriment les effets de leur opération. Ainsi Michel signifie : Qui est semblable à Dieu ? Gabriel, Force de Dieu ; Raphaël, Remède de Dieu.

R/. L’Archange Michel est venu avec une multitude d’Anges ; c’est à lui que Dieu a confié les âmes des saints, * Pour qu’il les fasse parvenir aux joies du paradis. V/. Seigneur, envoyez du ciel votre Esprit-Saint, l’esprit de sagesse et d’intelligence. * Pour qu’il.

Sixième leçon. Toutes les fois qu’il s’agit d’une chose où il faut une puissance extraordinaire, c’est Michel que l’Écriture cite comme envoyé, afin que son nom aussi bien que l’acte même, donne à comprendre que nul ne peut faire ce que Dieu fait par son incomparable puissance. Aussi l’antique ennemi qui disait, dans son orgueilleuse ambition de s’égaler à Dieu : « Je monterai jusqu’aux cieux, j’élèverai mon trône au-dessus des astres du ciel, je serai semblable au Très-Haut ; » [4] cet ancien ennemi, dis-je, lorsqu’à la fin du monde il sera laissé dans toute sa force, pour être ensuite écrasé dans l’éternel supplice, est-il mentionné comme devant combattre contre l’Archange Michel, d’après cette parole de saint Jean : « Et un combat s’est engagé avec l’Archange Michel. » [5] De même, l’Archange envoyé à Marie, c’est Gabriel, dont le nom signifie : Force de Dieu. Il venait effectivement annoncer celui qui, pour faire sentir sa force aux puissances de l’air, a daigné paraître dans l’humiliation. Enfin, comme nous avons dit plus haut, Raphaël signifie : Remède de Dieu ; et en effet, cet Archange, en touchant les yeux de Tobie comme pour le guérir, dissipa les ténèbres de sa cécité.

R/. En ce temps-là s’élèvera Michel, qui est pour vos fils, * Et viendra un temps, tel qu’il n’y en a pas eu depuis que les nations ont commencé d’être jusqu’alors. V/. En ce temps-là, sera sauvé quiconque de ton peuple sera trouvé écrit dans le livre de vie. * Et. Gloire au Père. * Et.

AU TROISIÈME NOCTURNE.

Lecture du saint Évangile selon saint Matthieu.

En ce temps-là : Les disciples s’approchèrent de Jésus, disant : Qui, pensez-vous, est le plus grand dans le royaume des cieux ? Et le reste.

Homélie de saint Jérôme, Prêtre.

Septième leçon. Le statère vient d’être trouvé et le tribut payé, pourquoi cette question inopinée des Apôtres : « Qui, pensez-vous, est le plus grand dans le royaume des cieux ? » Parce qu’ils avaient vu payer un même tribut pour Pierre et le Seigneur, de cette égalité dans le prix, ils concluaient que Pierre était élevé au-dessus de tous les Apôtres, lui qui, pour la reddition du tribut, semblait être comparé au Seigneur ; et voilà pourquoi ils demandent : « Qui est le plus grand dans le royaume des cieux ? » Jésus, connaissant leurs pensées et discernant la cause de leur méprise, veut guérir en eux le désir de la gloire, en leur inspirant une généreuse émulation pour l’humilité.

R/. En présence des Gentils, ne craignez point : mais en vos cœurs adorez et craignez le Seigneur, * Car son Ange est avec vous. V/. L’Ange se tint devant l’autel du temple, ayant à la main un encensoir d’or. * Car.

Bened. Que ceux dont nous célébrons la Fête, etc. [6]

Huitième leçon. « Si donc ta main ou ton pied te scandalise, coupe-le et jette-le loin de toi. » Il faut, à-la vérité, que les scandales arrivent ; cependant, malheur à l’homme qui, par sa faute, est la cause de ce qui ne peut manquer de se produire dans le monde. En conséquence, toute affection est à briser, toute parenté est à rompre, quand il y a lieu de craindre que les croyants, dans leurs rapports de piété filiale ou de fidélité, ne soient exposés à des scandales. S’il y a quelqu’un, semble dire le Sauveur, qui vous soit aussi étroitement uni que la main, le pied, ou l’œil est uni au corps ; quelqu’un qui vous soit utile et dévoué, qui mette à votre service sa clairvoyance et sa pénétration, mais qui vous soit en même temps un sujet de scandale, et qui, par l’opposition des mœurs, vous entraîne dans l’enfer, il vaut mieux vous priver de son intimité et des avantages temporels qui en résultent, de peur qu’en voulant gagner vos proches et vos amis, vous n’ayez auprès d’eux des occasions de vous perdre.

R/. L’Archange Michel est venu au secours du peuple de Dieu, * Il a couvert de sa protection les âmes justes. V/. L’Ange se tint près de l’autel du temple, ayant à la main un encensoir d’or. * Il. Gloire au Père. * Il.

Neuvième leçon. « Je vous dis que leurs Anges voient sans cesse, dans le ciel, la face de mon Père. » Plus haut, sous l’image de la main, du pied et de l’œil dont il faut se défaire, il avait dit qu’on doit se séparer des parents et des amis, qui peuvent être des sujets de scandale Voici maintenant qu’il tempère la rigueur de ce principe, par cette recommandation qu’il ajoute à la suite. « Prenez garde de mépriser un seul de ces petits. » Comme s’il disait : Je ne commande pas la sévérité de conduite, sans apprendre en même temps qu’il y faut mêler de la douceur : « Car leurs Anges voient sans cesse, dans les deux, la face du Père. » Grandeur et dignité des âmes, en ce que chacun des hommes a, dès le moment de sa naissance, un Ange préposé à sa garde. Aussi lisons-nous dans l’Apocalypse de saint Jean : « Écris ceci à l’Ange d’Éphèse, et .aux Anges des autres Églises. » [7] Comme aussi l’Apôtre veut que, dans les églises, les femmes aient la tête voilée, à cause des Anges. [8]

[1] Ephés. 1, 21

[2] Col. 1, 16

[3] Ps. 103, 4

[4] Is. 14, 13

[5] Ap. 12, 7

[6] Même si historiquement la fête du 29 septembre commémore une dédicace d’église, elle n’est en rien une fête de la dédicace (c’est à dire une fête du Seigneur), mais une fête des saints Anges.

[7] Ap. 2, 1

[8] 1 Cor. 11, 10

Saint Michel, « boss » de tous les anges gardiens et peseur des âmes

Bernard Plessy | 27 septembre 2019

L’Archange Michel a tant de fonctions auprès de nous que nous pouvons être tenté de croire qu’il est à la limite de ce qu’il peut. Mais rassurons-nous d’emblée : il peut toujours tout pour nous. Et pour cause, son nom signifie : "Qui est comme Dieu". Voyons voir du coup tout ce qu’il fait pour nous.

Michel n’est pas un saint incarné, c’est un être céleste. Il ne relève pas du temps humain. S’il a un commencement, il n’a pas de fin ; son existence permanente n’est pas linéaire, mais ponctuelle ou sporadique, au gré de ses manifestations, ou apparitions. Michel est créature de Dieu, prestigieuse, chef de corps de la légion des anges, les anges du bien. On dit aussi Prince de la milice céleste. Flanqué de ses adjoints Gabriel et Raphaël. 

Lire aussi :

À quelle vitesse les anges se déplacent-ils ?

Et c’est donc lui qui livre bataille au Dragon. Qui est le Dragon ? C’est l’Ennemi. Le Rebelle, qui dit : Non serviam, je ne servirai pas. L’Insoumis. Combat décisif : ou lui ou Dieu. Sur le front, en première ligne, Michel, avec casque, armure, épée. Coups terribles. Autre chose qu’Olivier et Roland dans La Légende des Siècles. Michel l’emporte. Le Dragon est précipité dans l’abîme. Et Michel y gagne ses galons de porte-étendard, signifer.

Quand cela se passe-t-il ? Aux origines ? L’Apocalypse, qui raconte le combat, permet cette lecture (Ap 12, 7-9). Elle ne la garantit pas. Elle-même est hors du temps. Sa nature est de révéler. Elle peut le faire par préfiguration, et mettre aux origines ce qui sera lutte finale. Jésus, dans ses prédictions apocalyptiques, puisque les Évangiles le font donner dans ce genre d’époque, concourt à cette lecture ambiguë : « Je regardais le Satan tomber du ciel comme un éclair ! » (Lc, 10, 18).

Veiller à la victoire anticipée de chaque âme

Pour nous la seule chose qui importe, c’est que Michel ait gagné. De provisoirement on passera à définitivement. Mais en attendant la victoire finale, Michel a la lourde tâche de s’occuper de nous. Laissons ses apparitions — et même notre Mont-Saint-Michel, trop à dire. L’immense victoire collective de la fin des temps — when the stars begin to fall, comme dit un beau spiritual — ne le dispense pas de veiller à la victoire anticipée de chaque âme venue en ce monde. Quel travail ! 

Lire aussi :

13 infos que vous ignorez sûrement sur le Mont-Saint-Michel

Il s’y emploie au moins de trois façons. Responsable des anges gardiens, il vient s’assurer que chacun fait bien son office. Il se promène parmi nous. Mais nous ne le voyons pas ! Jeanne d’Arc, elle, le voyait. Parlant des saints : « Ils viennent très souvent, et très souvent je les ai vus parmi les chrétiens… Je vis saint Michel et ses anges des yeux de mon corps aussi bien que je vous vois… » Mon Dieu, donnez-nous le regard de Jeanne. Puis il s’active au moment de notre mort, comme en témoigne cet Offertoire de funérailles : « Seigneur Jésus-Christ, Roi de gloire, délivrez les âmes de tous les fidèles défunts des peines de l’enfer et du gouffre sans fond ; délivrez-les de la gueule du lion  pour que l’abîme ne les engloutisse pas et qu’elles ne soient pas précipitées dans les ténèbres, mais que saint Michel, le porte-étendard, les introduise dans la sainte Lumière. » Dans ce rôle les savants disent qu’il est psychopompe, il accompagne les âmes, comme Hermès ou Mercure. Car il y a dans tout cela, sans la moindre irrévérence, une discrète part mythologique, dont il serait bien de parler un jour.

Et puis surtout il continue son combat contre le Malin ou le Mauvais, tant que ce monde reste dans le temps. Il n’y a pas si longtemps, à la fin de la messe, le prêtre, au bas de l’autel, récitait une prière composée et prescrite par Léon XIII : « Saint Michel Archange, défendez-nous dans le combat ; soyez notre secours contre la malice et les embûches du démon. Que Dieu exerce sur lui son empire, nous le demandons en suppliant : et vous, Prince de la milice céleste, repoussez en enfer, par la vertu divine, Satan et les autres esprits mauvais qui rôdent dans le monde pour perdre les âmes. » Les autres esprits mauvais… Ô saint Michel, nous pourrions vous en faire une belle liste. Voilà l’Archange et ses états d’incessants services. Et il en a d’autres. Il protège la France. Henri Pourrat l’appelle l’Ange de la Nation. Chaque nation a son ange : nous, c’est saint Michel. Tous les 29 septembre, il reprend sa tenue militaire à la tête (et à la fête) des parachutistes.

Michel, le peseur d’âmes

Nous, nous avons rendez-vous avec saint Michel au dernier jour. Cette fois Michel psychostase : le peseur d’âmes. Nous le voyons au tympan des cathédrales, Autun par exemple, balance à deux plateaux en main. La pesée d’une vie. Il est beau, il est sûr, il est souriant. Le plateau des bonnes actions descend : c’est le plus lourd. Agrippé à l’autre plateau, Satan grimace : il ne fait pas le poids. Comment laisser Michel ? Il faut plutôt lui demander de ne pas nous quitter. Faisons nôtre une antienne des IIes vêpres de sa fête : « Prince très glorieux, Archange Michel, souvenez-vous de nous ; ici et en tous lieux, priez toujours pour nous le Fils de Dieu, alleluia, alleluia. » 

Lire aussi :

Michel, Raphaël, Gabriel : quels sont les pouvoirs des archanges ?

SOURCE : https://fr.aleteia.org/2019/09/27/saint-michel-boss-de-tous-les-anges-gardiens-et-peseur-des-ames/?utm_campaign=NL_fr&utm_source=daily_newsletter&utm_medium=mail&utm_content=NL_fr

La prière toute simple pour apprendre aux enfants à invoquer saint Michel

Bénédicte de Saint-Germain | 27 septembre 2019

Le 29 septembre, toute l’Église fête les saints archanges. L’occasion de parler aux enfants de saint Michel et de leur apprendre à l’invoquer avec une prière toute simple.

Revêtu de son armure, brandissant son épée, terrassant le démon, … le grand saint Michel, « chef de la milice céleste », peut paraître un peu éloigné des préoccupations enfantines. N’est-il pas le spécialiste des grands combats, invoqué par les papes pour défendre l’Église ? L’archange est pourtant un allié précieux dans la vie quotidienne. Nous pouvons l’expliquer aux enfants en leur enseignant une courte prière. Très facile à mémoriser et, même à gestuer, elle reprend trois missions fondamentales de l’archange :

« Saint Michel archange, de ta lumière, éclaire-nous,
Saint Michel archange, de tes ailes, protège-nous,
Saint Michel archange, de ton épée, défends-nous. »

Saint Michel nous éclaire

Avec tous les anges, saint Michel voit « sans cesse la face de mon Père qui est aux cieux », nous dit Jésus (Mt 18, 10). Comme tous les bons anges, il resplendit de la gloire de Dieu. Avec tous les esprits bienheureux, il s’émerveille de Sa grandeur et il chante sa splendeur. 

Lire aussi :

Un Tour de France pour saint Michel

À la messe, quand nous chantons le Sanctus, nous sommes en communion avec tous les anges et tous les saints. Comme eux, toute notre vie doit être une louange à la gloire du Père. Demandons à saint Michel de nous apprendre à louer le Seigneur pour toutes les merveilles de la Création, pour tout ce qu’Il accomplit dans le monde et dans le cœur des hommes.

Saint Michel nous protège

Le Seigneur « a donné mission à ses anges de nous garder sur tous nos chemins » (Ps 90). Avec notre ange gardien, les archanges veillent sur nous. Les enfants, qui éprouvent si simplement le besoin d’être protégés, avec tendresse et confiance, comprendront la puissance de saint Michel. 

Lire aussi :

Est-ce que mon ange gardien achève ma prière si je m’endors ?

Michel signifie « Qui est comme Dieu ? ». Ce nom un peu énigmatique nous rappelle le combat que saint Michel a mené contre le démon, l’ange orgueilleux qui a voulu se faire l’égal de Dieu (Ap 12, 7-9). « Chaque fois qu’il est besoin d’un déploiement de force extraordinaire, c’est Michel qui est envoyé, explique Monique Berger dans Vivre l’année liturgique avec les enfants (éditions Transmettre) : son action et son nom font comprendre que nul ne peut faire ce qu’il appartient à Dieu seul de faire. »  Demandons-lui son aide pour nous protéger de l’orgueil.

Saint Michel nous défend

Le grand saint Michel a pour mission la lutte contre le démon et la défense de l’Église. « Le diable (dia-bolos) est celui qui “se jette en travers” du dessein de Dieu et de son œuvre de salut accomplie dans le Christ » (Catéchisme de l’Église catholique, n° 2851). Nous voulons faire le bien mais le diable met des obstacles à notre bonne volonté : il nous présente des tentations, nous séduit et nous détourne de nos bonnes résolutions. Demandons à saint Michel de nous aider à enlever ces obstacles et à rendre droit notre chemin vers Dieu. Confions-lui aussi l’Église et le monde. 

Lire aussi :

Trois façons efficaces de prier l’archange saint Michel

SOURCE : https://fr.aleteia.org/2019/09/27/la-priere-toute-simple-pour-apprendre-aux-enfants-a-invoquer-saint-michel/?utm_campaign=NL_fr&utm_source=daily_newsletter&utm_medium=mail&utm_content=NL_fr

Les saints archanges, bien plus que des messagers de Dieu

Edifa | 28 septembre 2020

Saint Raphaël, saint Michel et saint Gabriel… En cette fin de septembre, l’Église nous invite à fêter des saints pas comme les autres.

Le 29 septembre, l’Eglise fête les archanges Michel, Gabriel et Raphaël. Des super-anges, en plus légers. Comme tout ange, ils sont des envoyés de Dieu auprès des hommes : « Messagers du Seigneur, bénissez le Seigneur, vous, les invincibles porteurs de ses ordres, prompts à exécuter sa Parole » (antienne d’ouverture).

Les archanges arrivent les premiers parmi ces créatures spirituelles qui proclament l’inouï de Dieu. Ils sont souvent mandatés pour des missions impossibles. Ces agents très spéciaux ne cessent de se tenir devant la face de Dieu, Le servant jour et nuit. Lorsqu’ils sortent de l’anonymat, ils portent un nom d’homme, et avec ce nom une fonction.

Le combattant, le diplomate et le compatissant

Il y a d’abord le chef Michel, « Qui est comme Dieu », combattant du Dragon. C’est le plus grand des esprits angéliques. C’est le lutteur par excellence contre les forces du Mal. Lorsque Dieu a besoin d’un ange fort et rapide, Il envoie Michel. 

Lire aussi :

Le chapelet de saint Michel, l’indispensable prière pour les combats quotidiens

Voici le diplomate Gabriel, nom qui signifie « homme de Dieu ». Le livre de Daniel présente Gabriel comme un ange-interprète. On le connaît surtout dans le Nouveau Testament pour ses apparitions à Zacharie et à Marie. Lorsque Dieu veut faire une grande annonciation, Il envoie Gabriel. 

Lire aussi :

Michel, Raphaël, Gabriel : quels sont les pouvoirs des archanges ?

Enfin, il y a le compatissant Raphaël, qui veut dire « Dieu guérit ». Cet ange débonnaire accompagne le jeune Tobie pour qu’il fasse un beau voyage. Avis aux pèlerins et voyageurs, il délivre aussi des esprits mauvais. Il se présente lui-même comme l’un des sept anges qui sont devant Dieu, Lui offrant nos supplications gratuitement. Lorsque Dieu veut faire avancer quelqu’un sur le chemin de la vie, Il envoie Raphaël.

Quand les anges nous envoient de discrets signes

Ces archanges de la lumière nous disent combien Dieu est beau. Avec d’autres anges anonymes, ils nous font signe discrètement, sans forcer aucune porte : c’est une intuition à faire le bien, une chute évitée de justesse, une aide à devenir soi-même, une voix que l’on discerne, un geste au bon moment, une joie à vivre le moment présent…

En fêtant les archanges, l’Eglise nous dit que nous ne sommes pas seuls sur Terre. Ils combattent avec nous contre les puissances des Ténèbres. Ils nous invitent surtout à louer Dieu, et à faire avec eux des haltes d’adoration. C’est alors qu’on les entend parfois passer, avec ou sans ailes, dans le silence amoureux de la prière. 

Lire aussi :

Combien d’archanges y a-t-il dans la Bible ?

Jacques Gauthier

SOURCE : https://fr.aleteia.org/cp1/2020/09/28/les-saints-archanges-bien-plus-que-des-messagers-de-dieu/?utm_campaign=Web_Notifications&utm_source=onesignal&utm_medium=notifications

Michael the Archangel

Memorial

29 September

8 May – Apparition of Saint Michael and Protector of Cornwall

Profile

Archangel. Leader of the army of God during the Lucifer uprising. Devotion is common to Muslims, Christians and Jews, and there are writings about him in all three cultures. Considered the guardian angel of Israel, and the guardian and protector of the Church. In the Book of Daniel (12:1), Michael is described as rising up to defend the Church against the Anti-Christ.

The feast of the Apparition of Saint Michael commemorates appearance of the archangel to a man named Gargan in 492 on Mount Gargano near Manfredonia in southern Italy. Gargan and others were pasturing cattle on the mountain; a bull wandered off and hid in a cave. An arrow was shot into the cave, but it came flying back out and wounded the archer. The cowherds went to their bishop who ordered three days of fasting and prayer to seek an explanation for the mystery. At the end of the three days Michael appeared to the bishop and requested a church built in the honour of the Holy Angels in the cave. If you find medals or holy cards with ‘relics‘ of Michael, they are probably rock chips from the cave, or pieces of cloth that have touched it.

Born

wasn’t

Died

hasn’t

Canonized

Pre-Congregation

Name Meaning

Who is like God? (the battle cry of the army of heaven)

Patronage

against danger at sea

against temptations

ambulance drivers

arms manufacturers

artists

bakers

bankers, banking

barrel makers, coopers

battle

cutlers, knife grinders, knife sharpers

dying people

emergency medical technicians, EMTs, paramedics

fencers

fencing

Greek Air Force

greengrocers

grocers

Guild of Tanners and Weavers of BarcelonaSpain

haberdashers

hatmakers, hatters, cap makers

holy death

knights

mariners, sailors, watermen, boatmen

milleners

paratroopers

police officers

radiologists (proclaimed on 15 January 1941 by Pope Pius XII)

radiotherapists

scale makers

security guards

sick people

soldiers

Spanish police officers

storms at sea

swordsmiths

Belarus

England

Germany

Papua, New Guinea

Vatican City (given in 2013)

Worshipful Company of Plumbers

Albenga-ImperiaItalydiocese of

Alghero-BosaItalydiocese of

Altamura–Gravina–Acquaviva delle FontiItalydiocese of

AuchiNigeriadiocese of

CaltanissettaItalydiocese of

CasertaItalydiocese of

Chieti-VastoItalyarchdiocese of

CoimbatoreIndiadiocese of

IliganPhilippinesdiocese of

Keta-Akatsi, Ghana, diocese of

MobileAlabamaarchdiocese of

Pensacola-TallahasseeFloridadiocese of

Rouyn-NorandaQuébecdiocese of

San AngeloTexasdiocese of

SeattleWashingtonarchdiocese of

SherbrookeCanadaarchdiocese of

SpringfieldMassachusettsdiocese of

Toronto, Ontario, archdiocese of

in Belgium

Affligem

Brecht

Bree

Brussels

in Brazil

Araponga

Catuji

Guanhães

Jequitinhonha

Rio Piracicaba

Veríssimo

Toronto, Ontario, Canada

SibenikCroatia

SlagelseDenmark

in England

Cornwall

London

in Germany

Amburgo

Andernacht

Dormagen

Zeitz

DunakesziHungary

in Italy

Albenga

Albidona

Alghero

Amorosi

Appiano sulla Strada del Vino

Aprilia

Apulia

Arba

Arpaia

Arsiero

Badia Tedalda

Bagnacavallo

BarconVedelago

Bastia Umbria

Benestare

Bevagna

Bigolino

Bitetto

Brendola

Brisighella

Brosso

Busto Arsizio

Cagnano Varano

Caltanissetta

Campobasso

Canicattini Bagni

Cantagallo

Carbonara di Bari

Cariati

Carmignano

Carpineto Sinello

Casagiove

Caserta

Castel Madama

Castelnuovo del Zappa

Castiglion Fiorentino

Castiglione del Genovesi

Castrignano del Capo

Celico

Certosa di Pavia

Cerveteri

Cuneo

DomaninsSan Giorgio della Richinvelda

Fener

GabbroRosignano Marittimo

Gaby

Gravina

Greccio

Maddaloni

Marcianise

Milzanello

Mondaino

Pergine Valdarno

Rastiglione

Rocca Massima

RovennaCernobbio

Salgareda

Sant’Angelo Romano

Saracinesco

Torre del Mangano

Umbria

Vallinfreda

Vasto

Venice

Villacanale

Zugliano, Pozzuolo del Friuli

in Malta

Iklin

in Mexico

Puebla

San Miguel de Allende

in the Philippines

ArgaoCebu

Basey, Samar

San Miguel, Iloilo

in Puerto Rico

Cabo Rojo

Naranjito

in Switzerland

Beromünster

Congregation of Saint Michael the Archangel

Siegburg Abbey

Sisters of Reparation to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

Representation

balance (helping to judge at the Last Judgment)

banner (as the leader of the army of God)

dragon (representing the defeated devil)

scales (helping to judge at the Last Judgment)

sword (as a soldier of God)

Storefront

tiny saints charms and clips

hand painted medals

Additional Information

A Garner of Saints, by Allen Banks Hinds, M.A.

Act of Consecration to Michael the Archangel

Angelic Crown in Honor of Saint Michael the Archangel

Angels in Art, by Clara Erskine Clement

Book of Saints, by the Monks of Ramsgate

Butler’s Lives of the Saints: Dedication of Saint Michael’s Church

Butler’s Lives of the Saints: Apparition of Saint Michael the Archangel

Catholic Encyclopedia

Goffine’s Devout Instructions

Golden Legend

Legend of Saint Michael and the Hermit, from Catholic World

Light From the Altar, edited by Father James J McGovern

Litany to Michael the Archangel

Lives of the Saints, by Father Francis Xavier Weninger

Meditations on the Gospels for Every Day in the Year, by Father Pierre Médaille

‘Neath Saint Michael’s Shield, by the Benedictine Convent of Perpetual Adoration

New Catholic Dictionary: Michaelmas Day

New Catholic Dictionary: Saint Michael

Pictorial Lives of the Saints: Saint Michael, Archangel

Pictorial Lives of the Saints: Apparition of Saint Michael the Archangel

Prayer to Michael the Archangel

Roman Martyrology1914 edition

Saint Michael, Defender in the Day of Battle, by Michael Derrick

Saint Michael, Protector of the Church, by Bishop John Edward Cuthbert Hedley

Saints and Saintly Dominicans, by Blessed Hyacinthe-Marie CormierO.P.

Short Lives of the Saints, by Eleanor Cecilia Donnelly

Short Lives of the Saints, by Eleanor Cecilia Donnelly

Three Archangels and the Guardian Angels in Art, by Eliza Allen Starr

books

Our Sunday Visitor’s Encyclopedia of Saints

other sites in english

Aleteia

AnaStpaul

Billy Ryan: Inside the Cave-Shrine Where Saint Michael the Archangel Appeared

Catholic Culture

Catholic Exchange: Prayer to Michael the Archangel

Catholic Exchange: Intercession of Michael in Christian History

Catholic Fire

Catholic Harbor

Catholic Herald: Five Shrines to Michael

Catholic Ireland

Catholic News Agency

Catholic Online

Christian Biographies, by James E Kiefer

Communio

Community of Hope

Cradio

Exciting Holiness

Father Z

Franciscan Media

Independent Catholic News

Jewish Encyclopedia

Jimmy Akin

Katherine Rabenstein

Liturgical Year, by Dom Gueranger

Michaelmas Bannock

New Liturgical Movement: On the Apparition of Michael

Omnium Sanctorum Hiberniae

Oxford Times

Philip Kosloski

Pray More Novenas

Queen of Angels Foundation

Regina Magazine

Roman Catholic Man

Roman Catholic Saints

Saints for Sinners

Saints Project

Saints Resource

Saints Stories for All Ages

Spiritual Direction

TFP Student Action: What is the Sword of Saint Michael?

uCatholic

Wikipedia: Michael the Archangel

Wikipedia: Saint Michael

Wikipedia: Chaplet of Saint Michael

Wikipedia: Michaelmas Day

Wikipedia: Prayer to Saint Michael

images

Santi e Beati

Santi e Beati

Wikimedia Commons

audio

Super Saints Podcast

video

YouTube PlayList

webseiten auf deutsch

Kathpedia

Kirche in Not

Wikipedia

sitios en español

Martirologio Romano2001 edición

sites en français

Abbé Christian-Philippe Chanut

Fête des prénoms

fonti in italiano

Cathopedia

Santi e Beati

Santi e Beati

Santi e Beati

Santo del Giorno

Wikipedia: Arcangelo Michele

Wikipedia: Santi patroni della città di Venezia

nettsteder i norsk

Den katolske kirke

Wikipedia

Readings

You should be aware that the word “angel” denotes a function rather than a nature. Those holy spirits of heaven have indeed always been spirits. They can only be called angels when they deliver some message. Moreover, those who deliver messages of lesser importance are called angels; and those who proclaim messages of supreme importance are called archangels.

Whenever some act of wondrous power must be performed, Michael is sent, so that his action and his name may make it clear that no one can do what God does by his superior power. – from a homily by Pope Saint Gregory the Great

MLA Citation

“Michael the Archangel“. CatholicSaints.Info. 21 September 2023. Web. 29 September 2023. <https://catholicsaints.info/michael-the-archangel/>

SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/michael-the-archangel/

St. Michael the Archangel

(Hebrew "Who is like God?").

St. Michael is one of the principal angels; his name was the war-cry of the good angels in the battle fought in heaven against the enemy and his followers. Four times his name is recorded in Scripture:

(1) Daniel 10:13 sqq.Gabriel says to Daniel, when he asks God to permit the Jews to return to Jerusalem: "The Angel [D.V. prince] of the kingdom of the Persians resisted me . . . and, behold Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me . . . and none is my helper in all these things, but Michael your prince."

(2) Daniel 12, the Angel speaking of the end of the world and the Antichrist says: "At that time shall Michael rise up, the great prince, who standeth for the children of thy people."

(3) In the Catholic Epistle of St. Jude: "When Michael the Archangel, disputing with the devil, contended about the body of Moses", etc. St. Jude alludes to an ancient Jewish tradition of a dispute between Michael and Satan over the body of Moses, an account of which is also found in the apocryphal book on the assumption of Moses (OrigenDe Principiis III.2.2). St. Michael concealed the tomb of MosesSatan, however, by disclosing it, tried to seduce the Jewish people to the sin of hero-worship. St. Michael also guards the body of Eve, according to the "Revelation of Moses" ("Apocryphal Gospels", etc., ed. A. Walker, Edinburgh, p. 647).

(4) Apocalypse 12:7, "And there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon." St. John speaks of the great conflict at the end of time, which reflects also the battle in heaven at the beginning of time. According to the Fathers there is often question of St. Michael in Scripture where his name is not mentioned. They say he was the cherub who stood at the gate of paradise, "to keep the way of the tree of life" (Genesis 3:24), the angel through whom God published the Decalogue to his chosen people, the angel who stood in the way against Balaam (Numbers 22:22 sqq.), the angel who routed the army of Sennacherib (2 Kings 19:35).

Following these Scriptural passages, Christian tradition gives to St. Michael four offices:

To fight against Satan.

To rescue the souls of the faithful from the power of the enemy, especially at the hour of death.

To be the champion of God's people, the Jews in the Old Law, the Christians in the New Testament; therefore he was the patron of the Church, and of the orders of knights during the Middle Ages.

To call away from earth and bring men's souls to judgment ("signifer S. Michael repraesentet eas in lucam sanctam", Offert. Miss Defunct. "Constituit eum principem super animas suscipiendas", Antiph. off. Cf. The Shepherd of Hermas, Book III, Similitude 8, Chapter 3).

Regarding his rank in the celestial hierarchy opinions vary; St. Basil (Hom. de angelis) and other Greek Fathers, also SalmeronBellarmine, etc., place St. Michael over all the angels; they say he is called "archangel" because he is the prince of the other angels; others (cf. P. Bonaventura, op. cit.) believe that he is the prince of the seraphim, the first of the nine angelic orders. But, according to St. Thomas (Summa Ia.113.3) he is the prince of the last and lowest choir, the angels. The Roman Liturgy seems to follow the Greek Fathers; it calls him "Princeps militiae coelestis quem honorificant angelorum cives". The hymn of the Mozarabic Breviary places St. Michael even above the Twenty-four Elders. The Greek Liturgy styles him Archistrategos, "highest general" (cf. Menaea, 8 Nov. and 6 Sept.).

Veneration

It would have been natural to St. Michael, the champion of the Jewish people, to be the champion also of Christians, giving victory in war to his clients. The early Christians, however, regarded some of the martyrs as their military patrons: St. GeorgeSt. TheodoreSt. DemetriusSt. Sergius, St. Procopius, St. Mercurius, etc.; but to St. Michael they gave the care of their sick. At the place where he was first venerated, in Phrygia, his prestige as angelic healer obscured his interposition in military affairs. It was from early times the centre of the true cult of the holy angels, particularly of St. Michael. Tradition relates that St. Michael in the earliest ages caused a medicinal spring to spout at Chairotopa near Colossae, where all the sick who bathed there, invoking the Blessed Trinity and St. Michael, were cured.

Still more famous are the springs which St. Michael is said to have drawn from the rock at Colossae (Chonae, the present Khonas, on the Lycus). The pagans directed a stream against the sanctuary of St. Michael to destroy it, but the archangel split the rock by lightning to give a new bed to the stream, and sanctified forever the waters which came from the gorge. The Greeks claim that this apparition took place about the middle of the first century and celebrate a feast in commemoration of it on 6 September (Analecta Bolland., VIII, 285-328). Also at Pythia in Bithynia and elsewhere in Asia the hot springs were dedicated to St. Michael.

At Constantinople likewise, St. Michael was the great heavenly physician. His principal sanctuary, the Michaelion, was at Sosthenion, some fifty miles south of Constantinople; there the archangel is said to have appeared to the Emperor Constantine. The sick slept in this church at night to wait for a manifestation of St. Michael; his feast was kept there 9 June. Another famous church was within the walls of the city, at the thermal baths of the Emperor Arcadius; there the synaxis of the archangel was celebrated 8 November. This feast spread over the entire Greek Church, and the SyrianArmenian, and Coptic Churches adopted it also; it is now the principal feast of St. Michael in the Orient. It may have originated in Phrygia, but its station at Constantinople was the Thermae of Arcadius (Martinow, "Annus Graeco-slavicus", 8 Nov.). Other feasts of St. Michael at Constantinople were: 27 October, in the "Promotu" church; 18 June, in the Church of St. Julian at the Forum; and 10 December, at Athaea.

The Christians of Egypt placed their life-giving river, the Nile, under the protection of St. Michael; they adopted the Greek feast and kept it 12 November; on the twelfth of every month they celebrate a special commemoration of the archangel, but 12 June, when the river commences to rise, they keep as a holiday of obligation the feast of St. Michael "for the rising of the Nile", euche eis ten symmetron anabasin ton potamion hydaton.

At Rome the Leonine Sacramentary (sixth century) has the "Natale Basilicae Angeli via Salaria", 30 September; of the five Masses for the feast three mention St. Michael. The Gelasian Sacramentary (seventh century) gives the feast "S. Michaelis Archangeli", and the Gregorian Sacramentary (eighth century), "Dedicatio Basilionis S. Angeli Michaelis", 29 Sept. A manuscript also here adds "via Salaria" (Ebner, "Miss. Rom. Iter Italicum", 127). This church of the Via Salaria was six miles to the north of the city; in the ninth century it was called Basilica Archangeli in Septimo (Armellini, "Chiese di Roma", p. 85). It disappeared a thousand years ago. At Rome also the part of heavenly physician was given to St. Michael. According to an (apocryphal?) legend of the tenth century he appeared over the Moles Hadriani (Castel di S. Angelo), in 950, during the procession which St. Gregory held against the pestilence, putting an end to the plague. Boniface IV (608-15) built on the Moles Hadriani in honour of him, a church, which was styled St. Michaelis inter nubes (in summitate circi).

Well known is the apparition of St. Michael (a. 494 or 530-40), as related in the Roman Breviary, 8 May, at his renowned sanctuary on Monte Gargano, where his original glory as patron in war was restored to him. To his intercession the Lombards of Sipontum (Manfredonia) attributed their victory over the Greek Neapolitans, 8 May, 663. In commemoration of this victory the church of Sipontum instituted a special feast in honour of the archangel, on 8 May, which has spread over the entire Latin Church and is now called (since the time of Pius V) "Apparitio S. Michaelis", although it originally did not commemorate the apparition, but the victory.

In Normandy St. Michael is the patron of mariners in his famous sanctuary at Mont-Saint-Michel in the Diocese of Coutances. He is said to have appeared there, in 708, to St. Aubert, Bishop of Avranches. In Normandy his feast "S. Michaelis in periculo maris" or "in Monte Tumba" was universally celebrated on 18 Oct., the anniversary of the dedication of the first church, 16 Oct., 710; the feast is now confined to the Diocese of Coutances. In Germany, after its evangelization, St. Michael replaced for the Christians the pagan god Wotan, to whom many mountains were sacred, hence the numerous mountain chapels of St. Michael all over Germany.

The hymns of the Roman Office are said to have been composed by St. Rabanus Maurus of Fulda (d. 856). In art St. Michael is represented as an angelic warrior, fully armed with helmet, sword, and shield (often the shield bears the Latin inscription: Quis ut Deus), standing over the dragon, whom he sometimes pierces with a lance. He also holds a pair of scales in which he weighs the souls of the departed (cf. Rock, "The Church of Our Fathers", III, 160), or the book of life, to show that he takes part in the judgment. His feast (29 September) in the Middle Ages was celebrated as a holy day of obligation, but along with several other feasts it was gradually abolished since the eighteenth century (see FEASTS). Michaelmas Day, in England and other countries, is one of the regular quarter-days for settling rents and accounts; but it is no longer remarkable for the hospitality with which it was formerly celebrated. Stubble-geese being esteemed in perfection about this time, most families had one dressed on Michaelmas Day. In some parishes (Isle of Skye) they had a procession on this day and baked a cake, called St. Michael's bannock.

Holweck, Frederick. "St. Michael the Archangel." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 10. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911. 29 Sept. 2016 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10275b.htm>.

Transcription. This article was transcribed for New Advent by Sean Hyland. Image scanned by Wm Stuart French Jr.

Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil Obstat. October 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.

Copyright © 2020 by Kevin Knight. Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

SOURCE : http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10275b.htm

Angels

 (Latin angelus; Greek aggelos; from the Hebrew for "one going" or "one sent"; messenger). The word is used in Hebrew to denote indifferently either a divine or human messenger. The Septuagint renders it by aggelos which also has both significations. The Latin version, however, distinguishes the divine or spirit-messenger from the human, rendering the original in the one case by angelus and in the other by legatus or more generally by nuntius. In a few passages the Latin version is misleading, the word angelus being used where nuntius would have better expressed the meaning, e.g. Isaiah 18:233:3-6.

It is with the spirit-messenger alone that we are here concerned. We have to discuss

the meaning of the term in the Bible,

the offices of the angels,

the names assigned to the angels,

the distinction between good and evil spirits,

the divisions of the angelic choirs,

the question of angelic appearances, and

the development of the scriptural idea of angels.

The angels are represented throughout the Bible as a body of spiritual beings intermediate between God and men: "You have made him (man) a little less than the angels" (Psalm 8:6). They, equally with man, are created beings; "praise ye Him, all His angels: praise ye Him, all His hosts . . . for He spoke and they were made. He commanded and they were created" (Psalm 148:2-5Colossians 1:16-17). That the angels were created was laid down in the Fourth Lateran Council (1215). The decree "Firmiter" against the Albigenses declared both the fact that they were created and that men were created after them. This decree was repeated by the Vatican Council, "Dei Filius". We mention it here because the words: "He that liveth for ever created all things together" (Ecclesiasticus 18:1) have been held to prove a simultaneous creation of all things; but it is generally conceded that "together" (simul) may here mean "equally", in the sense that all things were "alike" created. They are spirits; the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews says: "Are they not all ministering spirits, sent to minister to them who shall receive the inheritance of salvation?" (Hebrews 1:14).

Attendants at God's throne

It is as messengers that they most often figure in the Bible, but, as St. Augustine, and after him St. Gregory, expresses it: angelus est nomen officii ("angel is the name of the office") and expresses neither their essential nature nor their essential function, viz.: that of attendants upon God's throne in that court of heaven of which Daniel has left us a vivid picture:

I behold till thrones were placed, and the Ancient of Days sat: His garment was white as snow, and the hair of His head like clean wool: His throne like flames of fire: the wheels of it like a burning fire. A swift stream of fire issued forth from before Him: thousands of thousands ministered to Him, and ten thousand times a hundred thousand stood before Him: the judgment sat and the books were opened. (Daniel 7:9-10; cf. also Psalm 96:7Psalm 102:20Isaiah 6, etc.)

This function of the angelic host is expressed by the word "assistance" (Job 1:62:1), and our Lord refers to it as their perpetual occupation (Matthew 18:10). More than once we are told of seven angels whose special function it is thus to "stand before God's throne" (Tobit 12:15Revelation 8:2-5). The same thought may be intended by "the angel of His presence" (Isaiah 63:9) an expression which also occurs in the pseudo-epigraphical "Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs".

God's messengers to mankind

But these glimpses of life beyond the veil are only occasional. The angels of the Bible generally appear in the role of God's messengers to mankind. They are His instruments by whom He communicates His will to men, and in Jacob's vision they are depicted as ascending and descending the ladder which stretches from earth to heaven while the Eternal Father gazes upon the wanderer below. It was an angel who found Agar in the wilderness (Genesis 16); angels drew Lot out of Sodom; an angel announces to Gideon that he is to save his people; an angel foretells the birth of Samson (Judges 13), and the angel Gabriel instructs Daniel (Daniel 8:16), though he is not called an angel in either of these passages, but "the man Gabriel" (9:21). The same heavenly spirit announced the birth of St. John the Baptist and the Incarnation of the Redeemer, while tradition ascribes to him both the message to the shepherds (Luke 2:9), and the most glorious mission of all, that of strengthening the King of Angels in His Agony (Luke 22:43). The spiritual nature of the angels is manifested very clearly in the account which Zacharias gives of the revelations bestowed upon him by the ministry of an angel. The prophet depicts the angel as speaking "in him". He seems to imply that he was conscious of an interior voice which was not that of God but of His messenger. The Massoretic text, the Septuagint, and the Vulgate all agree in thus describing the communications made by the angel to the prophet. It is a pity that the "Revised Version" should, in apparent defiance of the above-named texts, obscure this trait by persistently giving the rendering: "the angel that talked with me: instead of "within me" (cf. Zechariah 1:9-142:34:55:10).

Such appearances of angels generally last only so long as the delivery of their message requires, but frequently their mission is prolonged, and they are represented as the constituted guardians of the nations at some particular crisis, e.g. during the Exodus (Exodus 14:19Baruch 6:6). Similarly it is the common view of the Fathers that by "the prince of the Kingdom of the Persians" (Daniel 10:13-21) we are to understand the angel to whom was entrusted the spiritual care of that kingdom, and we may perhaps see in the "man of Macedonia" who appeared to St. Paul at Troas, the guardian angel of that country (Acts 16:9). The Septuagint (Deuteronomy 32:8), has preserved for us a fragment of information on this head, though it is difficult to gauge its exact meaning: "When the Most High divided the nations, when He scattered the children of Adam, He established the bounds of the nations according to the number of the angels of God". How large a part the ministry of angels played, not merely in Hebrew theology, but in the religious ideas of other nations as well, appears from the expression "like to an angel of God". It is three times used of David (2 Samuel 14:17-2014:27) and once by Achis of Geth (1 Samuel 29:9). It is even applied by Esther to Assuerus (Esther 15:16), and St. Stephen's face is said to have looked "like the face of an angel" as he stood before the Sanhedrin (Acts 6:15).

Personal guardians

Throughout the Bible we find it repeatedly implied that each individual soul has its tutelary angel. Thus Abraham, when sending his steward to seek a wife for Isaac, says: "He will send His angel before thee" (Genesis 24:7). The words of the ninetieth Psalm which the devil quoted to our Lord (Matthew 4:6) are well known, and Judith accounts for her heroic deed by saying: "As the Lord liveth, His angel hath been my keeper" (13:20). These passages and many like them (Genesis 16:6-32Hosea 12:41 Kings 19:5Acts 12:7Psalm 33:8), though they will not of themselves demonstrate the doctrine that every individual has his appointed guardian angel, receive their complement in our Saviour's words: "See that you despise not one of these little ones; for I say to you that their angels in Heaven always see the face of My Father Who is in Heaven" (Matthew 18:10), words which illustrate the remark of St. Augustine: "What lies hidden in the Old Testament, is made manifest in the New". Indeed, the book of Tobias seems intended to teach this truth more than any other, and St. Jerome in his commentary on the above words of our Lord says: "The dignity of a soul is so great, that each has a guardian angel from its birth." The general doctrine that the angels are our appointed guardians is considered to be a point of faith, but that each individual member of the human race has his own individual guardian angel is not of faith (de fide); the view has, however, such strong support from the Doctors of the Church that it would be rash to deny it (cf. St. Jerome, supra). Peter the Lombard (Sentences, lib. II, dist. xi) was inclined to think that one angel had charge of several individual human beingsSt. Bernard's beautiful homilies (11-14) on the ninetieth Psalm breathe the spirit of the Church without however deciding the question. The Bible represents the angels not only as our guardians, but also as actually interceding for us. "The angel Raphael (Tobit 12:12) says: "I offered thy prayer to the Lord" (cf. Job 5:1 (Septuagint), and 33:23 (Vulgate); Apocalypse 8:4). The Catholic cult of the angels is thus thoroughly scriptural. Perhaps the earliest explicit declaration of it is to be found in St. Ambrose's words: "We should pray to the angels who are given to us as guardians" (De Viduis, ix); (cf. St. AugustineReply to Faustus XX.21). An undue cult of angels was reprobated by St. Paul (Colossians 2:18), and that such a tendency long remained in the same district is evidenced by Canon 35 of the Synod of Laodicea.

As divine agents governing the world

The foregoing passages, especially those relating to the angels who have charge of various districts, enable us to understand the practically unanimous view of the Fathers that it is the angels who put into execution God's law regarding the physical world. The Semitic belief in genii and in spirits which cause good or evil is well known, and traces of it are to be found in the Bible. Thus the pestilence which devastated Israel for David's sin in numbering the people is attributed to an angel whom David is said to have actually seen (2 Samuel 24:15-17), and more explicitly, I Par., xxi, 14-18). Even the wind rustling in the tree-tops was regarded as an angel (2 Samuel 5:23-241 Chronicles 14:14, 15). This is more explicitly stated with regard to the pool of Probatica (John 5:1-4), though there is some doubt about the text; in that passage the disturbance of the water is said to be due to the periodic visits of an angel. The Semites clearly felt that all the orderly harmony of the universe, as well as interruptions of that harmony, were due to God as their originator, but were carried out by His ministers. This view is strongly marked in the "Book of Jubilees" where the heavenly host of good and evil angels is ever interfering in the material universeMaimonides (Directorium Perplexorum, iv and vi) is quoted by St. Thomas Aquinas (Summa Theologicæ I.1.3) as holding that the Bible frequently terms the powers of nature angels, since they manifest the omnipotence of God (cf. St. Jerome, In Mich., vi, 1, 2; P.L., iv, col. 1206).

Hierarchical organization

Though the angels who appear in the earlier works of the Old Testament are strangely impersonal and are overshadowed by the importance of the message they bring or the work they do, there are not wanting hints regarding the existence of certain ranks in the heavenly army.

After Adam's fall Paradise is guarded against our First Parents by cherubim who are clearly God's ministers, though nothing is said of their nature. Only once again do the cherubim figure in the Bible, viz., in Ezechiel's marvellous vision, where they are described at great length (Ezekiel 1), and are actually called cherub in Ezechiel 10. The Ark was guarded by two cherubim, but we are left to conjecture what they were like. It has been suggested with great probability that we have their counterpart in the winged bulls and lions guarding the Assyrian palaces, and also in the strange winged men with hawks' heads who are depicted on the walls of some of their buildings. The seraphim appear only in the vision of Isaias 6:6.

Mention has already been made of the mystic seven who stand before God, and we seem to have in them an indication of an inner cordon that surrounds the throne. The term archangel occurs only in St. Jude and 1 Thessalonians 4:15; but St. Paul has furnished us with two other lists of names of the heavenly cohorts. He tells us (Ephesians 1:21) that Christ is raised up "above all principality, and power, and virtue, and dominion"; and, writing to the Colossians (1:16), he says: "In Him were all things created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominations, or principalities or powers." It is to be noted that he uses two of these names of the powers of darkness when (2:15) he talks of Christ as "despoiling the principalities and powers . . . triumphing over them in Himself". And it is not a little remarkable that only two verses later he warns his readers not to be seduced into any "religion of angels". He seems to put his seal upon a certain lawful angelology, and at the same time to warn them against indulging superstition on the subject. We have a hint of such excesses in the Book of Enoch, wherein, as already stated, the angels play a quite disproportionate part. Similarly Josephus tells us (Bel. Jud., II, viii, 7) that the Essenes had to take a vow to preserve the names of the angels.

We have already seen how (Daniel 10:12-21) various districts are allotted to various angels who are termed their princes, and the same feature reappears still more markedly in the Apocalyptic "angels of the seven churches", though it is impossible to decide what is the precise signification of the term. These seven Angels of the Churches are generally regarded as being the Bishops occupying these seesSt. Gregory Nazianzen in his address to the Bishops at Constantinople twice terms them "Angels", in the language of the Apocalypse.

The treatise "De Coelesti Hierarchia", which is ascribed to St. Denis the Areopagite, and which exercised so strong an influence upon the Scholastics, treats at great length of the hierarchies and orders of the angels. It is generally conceded that this work was not due to St. Denis, but must date some centuries later. Though the doctrine it contains regarding the choirs of angels has been received in the Church with extraordinary unanimity, no proposition touching the angelic hierarchies is binding on our faith. The following passages from St. Gregory the Great (Hom. 34, In Evang.) will give us a clear idea of the view of the Church's doctors on the point:

We know on the authority of Scripture that there are nine orders of angels, viz., Angels, Archangels, Virtues, Powers, Principalities, Dominations, Throne, Cherubim and Seraphim. That there are Angels and Archangels nearly every page of the Bible tell us, and the books of the Prophets talk of Cherubim and SeraphimSt. Paul, too, writing to the Ephesians enumerates four orders when he says: 'above all Principality, and Power, and Virtue, and Domination'; and again, writing to the Colossians he says: 'whether Thrones, or Dominations, or Principalities, or Powers'. If we now join these two lists together we have five Orders, and adding Angels and Archangels, Cherubim and Seraphim, we find nine Orders of Angels.

St. Thomas (Summa Theologica I:108), following St. Denis (De Coelesti Hierarchia, vi, vii), divides the angels into three hierarchies each of which contains three orders. Their proximity to the Supreme Being serves as the basis of this division. In the first hierarchy he places the SeraphimCherubim, and Thrones; in the second, the Dominations, Virtues, and Powers; in the third, the Principalities, Archangels, and Angels. The only Scriptural names furnished of individual angels are RaphaelMichael, and Gabriel, names which signify their respective attributes. Apocryphal Jewish books, such as the Book of Enoch, supply those of Uriel and Jeremiel, while many are found in other apocryphal sources, like those Milton names in "Paradise Lost". (On superstitious use of such names, see above).

The number of angels

The number of the angels is frequently stated as prodigious (Daniel 7:10Apocalypse 5:11Psalm 67:18Matthew 26:53). From the use of the word host (sabaoth) as a synonym for the heavenly army it is hard to resist the impression that the term "Lord of Hosts" refers to God's Supreme command of the angelic multitude (cf. Deuteronomy 33:232:43Septuagint). The Fathers see a reference to the relative numbers of men and angels in the parable of the hundred sheep (Luke 15:1-3), though this may seem fanciful. The Scholastics, again, following the treatise "De Coelesti Hierarchia" of St. Denis, regard the preponderance of numbers as a necessary perfection of the angelic host (cf. St. ThomasSumma Theologica I:1:3).

The evil angels

The distinction of good and bad angels constantly appears in the Bible, but it is instructive to note that there is no sign of any dualism or conflict between two equal principles, one good and the other evil. The conflict depicted is rather that waged on earth between the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of the Evil One, but the latter's inferiority is always supposed. The existence, then, of this inferior, and therefore created, spirit, has to be explained.

The gradual development of Hebrew consciousness on this point is very clearly marked in the inspired writings. The account of the fall of our First Parents (Genesis 3) is couched in such terms that it is impossible to see in it anything more than the acknowledgment of the existence of a principle of evil who was jealous of the human race. The statement (Genesis 6:1) that the "sons of God" married the daughters of men is explained of the fall of the angels, in Enoch, vi-xi, and codices, D, E F, and A of the Septuagint read frequently, for "sons of God", oi aggeloi tou theou. Unfortunately, codices B and C are defective in Genesis 6, but it is probably that they, too, read oi aggeloi in this passage, for they constantly so render the expression "sons of God"; cf. Job 1:62:1 and 38:7; but on the other hand, see Psalm 2:1 and 88 (Septuagint). Philo, in commenting on the passage in his treatise "Quod Deus sit immutabilis", i, follows the Septuagint. For Philo's doctrine of Angels, cf. "De Vita Mosis", iii, 2, "De Somniis", VI: "De Incorrupta Manna", i; "De Sacrificis", ii; "De Lege Allegorica", I, 12; III, 73; and for the view of Genesis 6:1, cf. St. JustinFirst Apology 5. It should moreover be noted that the Hebrew word nephilim rendered gigantes, in 6:4, may mean "fallen ones". The Fathers generally refer it to the sons of Seth, the chosen stock. In 1 Samuel 19:9, an evil spirit is said to possess Saul, though this is probably a metaphorical expression; more explicit is 1 Kings 22:19-23, where a spirit is depicted as appearing in the midst of the heavenly army and offering, at the Lord's invitation, to be a lying spirit in the mouth of Achab's false prophets. We might, with Scholastics, explain this is malum poenae, which is actually caused by God owing to man's fault. A truer exegesis would, however, dwell on the purely imaginative tone of the whole episode; it is not so much the mould in which the message is cast as the actual tenor of that message which is meant to occupy our attention.

The picture afforded us in Job 1 and 2 is equally imaginative; but Satan, perhaps the earliest individualization of the fallen Angel, is presented as an intruder who is jealous of Job. He is clearly an inferior being to the Deity and can only touch Job with God's permission. How theologic thought advanced as the sum of revelation grew appears from a comparison of 2 Samuel 24:1, with 1 Chronicles 21:1. Whereas in the former passage David's sin was said to be due to "the wrath of the Lord" which "stirred up David", in the latter we read that "Satan moved David to number Israel". In Job 4:18, we seem to find a definite declaration of the fall: "In His angels He found wickedness." The Septuagint of Job contains some instructive passages regarding avenging angels in whom we are perhaps to see fallen spirits, thus 33:23: "If a thousand death-dealing angels should be (against him) not one of them shall wound him"; and 36:14: "If their souls should perish in their youth (through rashness) yet their life shall be wounded by the angels"; and 20:15: "The riches unjustly accumulated shall be vomited up, an angel shall drag him out of his house;" cf. Proverbs 17:11Psalm 34:5-6 and 77:49, and especially Ecclesiasticus 39:33, a text which, as far as can be gathered from the present state of the manuscript, was in the Hebrew original. In some of these passages, it is true, the angels may be regarded as avengers of God's justice without therefore being evil spirits. In Zechariah 3:1-3, Satan is called the adversary who pleads before the Lord against Jesus the High PriestIsaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 are for the Fathers the loci classici regarding the fall of Satan (cf. TertullianAgainst Marcion 2.10); and Our Lord Himself has given colour to this view by using the imagery of the latter passage when saying to His Apostles: "I saw Satan like lightning falling from heaven" (Luke 10:18).

In New Testament times the idea of the two spiritual kingdoms is clearly established. The devil is a fallen angel who in his fall has drawn multitudes of the heavenly host in his train. Our Lord terms him "the Prince of this world" (John 14:30); he is the tempter of the human race and tries to involve them in his fall (Matthew 25:412 Peter 2:4Ephesians 6:122 Corinthians 11:1412:7). Christian imagery of the devil as the dragon is mainly derived from the Apocalypse (9:11-15 and 12:7-9), where he is termed "the angel of the bottomless pit", "the dragon", "the old serpent", etc., and is represented as having actually been in combat with Archangel Michael. The similarity between scenes such as these and the early Babylonian accounts of the struggle between Merodach and the dragon Tiamat is very striking. Whether we are to trace its origin to vague reminiscences of the mighty saurians which once people the earth is a moot question, but the curious reader may consult Bousett, "The Anti-Christ Legend" (tr. by Keane, London, 1896). The translator has prefixed to it an interesting discussion on the origin of the Babylonian Dragon-Myth.

The term "angel" in the Septuagint

We have had occasion to mention the Septuagint version more than once, and it may not be amiss to indicate a few passages where it is our only source of information regarding the angels. The best known passage is Isaiah 9:6, where the Septuagint gives the name of the Messias, as "the Angel of great Counsel". We have already drawn attention to Job 20:15, where the Septuagint reads "Angel" instead of "God", and to 36:14, where there seems to be question of evil angels. In 9:7Septuagint (B) adds: "He is the Hebrew (5:19) say of "Behemoth": "He is the beginning of the ways of God, he that made him shall make his sword to approach him", the Septuagint reads: "He is the beginning of God's creation, made for His Angels to mock at", and exactly the same remark is made about "Leviathan" (41:24). We have already seen that the Septuagint generally renders the term "sons of God" by "angels", but in Deuteronomy 32:43, the Septuagint has an addition in which both terms appear: "Rejoice in Him all ye heavens, and adore Him all ye angels of God; rejoice ye nations with His people, and magnify Him all ye Sons of God." Nor does the Septuagint merely give us these additional references to angels; it sometimes enables us to correct difficult passages concerning them in the Vulgate and Massoretic text. Thus the difficult Elim of MT in Job 41:17, which the Vulgate renders by "angels", becomes "wild beasts" in the Septuagint version.

The early ideas as to the personality of the various angelic appearances are, as we have seen, remarkably vague. At first the angels are regarded in quite an impersonal way (Genesis 16:7). They are God's vice-regents and are often identified with the Author of their message (Genesis 48:15-16). But while we read of "the Angels of God" meeting Jacob (Genesis 32:1) we at other times read of one who is termed "the Angel of God" par excellence, e.g. Genesis 31:11. It is true that, owing to the Hebrew idiom, this may mean no more than "an angel of God", and the Septuagint renders it with or without the article at will; yet the three visitors at Mambre seem to have been of different ranks, though St. Paul (Hebrews 13:2) regarded them all as equally angels; as the story in Genesis 13 develops, the speaker is always "the Lord". Thus in the account of the Angel of the Lord who visited Gideon (Judges 6), the visitor is alternately spoken of as "the Angel of the Lord" and as "the Lord". Similarly, in Judges 13, the Angel of the Lord appears, and both Manue and his wife exclaim: "We shall certainly die because we have seen God." This want of clearness is particularly apparent in the various accounts of the Angel of Exodus. In Judges 6, just now referred to, the Septuagint is very careful to render the Hebrew "Lord" by "the Angel of the Lord"; but in the story of the Exodus it is the Lord who goes before them in the pillar of a cloud (Exodus 13:21), and the Septuagint makes no change (cf. also Numbers 14:14, and Nehemiah 9:7-20. Yet in Exodus 14:19, their guide is termed "the Angel of God". When we turn to Exodus 33, where God is angry with His people for worshipping the golden calf, it is hard not to feel that it is God Himself who has hitherto been their guide, but who now refuses to accompany them any longer. God offers an angel instead, but at Moses's petition He says (14) "My face shall go before thee", which the Septuagint reads by autos though the following verse shows that this rendering is clearly impossible, for Moses objects: "If Thou Thyself dost not go before us, bring us not out of this place." But what does God mean by "my face"? Is it possible that some angel of specially high rank is intended, as in Isaiah 63:9 (cf. Tobit 12:15)? May not this be what is meant by "the angel of God" (cf. Numbers 20:16)?

That a process of evolution in theological thought accompanied the gradual unfolding of God's revelation need hardly be said, but it is especially marked in the various views entertained regarding the person of the Giver of the Law. The Massoretic text as well as the Vulgate of Exodus 3 and 19-20 clearly represent the Supreme Being as appearing to Moses in the bush and on Mount Sinai; but the Septuagint version, while agreeing that it was God Himself who gave the Law, yet makes it "the angel of the Lord" who appeared in the bush. By New Testament times the Septuagint view has prevailed, and it is now not merely in the bush that the angel of the Lord, and not God Himself appears, but the angel is also the Giver of the Law (cf. Galatians 3:19Hebrews 2:2Acts 7:30). The person of "the angel of the Lord" finds a counterpart in the personification of Wisdom in the Sapiential books and in at least one passage (Zechariah 3:1) it seems to stand for that "Son of Man" whom Daniel (7:13) saw brought before "the Ancient of Days"Zacharias says: "And the Lord showed me Jesus the high priest standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan stood on His right hand to be His adversary". Tertullian regards many of these passages as preludes to the Incarnation; as the Word of God adumbrating the sublime character in which He is one day to reveal Himself to men (cf. Against Praxeas 16Against Marcion 2.273.91.101.21-22). It is possible, then, that in these confused views we can trace vague gropings after certain dogmatic truths regarding the Trinity, reminiscences perhaps of the early revelation of which the Protevangelium in Genesis 3 is but a relic. The earlier Fathers, going by the letter of the text, maintained that it was actually God Himself who appeared. He who appeared was called God and acted as God. It was not unnatural then for Tertullian, as we have already seen, to regard such manifestations in the light of preludes to the Incarnation, and most of the Eastern Fathers followed the same line of thought. It was held as recently as 1851 by Vandenbroeck, "Dissertatio Theologica de Theophaniis sub Veteri Testamento" (Louvain).

But the great Latins, St. JeromeSt. Augustine, and St. Gregory the Great, held the opposite view, and the Scholastics as a body followed them. St. Augustine (Sermo vii, de Scripturis, P.G. V) when treating of the burning bush (Exodus 3) says: "That the same person who spoke to Moses should be deemed both the Lord and an angel of the Lord, is very hard to understand. It is a question which forbids any rash assertions but rather demands careful investigation . . . Some maintain that he is called both the Lord and the angel of the Lord because he was Christ, indeed the prophet (Isaiah 9:6Septuagint Version) clearly styles Christ the 'Angel of great Counsel.'" The saint proceeds to show that such a view is tenable though we must be careful not to fall into Arianism in stating it. He points out, however, that if we hold that it was an angel who appeared, we must explain how he came to be called "the Lord," and he proceeds to show how this might be: "Elsewhere in the Bible when a prophet speaks it is yet said to be the Lord who speaks, not of course because the prophet is the Lord but because the Lord is in the prophet; and so in the same way when the Lord condescends to speak through the mouth of a prophet or an angel, it is the same as when he speaks by a prophet or apostle, and the angel is correctly termed an angel if we consider him himself, but equally correctly is he termed 'the Lord' because God dwells in him." He concludes: "It is the name of the indweller, not of the temple." And a little further on: "It seems to me that we shall most correctly say that our forefathers recognized the Lord in the angel," and he adduces the authority of the New Testament writers who clearly so understood it and yet sometimes allowed the same confusion of terms (cf. Hebrews 2:2, and Acts 7:31-33).

The saint discusses the same question even more elaborately, "In Heptateuchum," lib. vii, 54, P.G. III, 558. As an instance of how convinced some of the Fathers were in holding the opposite view, we may note Theodoret's words (In Exod.): "The whole passage (Exodus 3) shows that it was God who appeared to him. But (Moses) called Him an angel in order to let us know that it was not God the Father whom he saw — for whose angel could the Father be? — but the Only-begotten Son, the Angel of great Counsel" (cf. Eusebius, Church History I.2.7St. IrenaeusAgainst Heresies 3:6). But the view propounded by the Latin Fathers was destined to live in the Church, and the Scholastics reduced it to a system (cf. St. Thomas, Quaest., Disp., De Potentia, vi, 8, ad 3am); and for a very good exposition of both sides of the question, cf. "Revue biblique," 1894, 232-247.

Angels in Babylonian literature

The Bible has shown us that a belief in angels, or spirits intermediate between God and man, is a characteristic of the Semitic people. It is therefore interesting to trace this belief in the Semites of Babylonia. According to Sayce (The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia, Gifford Lectures, 1901), the engrafting of Semitic beliefs on the earliest Sumerian religion of Babylonia is marked by the entrance of angels or sukallin in their theosophy. Thus we find an interesting parallel to "the angels of the Lord" in Nebo, "the minister of Merodach" (ibid., 355). He is also termed the "angel" or interpreter of the will or Merodach (ibid., 456), and Sayce accepts Hommel's statement that it can be shown from the Minean inscriptions that primitive Semitic religion consisted of moon and star worship, the moon-god Athtar and an "angel" god standing at the head of the pantheon (ibid., 315). The Biblical conflict between the kingdoms of good and evil finds its parallel in the "spirits of heaven" or the Igigi--who constituted the "host" of which Ninip was the champion (and from who he received the title of "chief of the angels") and the "spirits of the earth", or Annuna-Ki, who dwelt in Hades (ibid. 355). The Babylonian sukalli corresponded to the spirit-messengers of the Bible; they declared their Lord's will and executed his behests (ibid., 361). Some of them appear to have been more than messengers; they were the interpreters and vicegerents of the supreme deity, thus Nebo is "the prophet of Borsippa". These angels are even termed "the sons" of the deity whose vicegerents they are; thus Ninip, at one time the messenger of En-lil, is transformed into his son just as Merodach becomes the son of Ea (ibid., 496). The Babylonian accounts of the Creation and the Flood do not contrast very favourably with the Biblical accounts, and the same must be said of the chaotic hierarchies of gods and angels which modern research has revealed. perhaps we are justified in seeing all forms of religion vestiges of a primitive nature-worship which has at times succeeded in debasing the purer revelation, and which, where that primitive revelation has not received successive increments as among the Hebrews, results in an abundant crop of weeds.

Thus the Bible certainly sanctions the idea of certain angels being in charge of special districts (cf. Daniel 10, and above). This belief persists in a debased form in the Arab notion of Genii, or Jinns, who haunt particular spots. A reference to it is perhaps to be found in Genesis 32:1-2: "Jacob also went on the journey he had begun: and the angels of God met him: And when he saw then he said: These are the camps of God, and he called the name of that place Mahanaim, that is, 'Camps.'" Recent explorations in the Arab district about Petra have revealed certain precincts marked off with stones as the abiding-laces of angels, and the nomad tribes frequent them for prayer and sacrifice. These places bear a name which corresponds exactly with the "Mahanaim" of the above passage in Genesis (cf. Lagrange, Religions Semitques, 184, and Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, 445). Jacob's vision at Bethel (Genesis 28:12) may perhaps come under the same category. Suffice it to say that not everything in the Bible is revelation, and that the object of the inspired writings is not merely to tell us new truths but also to make clearer certain truths taught us by nature. The modern view, which tends to regard everything Babylonian as absolutely primitive and which seems to think that because critics affix a late date to the Biblical writings the religion therein contained must also be late, may be seen in Haag, "Theologie Biblique" (339). This writer sees in the Biblical angels only primitive deities debased into demi-gods by the triumphant progress of Monotheism.

Angels in the Zend-Avesta

Attempts have also been made to trace a connection between the angels of the Bible and the "great archangels" or "Amesha-Spentas" of the Zend-Avesta. That the Persian domination and the Babylonian captivity exerted a large influence upon the Hebrew conception of the angels is acknowledged in the Talmud of Jerusalem, Rosch Haschanna, 56, where it is said that the names of the angels were introduced from Babylon. It is, however, by no means clear that the angelic beings who figure so largely in the pages of the Avesta are to be referred to the older Persian Neo-Zoroastrianism of the Sassanides. If this be the case, as Darmesteter holds, we should rather reverse the position and attribute the Zoroastrian angels to the influence of the Bible and of Philo. Stress has been laid upon the similarity between the Biblical "seven who stand before God" and the seven Amesha-Spentas of the Zend-Avesta. But it must be noted that these latter are really six, the number seven is only obtained by counting "their father, Ahura-Mazda," among them as their chief. Moreover, these Zoroastrian archangels are more abstract than concrete; they are not individuals charged with weighty missions as in the Bible.

Angels in the New Testament

Hitherto we have dwelt almost exclusively on the angels of the Old Testament, whose visits and messages have been by no means rare; but when we come to the New Testament their name appears on every page and the number of references to them equals those in the Old Dispensation. It is their privilege to announce to Zachary and Mary the dawn of Redemption, and to the shepherds its actual accomplishment. Our Lord in His discourses talks of them as one who actually saw them, and who, whilst "conversing amongst men", was yet receiving the silent unseen adoration of the hosts of heaven. He describes their life in heaven (Matthew 22:30Luke 20:36); He tell us how they form a bodyguard round Him and at a word from Him would avenge Him on His enemies (Matthew 26:53); it is the privilege of one of them to assist Him in His Agony and sweat of Blood. More than once He speaks of them as auxiliaries and witnesses at the final judgment (Matthew 16:27), which indeed they will prepare (13:39-49); and lastly, they are the joyous witnesses of His triumphant Resurrection (28:2).

It is easy for skeptical minds to see in these angelic hosts the mere play of Hebrew fancy and the rank growth of superstition, but do not the records of the angels who figure in the Bible supply a most natural and harmonious progression? In the opening page of the sacred story the Jewish nation is chosen out from amongst others as the depositary of God's promise; as the people from whose stock He would one day raise up a Redeemer. The angels appear in the course of this chosen people's history, now as God's messengers, now as that people's guides; at one time they are the bestowers of God's law, at another they actually prefigure the Redeemer Whose divine purpose they are helping to mature. They converse with His prophets, with David and Elias, with Daniel and Zacharias; they slay the hosts camped against Israel, they serve as guides to God's servants, and the last prophet, Malachi, bears a name of peculiar significance; "the Angel of Jehovah." He seems to sum up in his very name the previous "ministry by the hands of angels", as though God would thus recall the old-time glories of the Exodus and Sinai. The Septuagint, indeed, seems not to know his name as that of an individual prophet and its rendering of the opening verse of his prophecy is peculiarly solemn: "The burden of the Word of the Lord of Israel by the hand of His angel; lay it up in your hearts." All this loving ministry on the part of the angels is solely for the sake of the Saviour, on Whose face they desire to look. Hence when the fullness of time was arrived it is they who bring the glad message, and sing "Gloria in excelsis Deo". They guide the newborn King of Angels in His hurried flight into Egypt, and minister to Him in the desert. His second coming and the dire events that must precede that, are revealed to His chosen servant in the island of Patmos, It is a question of revelation again, and consequently its ministers and messengers of old appear once more in the sacred story and the record of God's revealing love ends fittingly almost as it had begun: "I, Jesus, have sent My angel to testify to you these things in the churches" (Revelation 22:16). It is easy for the student to trace the influence of surrounding nations and of other religions in the Biblical account of the angels. Indeed it is needful and instructive to do so, but it would be wrong to shut our eyes to the higher line of development which we have shown and which brings out so strikingly the marvellous unity and harmony of the whole divine story of the Bible. (See also ANGELS IN EARLY CHRISTIAN ART.)

Sources

In addition to works mentioned above, see St. Thomas, Summa Theol., I, QQ. 50-54 and 106-114; Suarez De Angelis, lib. i-iv.

Pope, Hugh. "Angels." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 1. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1907. 29 Sept. 2020 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01476d.htm>.

Transcription. This article was transcribed for New Advent by Jim Holden.

Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil Obstat. March 1, 1907. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York.

Copyright © 2020 by Kevin Knight. Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

SOURCE : https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01476d.htm

St. Michael, St. Gabriel, & St. Raphael – The Archangels

Angels—messengers from God—appear frequently in Scripture, but only Michael, Gabriel and Raphael are named. The memorials of Gabriel (March 24) and Raphael (October 24) were added to the Roman calendar in 1921. The 1970 revision of the calendar joined their feasts to Michael’s.

Michael (meaning: Who Is Like To God?)

The name Michael signifies “Who is like to God?” and was the war cry of the God’s angels in the battle fought in heaven against satan and his followers. Holy Scripture describes Michael as one of the chief princes, and leader of the forces of heaven in their triumph over the powers of hell. He has been especially honoured and invoked as patron and protector by the Church from the time of the earliest Christians. Although he is called “the Archangel,” the Greek Fathers and many others place him over all the angels – as Prince of the Seraphim. Michael is the patron of grocers, mariners, paratroopers, police and sickness.

Michael’s name is recorded four times in Scripture:

• Daniel 10:13. Gabriel says to Daniel, when he asks God to permit the Jews to return to Jerusalem: “The Angel of the kingdom of the Persians resisted me . . . and, behold Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me . . . and none is my helper in all these things, but Michael your prince”;

• Daniel 12, the Angel speaking of the end of the world and the Antichrist says: At that time shall Michael rise up, the great prince, who standeth for the children of thy people.

• The Epistle of St. Jude: When Michael the Archangel, disputing with the devil, contended about the body of Moses, St Jude alludes to an ancient Jewish tradition of a dispute between Michael and Satan over the body of Moses, an account of which is also found in the apocryphal book on the assumption of Moses (Origen, “De principiis”). St. Michael concealed the tomb of Moses; Satan, however, by disclosing it, tried to seduce the Jewish people to the sin of hero-worship. Michael also guards the body of Eve, according to the “Revelation of Moses”.

• Revelation 12:7, And there was a great battle in heaven, Michael and his angels fought with the dragon. St. John speaks of the great war at the end of time, which reflects also the battle in heaven at the beginning of time. According to the Fathers there is often question of St. Michael in Scripture where his name is not mentioned. They say he was the cherub who stood at the gate of paradise, “to keep the way of the tree of life” (Genesis iii, 24), the angel through whom God published the Decalogue to his chosen people, the angel who stood in the way against Balaam (Numbers 22:22), the angel who routed the army of Sennacherib (2 Kings 19:35).

Following these Scriptural passages, Christian tradition gives Michael four offices.

• To fight against Satan

• To rescue the souls of the faithful from the power of the enemy, especially at the hour of death.

• To be the champion of God’s people, the Jews in the Old Law, the Christians in the New Testament; therefore he was the patron of the Church, and of the orders of knights during the Middle Ages

• To call away from earth and bring men’s souls to judgment

Regarding his rank in the celestial hierarchy opinions vary; St. Basil and other Greek Fathers place Michael over all the angels, saying he is called archangel because he is the prince of the other angels. others believe he is the Prince of the Seraphim, the first of the nine angelic orders. But, according to Aquinas he is the prince of the last and lowest choir, the angels. The hymn of the Mozarabic Breviary places St. Michael even above the Twenty-four Elders.

Its natural to Michael the champion of the Jewish people, to be the champion also of Christians, giving victory in war to those who invoke him. The early Christians regarded some of the martyrs as their military patrons: Sts. George, Theodore, Demetrius, Sergius, etc.

In art Michael is represented as an angelic warrior, fully armed with helmet, sword, and shield (often the shield bears the Latin inscription: Quis ut Deus), standing over the dragon, whom he sometimes pierces with a lance. He also holds a pair of scales in which he weighs the souls of the departed, or the book of life to show that he takes part in the judgment. In the middle ages, his feast (29 September) was celebrated as a holy day of obligation, but along with several other feasts it was gradually abolished since the eighteenth century. Michaelmas Day, in England and other countries, is one of the regular quarter-days for settling rents and accounts; but it is no longer remarkable for the hospitality with which it was formerly celebrated.

Gabriel (meaning: The Power of God)

One of the three archangels mentioned in the Bible, only four appearances of Gabriel are recorded:

• Daniel viii, he explains the vision of the horned ram as portending the destruction of the Persian Empire by the Macedonian Alexander the Great, after whose death the kingdom will be divided up among his generals, from one of whom will spring Antiochus Epiphanes.

• In Chapter ix, after Daniel had prayed for Israel, we read that the man Gabriel . . . . flying swiftly touched me, and he communicated to him the mysterious prophecy of the “seventy weeks” of years which should elapse before the coming of Christ. In Chapter x, it is not clear whether the angel is Gabriel or not, but at any rate we may apply to him the marvellous description in verses 5 and 6.

• He foretells to Zachary the birth of the Precursor (Luke 1 v8ff)

• At the Annunciation – to Mary (Luke 1:26)

He is the angel of the Incarnation and of Consolation, and so in Christian tradition Gabriel is ever the angel of mercy. At the same time Gabriel is, as his name suggests, the angel of the Power or strength of God, and it is worth while noting the frequency with which such words as “great”, “might”, “power”, and “strength” occur in the passages referred to above. The Jews indeed seem to have dwelt particularly upon this feature in Gabriel’s character, regarding him as the angel of judgment. Thus they attribute to Gabriel the destruction of Sodom and of the host of Sennacherib, though they also regard him as the angel who buried Moses, and as the one deputed to mark the figure Tau on the foreheads of the elect (Ezech., 4). In later Jewish literature the names of angels were considered to have a peculiar efficacy, and the British Museum possesses some bowls inscribed with Hebrew, Aramaic, and Syriac incantations in which the names of Michael, Raphael, and Gabriel occur. These bowls were found at Hillah, the site of Babylon. In apocryphal Christian literature the same names occur, cf. Enoch, ix, and the Apocalypse of the Blessed Virgin.

Gabriel is mentioned only twice in the New Testament, but it is not unreasonable to suppose with Christian tradition that it is he who appeared to Joseph and to the shepherds, and also that it was Gabriel who strengthened Jesus in the garden.

Gabriel is generally termed only an archangel, but the expression used by Raphael, I am the angel Raphael, one of the seven, who stand before the Lord (Tobit xii, 15), and Gabriel’s own words, I am Gabriel, who stand before God (Luke 1, 19), have led some to think that these angels must belong to the highest rank. This is generally thought to mean their rank as the highest of God’s messengers, and not as placing them among the Seraphim and Cherubim.

Raphael (meaning: God has healed)

Raphael’s name doesn’t appear in the Hebrew Scriptures, and in the Septuagint only in the Book of Tobias. Here he first appears disguised in human form as the travelling companion of the younger Tobias, calling himself Azarias the son of the great Ananias. The story of the adventurous journey during which the protective influence of the angel is shown in many ways including the binding “in the desert of upper Egypt”, of the demon who had previously slain seven husbands of Sara, daughter of Raguel, is graphically related in Tobit 5-11. After the return and the healing of the blindness of the elder Tobias, Azarias makes himself known as the angel Raphael, one of the seven, who stand before the Lord (Tobit xii, 15. Cf. Apoc., viii, 2). Of these seven archangels who appear in the angelology of post-Exilic Judaism, only three, Gabriel, Michael and Raphael, are mentioned in the canonical Scriptures. The others, according to the Book of Enoch (cf. xxi) are Uriel, Raguel, Sariel, and Jerahmeel, while from other apocryphal sources we get the variant names Izidkiel, Hanael, and Kepharel instead of the last three in the other list.

Regarding the functions attributed to Raphael we have little more than his declaration to Tobias (Tobit 12) that when the latter was occupied in his works of mercy and charity, Raphael offered his prayer to the Lord, that he was sent by the Lord to heal him of his blindness and to deliver Sara, his son’s wife, from the devil.

The Jewish category of the archangels is recognized in the New Testament (I Thess., iv, 16; Jude, 9), but only Gabriel and Michael are mentioned by name. Many scholars however, identify Raphael with the “angel of the Lord” mentioned in John 5. This assumption is based both on the significance of the name, and on the healing role attributed to Raphael in the Book of Tobias.

It is widely thought that Raphael is the angel in John 5:1-4, at the pool called Bethzatha, where the multitude of the infirm lay awaiting the moving of the water. The blind, the lame and the paralyzed were waiting for an angel of the Lord who, descended at certain times into the pond; and the water was moved. And he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water was made whole of whatsoever infirmity he lay under.

SOURCE : http://www.ucatholic.com/saints/the-archangels/

Weninger’s Lives of the Saints – The Feast of the Dedication of the Archangel Saint Michael

Article

Today’s festival is called in the breviary of the Church, the Dedication of the Holy Archangel Saint Michael. To understand this, it is necessary to know an event which took place at the time of Pope Gelasius I in the latter part of the fifth Century. In Apulia, there is a mountain formerly called Gargano, now Monte Saint Angelo, or Angel’s mountain. Near this mountain, a herdsman was keeping his cattle. A steer strayed away from his herd and went into the woods on the mountain, to the entrance of a cave which was concealed by bushes. The herdsman, to drive the animal out of the cave back to the herd, shot an arrow at it. The arrow, however, turned and flew with great force back to him. The herdsman and those who were present were terrified at this and none dared to go nearer to the cave. They went to the bishop, who was at Siponto, a neighboring city, and informed him of what had occurred. The bishop, not doubting that a divine mystery was concealed under it, ordered his congregation to fast and pray three days, in order that God might graciously reveal it to them. At the expiration of the three days, Saint Michael, the Archangel, appeared to the bishop and announced to him that the place whither the steer had fled was under his especial protection, and that he desired that they should dedicate the spot to the honor of God, and to the memory of Saint Michael and all the Angels.

The bishop, greatly rejoiced, called the clergy and the people together, and having informed them of the revelation, formed a large procession and ascended the mountain. They found a large cave which was like a Church hewn out of the rock. Above the entrance was an opening by which the whole interior received light. To offer the holy sacrifice of the Mass in it, only the altar was wanting; but it was speedily erected by the pious bishop. The Church itself was soon after dedicated with great solemnity to Saint Michael and all holy Angels. The fame of this event spread in a short time all around and drew a great many pilgrims to the Church, while the many miracles that took place there, were a visible sign that the veneration and invocation of Saint Michael and the other holy angels must be very agreeable to the Most High. Today’s festival was instituted to commemorate the dedication of the Church on Mount Gargano, hence it is called the dedication of Saint Michael, as he is especially venerated in that Church. The commemoration of the apparition of this holy Archangel on Mount Gargano is celebrated on May 8th. Besides this, other apparitions of Saint Michael are recorded, which gave occasion, at different times, to the erection of splendid Churches in his honor, at Constantinople, at Rome and in France, as is to be read in the history of the Church. Experience has taught that this considerably increased the veneration of this great prince of heaven, and in truth we have most important reasons to show him especial honor; for, he is the head, or, as the Church expresses it, the prince of the heavenly legions. He is the first of those happy spirits who are continually in the presence of God, standing before His throne. It was he who, at the first moment of his existence, turned to the Almighty and submitted to Him in perfect obedience. It was he, who, so to say, first took up arms against the proud Lucifer, who would not be subject, but equal to the Most High. His humility, obedience and zeal for the honor of God raised him above all in heaven; as pride, disobedience and perfidy abased the proud Lucifer and precipitated him into hell. Saint Michael has been chosen by the Almighty as the protector of the Church of Christ, as in the old Covenant he was the protector of the Synagogue. He was, in olden times, solicitous for the welfare of the true believers in the Synagogue, as is evident from the words spoken by the holy Archangel, Saint Gabriel, to the prophet Daniel: “Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me” (Daniel 10). The angel, under whose protection the Persians were placed, desired that the Israelites should remain longer in Persia, as many Persians came to the knowledge of the true God by associating with the chosen people. The holy Archangel Gabriel, however, desired that the Israelites should be released out of Persia, because he feared that too great intimacy with the Persians might induce them to become faithless to the true God. Saint Michael united his prayers with those of Saint Gabriel, and thus evinced his care for the true believers. Not less watchful is he now for the faithful of the New Testament and for the entire Church.’ He comes to help her, prays for her and protects her against her enemies. At the end of the world, he will manifest his protection of her, especially against the Antichrist, the greatest enemy of the Christians, as Saint Gabriel revealed to the holy prophet Daniel, saying: “But at that time, Michael shall rise up, the great prince, who stands for the children of thy people” (Daniel 12). This holy Archangel is also appointed to bring the souls of men to the throne of the Most High, that they may receive their judgment; and that their sentence may be favorable, he strongly assists them in the last combat, which, at the end of their days, they have usually to fight with the Evil one. The devil, at that moment, uses all his powers to overcome man and make him unhappy for all eternity. Saint Michael, appointed by God to assist and to strengthen our souls in this dangerous combat, helps us to conquer, Hence the holy Church addresses him in the name of all the faithful in the prayers for the dying, as follows: Holy Archangel Michael, protect us in our fight, that we may not go to perdition on the day of Judgment.” She teaches us also to invoke this holy Archangel before all other heavenly spirits, in the litany of all Saints. But if we desire to secure his intercession, and enjoy his assistance in our last combat, it is necessary that we endeavor to imitate his example and fight bravely against the evil spirit, whom, at the end of our lives, we desire to conquer with Saint Michael’s assistance. Among different representations of Saint Michael there is one in which he has a shield in his hand, upon which are the words: “Who is like unto God?” The word “Michael” means in Hebrew, “Who is like God?” Saint Michael used this as a weapon, so to say, against the proud Lucifer who desired to be equal to the Lord. “Who is like God?” “Who is equal to God?” With these words, he conquered and precipitated Lucifer and his followers into hell. The same weapons, the same shield we also should use in all temptations. “Who is like God?” Who is so mighty, so wise, so beautiful, so amiable as God.” Who is so much to be feared as God? Who can recompense my service as God? Who can do so much good or so much harm to me as God? Whom have I reason to serve and obey as God? Whose grace have I to seek more than the grace of God? Whose disfavor have I to fear more than the disfavor of God? Whosoever uses these and other wholesome thoughts as spiritual weapons against the spirit of hell, fights after the example of Saint Michael, and will always conquer Satan. And those who accustom themselves now to combat thus, have reason to hope that they will vanquish Satan in the last fight, and that the holy Archangel will surely assist them at that important moment. In conclusion, I will add the beautiful words of Saint Lawrence Justinian, by which he admonishes all Christians to venerate the holy Archangel. “It is our duty,” says he, “to give honor to the prince of the heavenly legions. We ought to praise him especially on account of the elevated state of grace in which he is; and because God has distinguished him by bestowing so high a dignity upon him; for his invincible strength, for the Almighty’s favor to him and his heroic constancy in combats; hut in all these, we must honor him only in God, who has created him and us, He is very powerful with the Most High. The glorious victory is well known to us, which he won in heaven, soon after the Creation, over the rebellious angels. Not without reason does our Mother, the holy Church, endeavor to honor him especially, because she knows that the divine Majesty has given him to her as protector, mediator and receiver of all elect souls. Hence all should recognize Saint Michael as their protector, and duly praising him, honor him with devout prayers, commend their cares to him and rejoice him by reforming their lives, as his love is so great, that he cannot refuse our prayers, nor reject our confidence, nor disregard our love; as he protects the humble, loves the chaste, guides the innocent, guards the pious in this temporal life, and leads them to their heavenly home.”

Practical Considerations

• Saint Michael remained true to God when thousands of other angels became faithless to Him. He followed not their example. You also should not follow the bad example of others, but fulfill God’s commandments. Remain faithful to the Lord though thousands of others leave Him. Saint Michael was zealous in honoring God and opposed those who would not be obedient to the Creator. You can also do this. When others speak against the true faith in your presence, against the ceremonies and commandments of the true Church, against purity, against the honor of your neighbor; when you see that they transgress the laws of God and of the Church, you should defend the honor of the Almighty and prevent all the evil you can. If you are so situated that you cannot say or do much, show, by your silence, by your seriousness, that you are displeased by such offences against the Majesty of the Most High. Saint Michael fought valiantly against Lucifer and his adherents. Therefore God placed him above all the heavenly spirits. Lucifer, with his adherents, endeavors to induce you to leave God, to become faithless to Him. Fight bravely against him and you, too, will be exalted. Say to him: “Who is like God? Who is so kind, so mighty, so amiable as God?” And that you may fight vigorously, as well in life as in death, call often and fervently on Saint Michael: “Help us here to fight and to conquer the enemy, O Saint Michael!”

• Saint Michael is exalted for his fidelity and for defending the honor of the Almighty. But what was the fate of Lucifer and his adherents? They were precipitated into hell, which God had created for the rebels, and for all those who would follow them in disobedience. Behold, this is the end of those who are disobedient to the Creator, and offend Him. Consider this point carefully. Lucifer and almost numberless heavenly spirits have been cast into everlasting fire on account of sin, of only one and the first sin. God spared not one of so many noble spirits, nor gave them one single moment to repent; but cast them all immediately into hell. A single sin is punished with eternal damnation, and this a sin only in thought. Do you then at last comprehend how great the wickedness of one single sin must be? Can you still flatter yourself that thoughts are free, or that you cannot commit great sin with them? Can you still believe those who say to you that God does not much regard sins; that He pardons them very easily? Truly you must either say that God is unjust, or that the wickedness of sin is very great. The first you dare not say, because it would be blasphemy; hence you say the second: the just God punishes a single sin with hell; but He punishes it not more severely than it deserves. Thus, a single mortal sin deserves to be punished during all eternity in hell; hence the wickedness of a mortal sin must be exceedingly great. What have you to object to it? Certainly if the example of Lucifer and the just punishment which God made him and his adherents suffer, have not opened your eyes to recognize the wickedness of sin, and if this is not sufficient to induce you to avoid all sin, you are lost. Consider further, the words of Saint Peter, who said, that God, by chastising the sinful angels, shows all sinners how He will punish them. If God did not spare such noble spirits, how can you imagine that He will spare you? Make then this day, the resolution to fear sin, to fear it more than all the evils on earth, more even than hell itself; for, it is truly a greater evil than hell itself. “Many consider hell the greatest evil,” says Saint Chrysostom; “I think that sin is a greater evil.”

MLA Citation

Father Francis Xavier Weninger, DD, SJ. “The Feast of the Dedication of the Archangel Saint Michael”. Lives of the Saints1876. CatholicSaints.Info. 9 May 2018. Web. 29 September 2023. <https://catholicsaints.info/weningers-lives-of-the-saints-the-feast-of-the-dedication-of-the-archangel-saint-michael/>

SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/weningers-lives-of-the-saints-the-feast-of-the-dedication-of-the-archangel-saint-michael/

Angels in Art – The Archangel Michael

The Archangel Michael is reverenced as the first and mightiest of all created beings. He was worshipped by the Chaldeans, and the Gnostics taught that he was the leader of the seven angels who created the universe. After the Captivity the Hebrews regarded him as all that is implied by the Prophet Daniel when he says, “Michael, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people.” It is believed that he will be privileged to exalt the banner of the Cross on the Judgment Day, and to command the trumpet of the archangel to sound; it is on account of these offices that he is called the “Bannerer of Heaven.”

As captain of the heavenly host, it devolved on Michael to conquer Lucifer and his followers, and to expel them from heaven after their refusal to worship the Son of Man; and terrible was the punishment he inflicted on them. Chained in mid-air, where they must remain until the Judgment Day, they behold all that happens on earth. Man, whom they disdained, has flourished in their sight, and wields a power that they may well envy, while the souls of the redeemed constantly ascend to the heaven which is closed to them. Thus are they constantly tormented by hate, and a desire for revenge, of which they must ever despair.

Saint Michael is represented in art as young and severely beautiful. In the earliest pictures his drapery is always white and his wings of many colors, while his symbols, indicating that his conquests are made by spiritual force alone, are a lance terminating in a cross, or a sceptre. Later, it became the custom to represent him in a costume and with such emblems as indicated the nature of the work in which he was engaged; and except for the wings, his picture might often be mistaken for that of a celestially radiant knight, since he is clothed in armor, and bears a sword, shield, and lance. But his seraphic wings and his bearing mark him as a mighty spiritual power; and this impression is increased rather than lessened, when in all humility he is in the act of worship before the Divine Infant, or stands in reverent attitude near the Madonna, as if to guard her and her heaven-sent son.

When conquering Satan the treatment is varied, but the subject is easily recognized. More frequently than otherwise, the archangel stands on the demon, who is half human and half dragon, wearing a suit of mail, and is about to pierce the evil spirit with a lance or bind him in chains.

Such pictures date from the earliest attempts in religious painting, and the same subject was represented in ancient sculpture. Some of these works are so crude as to be absurd, but for their manifest reverence and sincerity. An early sculpture in the porch of the Cathedral of Cortona, probably dating from the seventh century, presents the archangel in long, heavy robes, reaching to his feet; he stands solidly on the back of the dragon, and as if to make the footing more secure, the beast curls his tail in air and lifts his head as high as possible, holding his mouth wide open, into which Saint Michael presses his lance without a struggle. The whole effect is that of some calm and commonplace occurrence, and is in striking contrast with the spirit of the conflict which is represented, as well as with the superhuman combat depicted by later artists.

The dragon is personified by a variety of horrible reptilian forms. Some artists even attempted to follow the apocalyptic description. “For their power is in their mouth, and in their tails: for their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads, and with them they do hurt.”

Lucifer is not always alone, but is sometimes surrounded by demons, who crouch with him at the feet of Saint Michael, before whom a company of angels kneel in adoration.

During the sixteenth century the pictures of this archangel took on the military aspect, to which I have referred, and but for the wings would have represented Saint George, or a Crusader of the Cross, as suitably as the great Warrior Angel.

An exquisite small picture of this type, now in the Academy at Florence, was painted by Fra Angelico. The lance and shield and the lambent flame above the brow are the only emblems; the latter symbolizing spiritual fervor. The rainbow-tinted wings are raised and fully spread, meeting above and behind the head; the armor is of a rich dark red and gold. The pose and the expression of the countenance indicate the reserved power and the godlike tranquillity of the celestial warrior, and fitly represent him as the patron of the Church Militant.

The representations of Saint Michael conquering Lucifer are so numerous and so interesting technically, that any adequate account of them and of their artistic and theological development would fill a volume, and might be considered rather tiresome. I shall speak especially of two examples which are very generally accepted as the most satisfactory of them all.

The first, painted by Raphael when at his best, is in the Louvre. It was a commission from Lorenzo dei Medici, who presented it to Francis I. The subject was doubtless chosen by Raphael as a compliment to the sovereign, who was the Grand Master of the Order of Saint Michael, the military patron saint of France.

It was painted on wood, and sent with three other pictures, packed on mules, to Fontainebleau, where Lorenzo was visiting, in May, 1518. The picture was somewhat injured on the journey. In 1773 it was transferred to canvas, and “restored” three years later, but at the beginning of this century the restorations were removed. We must believe that the picture has suffered from these chances and changes, but the fact remains that it is still a glorious work by a great master.

The beautiful young angel does not stand upon the fiend beneath him, but, poised in air, he lightly touches with his foot the shoulder of the demon in vulgar human form, fiery in color, having horns and a serpent’s tail. The expression of the angel is serious, calm, majestic, as he gazes down upon the writhing Satan, whose face, as he struggles to raise it, is full of malignant hate. This detail is lost in the black and white reproductions.

Michael grasps the lance with both hands, and so natural is the action, so easy and graceful, that the beholder instinctively waits to see the weapon do its work, while flames rise from the earth as if impatient to engulf the disgusting demon. The head of the angel, with its light, floating hair is against the background of the brilliant wings, in which blue, gold, and purple are gloriously mingled; his armor is gold and silver; a sword hangs by his side, and an azure scarf floats from his shoulders. His legs are bare, and his feet shod with buskins, which leave the toes uncovered. The contrast between the exquisite, angelic flesh tints, rosy in hue, and the brown coloring of the demon, effectively emphasizes the beauty of purity and the loathsomeness of evil.

The Saint Michael of Guido Reni so closely resembles that of Raphael in general treatment, that it is more nearly just to compare these works than is usually the case with pictures of the same subject by different masters. The attitude of Guido’s saint is like that of a dancing-master when contrasted with the pose of Raphael’s, and his demon is simply low and base, devoid of malignity or any supreme evil.

But the head and face of Guido’s Michael make his picture wonderful; they adequately express divine purity and beauty, while the studied and fictitious qualities of Guido’s art – here at their best – serve to enhance the exquisite effect of this angelic warrior, and the picture is justly esteemed as one of the treasures of the Cappucini at Rome.

Outside of Italian art, the Saint Michael of Martin Schoen is well worth notice. The figure is fully draped in a long, flowing robe and mantle; the pose is most graceful, and the bearing of the angel dignified and unruffled. The demon is made up of fins, a savage mouth, and numerous claws with which to seize its victims; an entirely emblematic and most repulsive figure.

There are occasional pictures of the “Fall of the Angels,” in which Saint Michael contends against the entire company of rebellious spirits. These are illustrative of the text, “When Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels, and the great dragon was cast out.”

The painting of such a picture at Arezzo, about 1400, caused the death of Spinello d’Arezzo, whose mind so dwelt upon the demons he had painted that he went mad, and fancied that Lucifer appeared to him, and cursed him for having represented the fiend and his angels in so revolting a manner. The horror of the artist induced a fever of which he died.

The smaller of the two pictures of this subject by Rubens, in Munich, is esteemed a miracle of art. It displays the inventive power of the great Flemish master in a wonderful tour de force, for the rebel angels are not fallen, but falling, and tumbling headlong out of heaven, down, down, in such confusion and affright as only Rubens could portray.

In some cases Raphael and Gabriel are represented as witnesses of the combat between Michael and Lucifer. To my taste, these figures, with their abundant white draperies, detract from the simplicity and dignity of this impressive scene. Not only these archangels, but apostles and saints are sometimes introduced, in spite of the evident anachronism, as observers of this great spiritual struggle, while hosts of angels are above and around the picture.

In short, the representations of this subject, in one form and another, are almost numberless, and can scarcely be too many, when they are regarded as embodying the great truth of the spiritual triumph over evil.

Mrs. Jameson says: “This is the secret of its perpetual repetition, and this the secret of the untired complacency with which we regard it. . .and if to this primal moral significance be added all the charm of poetry, grace, animated movement, which human genius has lavished on this ever-blessed, ever-welcome symbol, then, as we look up at it, we are ‘not only touched, but wakened and inspired,’ and the whole delighted imagination glows with faith and hope, and grateful triumphant sympathy, so, at least, I have felt, and I must believe that others have felt it, too.”

The representations of Saint Michael as the Lord of Souls are less numerous than those of the subjects just mentioned, but are very interesting. In some votive pictures he appears as the protector of those who have struggled with evil, and gained a victory. In such pictures the angel has his foot upon the dragon, or holds a dragon’s head in his hand, and bears the banner of victory.

Again, Michael is represented with his scales engaged in weighing the souls of the dead; in such pictures he is unarmed, and bears a sceptre ending in a cross. The souls are typified by little naked human figures; the accepted spirits usually kneel in the scales, with hands clasped as in prayer; the attitude of the rejected souls expresses horror and agony, which is sometimes emphasized by the figure of a demon, impatient for his prey, who reaches out his talons, or his devil’s fork, to seize the doomed spirits.

Leonardo da Vinci represented the angel as presenting the balance to the Infant Jesus, who has the air of blessing the pious soul in the upper scale. Signorelli, about 1500, painted a picture of this subject, which is in the church of San Gregorio at Rome, in which the archangel, in a suit of mail, stands with his wings spread out, and the balance with full scales held above a fierce, open-mouthed dragon. The lance of the archangel has pierced through the under jaw of the beast and entered his body, making an ugly wound, and a hideous little demon, resting on his tiny black wings, is clutching the condemned spirits in the lower scale.

In pictures of the Assumption or Glorification of the Virgin, if Saint Michael is present, it is in his office of Lord of Souls, as the legends of the Madonna teach that he received her spirit, and guarded it until it was again united with her sinless form.

As Lord of Souls it is taught that Saint Michael conducted the spirits of the just to heaven, and even cared for their bodies in some instances. The legend of Saint Catherine of Alexandria teaches that her body was borne by angels over the desert and sea to the top of Mount Sinai, where it was buried; and later a monastery was built over her sepulchre. In the picture of the “Translation of Saint Catherine,” which we give, Saint Michael is one of the four celestial bearers of the martyr saint.

In rare instances Saint Michael was represented without wings. Such a figure standing on a dragon is a Saint George, unless the balance is introduced. When the archangel stands upon the dragon with the balance in his hand, he appears in his double office as Conqueror of Satan and Lord of Souls. Memorial chapels and tombs were frequently decorated with this subject, a notable instance being that on the tomb of Henry VII, in Westminster Abbey.

In pictures of the Last Judgment, Saint Michael is sometimes seen in the very act of weighing souls, and, although I have nowhere found this explanation, it has seemed to me that the souls being thus weighed at the last hour should symbolize those of whom Saint Paul said, “We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.”

Since the Archangel Michael was made the guardian of the Hebrew nation, he was naturally an important actor in many scenes connected with their history. It was he who succored Hagar in the wilderness (Genesis 21:17), who appeared to restrain Abraham from the sacrifice of Isaac (Genesis 22:11). He brought the plagues on Egypt and led the Israelites on their journey. The Jews and early Christians believed that God spake through the mouth of Michael in the Burning Bush, and by him sent the law to Moses on Mount Sinai. When Satan would have entered the body of Moses, in order to personate the prophet and deceive the Jews, it was Michael who contended with the Evil One, and buried the body in an unknown place, as is distinctly stated by Jude. Signorelli chose this as the subject of one of his frescoes in the Sistine Chapel, and I have seen no other representation of it, although I believe that a few others exist.

It was Michael who put blessings instead of curses into Balaam’s mouth (Numbers 22:35), who was with Joshua in the plain of Jericho (Joshua 5:13), who appeared to Gideon (Judges 6:2), and delivered the three faithful Jews from the fiery furnace (Daniel 3:25). This last subject is one of the earliest in Christian art, and was a symbol of the redemption of man by Jesus Christ. There are still other like offices which Saint Michael filled as the protector of the Jews, while several important works are attributed to him in the Apochrypha and in the Legends of the Church.

For example, in the apochryphal story of Bel and the Dragon, it is related that when King Cyrus had thrown the prophet Daniel into the lions’ den, and he had been six days without food, the angel of the Lord appeared to the prophet Habakkuk in Jewry, when he had prepared a mess of potage for the reapers in his field, and the angel commanded Habakkuk to carry the potage to Babylon and give it to Daniel.

“Then Habakkuk said, ‘Lord, I never saw Babylon; neither do I know where the den is.’ Then the angel of the Lord took Habakkuk by the hair of his head, and set him in Babylon over the lions’ den; and Habakkuk cried, saying, ‘O Daniel, Daniel, take the dinner which God hath sent thee,’ – and the angel again set Habakkuk in his own place.”

At one period this subject was represented on sarcophagi; but I have only seen it in prints after the Flemish artist, Hemshirk.

In the legends of Saint Michael we read that in the sixth century, when the plague was raging in Rome, and processions threaded the streets chanting the service since known as the Great Litanies, the Archangel Michael appeared, hovering over the city. He alighted on the summit of the Mausoleum of Hadrian and sheathed his sword, from which blood was dripping. From that hour the plague was stayed, and from that day the Mausoleum, which is surmounted by a statue of the Archangel, has been called the Castle of Sant’ Angelo.

The legends also give an account of two appearances of Saint Michael when he commanded the erection of churches; one at Monte Galgano, on the east coast of Italy, and the second at Avranches in Normandy. The first site was found to cover a wonderful stream of water, which cured many diseases, and made the church of Monte Galgano a much frequented place of pilgrimage.

The church in Normandy is on the celebrated Mont Saint Michael, and is famous in all Christian countries. From the time when the angel appeared to Saint Aubert, the bishop, and commanded him to build the church, this saint was greatly venerated in France, and was made patron of France and of the order which Saint Louis instituted in his honor.

The first church erected here was small, but Richard of Normandy and William the Conquerer raised a magnificent abbey, which overlooked the most picturesque scenery, and for this reason, if no other, remains a much frequented spot.

The old English coin called an angel was so named from the representation of Saint Michael which was stamped upon it.

The pictures of Saint Michael announcing to the Virgin Mary the time of her death, bear so strong a resemblance to those of the Annunciation, that it is necessary to remember that these have the symbols of a palm on a lighted taper in the hand of the angel, instead of the lily of the Archangel Gabriel, as is seen in our illustration of a beautiful picture in the Florentine Academy.

The legend relates that on a certain day the heart of Mary was filled with an inexpressible longing to see her Son, and she wept sorely, when lo! an angel clothed in light appeared before her, saluting her, and saying, “Hail, O Mary! blessed by Him who hath given salvation to Israel! I bring thee here a branch of palm gathered in paradise; command that it be carried before thy bier in the day of thy death; for in three days thy soul shall leave thy body, and thou shalt enter into paradise where thy Son awaits thy coming.” Mary answering, said: “If I have found grace in thy sight tell me thy name, and grant that the Apostles may be reunited to me, that in their presence I may give up my soul to God. Also, I pray thee, that after death my soul may not be affrighted by any spirit of darkness, nor any evil angel be given power over me.” And the archangel replied: “My name is the Great and Wonderful. Doubt not that the Apostles shall be with thee today, for he who transported the prophet Habakkuk by the hair of his head to the lions’ den, can also bring hither the Apostles. Fear thou not the evil spirit, for thou hast bruised his head, and destroyed his kingdom.” And the angel departed, and the palm branch shed light from every leaf and sparkled as the stars of heaven.

And the duty of the archangel was thus fulfilled until he should again appear as Lord of Souls to receive the spirit of the Virgin, to guard it until it should again inhabit her sinless body.

SOURCE : https://catholicsaints.info/angels-in-art-the-archangel-michael/


Rogier van der Weyden (1443-1446). Saint Michel pesant les âmes, 
Polyptyque du Jugement dernier, Hospices de Beaune.












L’Archange Saint Michel, terrassant Satan représenté par un dragon, 
avec inscription Quis ut Deus ? sur son bouclier. 
Entrée principale de l'université de Bonn.




1619, 438 X 291,5, 







Strasbourg-Koenigshoffen, Église orthodoxe serbe Saint-Georges, 2A rue du Donon.






Santuario di Monte Sant'Angelo sul Gargano, province de Foggia, Pouilles.



Santuario di Monte Sant'Angelo sul Gargano, province de FoggiaPouilles.



Santuario di Monte Sant'Angelo sul Gargano, province de FoggiaPouilles.



Santuario di Monte Sant'Angelo sul Gargano, province de FoggiaPouilles.







Guariento di Arpo (Padoue ou Venise, 1310/1320 - Padoue, 1368/1370), La pesée des âmes
Museo Civico de Padoue.


The Dedication of St. Michael’s Church

[Or, the Festival of St. Michael and All the Holy Angels.]  THIS festival has been kept with great solemnity on the 29th of September ever since the fifth age, and was certainly celebrated in Apulia in 493. The dedication of the famous church of St. Michael on Mount Gargano, in Italy, 1 gave occasion to the institution of this feast in the West, which is hence called in the Martyrologies of St. Jerom, Bede, and others, The dedication of St. Michael. The dedication of St. Michael’s church in Rome, upon Adrian’s Mole, which was performed by Pope Boniface IV. in 610, and that of several other churches in the West, in honour of this arch-angel, were performed on this same day. 2 Churches were likewise erected in the East, in honour of St. Michael and other holy angels, from the time when the Christian worship was publicly established by the conversion of Constantine, doubtless upon the model of little oratories and churches, which had been formerly raised in the intervals of the general persecutions, in which storms they were again thrown down. Sozomen informs us, that Constantine the Great built a famous church in honour of this glorious archangel, called Michaelion, and that in it the sick were often cured, and other wonders wrought through the intercession of St. Michael. This historian assures us, that he had often experienced such relief here himself; and he mentions the miraculous cures of Aquilin, an eminent lawyer, and of Probian, a celebrated physician, wrought in the same place. This church stood about four miles from Constantinople; a monastery was afterwards built contiguous to it. Four churches in honour of St. Michael stood in the city of Constantinople itself; their number was afterwards increased to fifteen, which were built by several emperors. 3

Though only St. Michael be mentioned in the title of this festival, it appears from the prayers of the church that all the good angels are its object, together with this glorious prince and tutelar angel of the church. On it we are called upon, in a particular manner, to give thanks to God for the glory which the angels enjoy, and to rejoice in their happiness. Secondly, to thank him for his mercy to us in constituting such glorious beings to minister to our salvation, by aiding and assisting us. Thirdly, to join them in adoring and praising God with all possible ardour, desiring and praying that we may do his will on earth with the utmost fidelity, fervour, and purity of affection, as it is done by these blessed spirits in heaven; and that we may study to sanctify our souls in imitation of the spotless angels to whom we are associated. Lastly, we are invited to honour, and implore the intercession and succour of the holy angels.

Supreme honour called Latria is essentially reserved to God alone; nor can it ever be given to any creature without incurring the most heinous guilt of idolatry, and high treason against the majesty of God. This honour is paid by the offering of sacrifice, or by any direct or indirect acknowledgment of the divinity or any divine attribute residing in another. But there is an inferior or subaltern honour which is due to superior excellency in creatures. Such is that civil honour which the law of God expressly commands us to pay to parents, princes, magistrates, and all superiors; also some degree of a religious honour which the scriptures and law of nature teach us to be due to priests or the ministers of God, and which even the most wicked of kings often paid to prophets, who, as to the world, were mean and obscure persons. This inferior honour differs from divine or supreme honour, as much as infinity in the object does from what is finite; nor can it be any way derogatory from that which is due to God, whom it honours in his creatures, whose perfections it acknowledges merely to be its gifts. The respect which is shown to a governor or an ambassador is not injurious, but is highly agreeable and honourable to his master, on whose account it is paid, and whose dignity and authority are considered in those whom he has made in any part the depositaries of it. This duty which the law of nature dictates, is inculcated by those words of the apostle: Render to all men their due.—Honour to whom honour. 4 Hence St. Bernard expresses no more than what all men must necessarily approve, when he says: “Give to every one honour according to his dignity.” 5 Honour being no more than a testimony which we bear to another’s excellency, who can deny this to be due to the most sublime, most perfect, most holy, and most glorious heavenly spirits? Abraham prostrated himself before the angels whom he received in his tent. 6 Daniel did the same before one whom he saw upon the Tigris. 7 God commanded the Israelites to fear and respect the angel whom he sent to be their conductor into the promised land. 8 The first consideration for which the holy angels claim our respect, is that of the excellency of their nature, in which they are essentially of an order superior to men, being pure spirits, exempt from the weaknesses of our frail earthly frame, and endued with more noble faculties and qualities, suited to the perfection and simplicity of their unbodied and uncompounded being. Secondly, the gifts of grace and glory are proportioned in them to the superiority of their nature; and the scriptures speak of angels as absolutely above men, though some particular saints may, for ought we know, enjoy a greater felicity than many angels; and the Blessed Virgin is exalted in glory above all the heavenly spirits. Nor can any order of the highest spirits boast of an honour or dignity equal to that which is conferred on mankind by the mystery of the incarnation, in which the Son of God, who took not the nature of angels, assumed that of men, 9 and as man is constituted by his Father Lord of all creatures. Had the blessed angels no other title to command our veneration, this alone suffices, that they enjoy a state of bliss and glory, are the high courtiers of heaven, who stand always in the presence of God, are his officers who surround his throne, and his faithful ministers in executing in all things his holy will.

A circumstance in the blessed angels which above all others is most amiable and pleasing to devout souls, and must particularly excite their praise and reverence, is the constant and perfect fidelity of these holy spirits to God. Their innocence and sanctity were never tarnished with the least spot or stain, the purity of their affections was never debased by the least mixture of any thing inordinate, and the ardour with which they love God, and exert all their powers to serve him, and do his holy will, never admits the least abatement. If we love God, and rejoice when he is served and praised; if we grieve to see him forgotten and offended by men on earth; if we have the least spark of zeal for his glory, nothing will give us greater joy than to consider with what perfect fidelity he is served, and with what ardour and purity of affection he is loved and praised in heaven. Even those who serve him best on earth, acquit themselves of these duties very imperfectly amidst the snares and distractions of this life. But the blessed angels are creatures perfectly holy, who, without either division or abatement in their affections, or interruption in their happy employment, obey, love, and glorify God with all their powers. Always employed in the delightful contemplation of his infinite goodness, and other amiable perfections, swallowed up in the ocean of his love, they never cease crying out with all their might: Holy, Holy, Holy, the Lord God of Hosts; all the earth is full of his glory, which shineth forth in all his works. 10 They cease not day or night saying, Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God Almighty, who was, and who is, and who is to come. 11 In the most profound annihilation of themselves they give all honour and glory to him alone, and professing their crowns to be entirely his gifts they cast them at his feet, and sing: Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honour, and power, &c. 12 Burning with the most ardent love, and the most eager desire to praise more and more perfectly his infinite goodness and greatness, they continually repeat their hymns with new jubilation and an earnestness to outdo themselves, as they are every moment inebriated with fresh overflowing joy, and pierced more deeply with the darts of his sweet love. The psalmist, who felt in some degree the impetuosity of this impulse in his own breast, knew no stronger motive to invite them to love and praise God with all their powers, than their own insatiable and boundless ardour for this holy duty and employment. He therefore cries out to them: Bless the Lord, all you his angels; you that are mighty in strength, and execute his word, hearken to the voice of his orders. Bless the Lord, all you his hosts; you his ministers who do his will. 13 Can we call to mind those holy and glorious spirits without being penetrated with love and veneration? O truly happy creatures! we also desire to love and praise God; and we condemn the faintness of our desires. We rejoice in your ardour, and by it we pray you incessantly to praise God both for yourselves and us, pouring forth all your affections, and enlarging and exerting all your powers, with the utmost effort of your strength; because he is infinitely above the love and praise of all creatures: he infinitely transcends all things out of himself, nor can the most perfect homage of all created beings ever be commensurate to his greatness, goodness, mercy, and boundless majesty. Whilst we invite you to his praise, with what regret, alas! do we reflect that we have often sinned, and daily continue to heap offences against him! Oh! may we cease to sin; may your flames, holy angels, kindle a fire of the like holy love in our souls. In our devotions we will unite our praises with those which you incessantly pour forth in your heavenly choirs, and animate ourselves to fervour by your example in this great employment.

Another motive why we ought to love and honour the holy angels is our relation and close affinity with them. Our souls are spiritual and immortal like them; and by sanctifying grace are their co-heiresses and fellow-members. They are glorious citizens of heaven, and we are called to be one day their companions. They will receive an additional accidental glory from our company, who are to repair their losses, and fill the seats forfeited by their apostate fellows. We are to be eternally united with them in bliss and love, and are already united by grace, and the communion of saints. They are called the sons of God, 14 so are we. And in the communion of saints, which we profess in our creed, the good angels are comprised; for we enjoy with them a holy partnership founded on many titles, and we are linked with them by many sacred bands and alliances. By virtue of this communion we owe them love and veneration, and receive from them many benefits and succours, especially by their patronage and intercession.

God is pleased frequently to employ the ministry of his angels in affording us many helps, and in the government of this lower world. He can do all things by the simple act of his own will, and stands not in need of ministers to execute his decrees, as earthly kings do. It is not from any want of power, but merely from his infinite goodness and wisdom that he employs superior spirits in various dispensations of his providence concerning men. Zeal for the divine honour, fidelity in executing his will, and affection and charity for us make these holy spirits most diligent in their commission. Upon how many occasions were Abraham, Jacob, Moses, and other patriarchs and prophets favoured with apparitions and visions of these holy spirits! How many mysteries did they reveal! How many blessings did they bring from God sometimes to the church in general, sometimes to his faithful servants in particular! How many evils, both public and private, do they often avert! An angel sent by God relieved and comforted Agar in her despair. 15 Other angels delivered Lot from the burning of Sodom, 16 the three children from the flames, 17 Daniel from the lions, 18 St. Peter from his chains, 19 and the apostles out of their dungeon. 20 God gave his law to the Jews by an angel who was his ambassador. 21 By angels he showed to St. John the future state of his church, 22 and many wonderful visions to Daniel 23 and other prophets. They were his messengers in the execution of the principal mysteries relating to the incarnation, birth, flight, temptation, and agony of Christ. An angel conducted the Israelites into the land of promise. 24 The apostle St. Jude mentions a contest which St. Michael had with the devil about the burial of the body of Moses, and recommends humility, piety, and modesty in behaviour by the example of this archangel, who on that occasion used no curse, no harsh or reproachful word, but to repress the malicious fiend only said: The Lord command thee. 25 St. John describes a great battle of St. Michael and the good angels with the devil and his angels, 26 which seems by the context not to belong properly to the expulsion of these latter out of heaven when they sinned, but to some efforts of the evil spirits, when they were vanquished by Christ in the mystery of our redemption. By this victory of St. Michael we see the concern of the good angels for the salvation of man, and the activity and success with which they exert themselves in his behalf. Angels carried the soul of Lazarus into the place of rest. 27 Their host will descend with Christ at the last day, and will assemble men before his tribunal. 28 The holy scriptures assure us, that the angels are the ministers of God appointed to execute his orders, and to do his will in our favour. 29 God promises their ministry and succour to all who serve him. 30 Who is not astonished at the condescension with which the archangel Raphael accompanied the young Toby, and rescued him from all dangers? An angel wrestled all night with Jacob: another carried Habacuc by the hair to Babylon, to feed Daniel in the lions’ den.

That the good angels often intercede with God for us, and that their patronage is piously invoked, is an article of the Catholic faith. Jacob entreated with earnestness the angel with whom he had wrestled, that he would give him his blessing: 31 and on his death-bed he prayed the angel who had conducted and protected him, to bless his grandchildren Ephraim and Manasses. 32 If the angels give us their blessing, and do us greater offices, can we imagine that they do not pray to God for us? If Jacob prayed to his angel, this was certainly consonant to true religion and the practice of pious persons. The devils entreat God for permission to use their natural craft and strength to assail men with extraordinary temptations, as they did with regard to Job 33 and the apostles. 34 Christ prayed for St. Peter, that his faith should not fail under the assaults of Satan. The angels who are solicitous for us oppose these efforts of Satan against us, by praying for us, and otherwise. The prophet Daniel was informed in his visions how vigorously the guardian angel of Persia interposed in favour of that country, and much more what good offices Michael and other angels did for the Jews, in removing obstacles which retarded their return from the captivity. The angel Gabriel told Daniel that he had exerted his efforts for this purpose in Persia one-and-twenty days, and that Michael, the prince or guardian angel of the Jews, came to his help, 35 so that they conquered the impediments. Gabriel added: 36 From the first year of Darius the Mede, I stood up that he might be strengthened and confirmed; viz.: to promote the deliverance of God’s people. The same prophet, speaking of the cruel persecution of Antiochus, says: 37 At that time Michael shall rise up, the great prince that standeth for the children of thy people. This implies that Michael would support the Machabees, and other defenders of God’s people, whose protector this archangel was. Standing up for them must mean principally by praying for them, as it is said of the priests and Levites. 38 More ancient books of the holy scripture mention visible succours of holy angels which the Jews, in their deliverance from the slavery of Egypt, and passage to Canaan experienced; also many among the patriarchs, several among the judges of the Jewish nation, and others. From the traditionary notion of such interpositions of good spirits in favour of men, the Gentiles derived one part of their monstrous idolatry, into which they fell by a blind abuse of the most sacred truths; of which Dr. Lucas, an eminent Protestant divine, writes as follows: 39 “When I read that angels are the ministering spirits of God; when I read in Daniel of the princes of Græcia and Persia, and find that provinces were committed to angels as the viceroys and lieutenants of God, I cannot think that those devout and charitable spirits did with less zeal in their provinces labour to promote the honour of God and the good of man, than evil spirits did the dishonour of the one, and the ruin of the other. And unless the frequent appearances of angels in the beginning had possessed men’s minds with a firm persuasion that there was a constant commerce maintained between heaven and earth; and that spirits very frequently did visibly engage themselves in the protection and assistance of men; I cannot as much as imagine what foundation there could be for the numerous impostures of oracles, or upon what ground the custom of putting themselves under the patronage of some tutelar spirit, could so generally have prevailed in the pagan world. I do not therefore doubt but that the Gentile world received very many good offices and advantages from good angels, as well as suffered many mischiefs from evil ones,” &c.

It is clear from several of the above-mentioned examples, and many other passages of the holy scriptures, that the good angels pray for us. The prophet Zacharias was favoured with a vision of angels in the seventieth year of the desolation of Jerusalem and the cities of Juda, dated from the beginning of the siege of Jerusalem, in the ninth year of Sedecias; which seventieth year was the second of Darius Hystaspis, and the eighteenth from the beginning of the reign of Cyrus in Babylon, and the end of the captivity. The prophet saw an angel in the shape of a man (probably Michael, the protector of the Jews) standing in a grove of myrtle trees, and several angels, the guardians of other provinces, came to him and said: We have walked through the earth, and behold, all the earth is inhabited, and is at rest. Then the angel made this prayer: O Lord of hosts, how long wilt thou not have mercy on Jerusalem, and on the cities of Juda, with which thou hast been angry? This is now the seventieth year. 40 The Lord answered his prayer, that he would return to Jerusalem in mercies, and that his house should be built in it. In the book of Job, Elihu says: 41 If there shall be an angel speaking for him among thousands; that is, if an angel chosen out of a thousand to be the guardian of a sinner, shall pray to God for him, and bring him to repentance, the sick sinner shall recover his health. The angel Raphael told Toby: When thou didst pray with tears, I offered thy prayers to the Lord, 42 doubtless to recommend them to God by his own intercession. St. John saw an angel offering to God the prayers of all the saints. 43 If the good angels pray for us, and often present our supplications to God, in order to strengthen them by their own prayers, they certainly know and hear our petitions. Jacob could not pray to the angel that he would bless his two boys, 44 if the angel could not hear him. Isaias had no sooner complained that his lips were defiled, but a seraph purified them with a burning coal from the altar. 45 How can the angels be offended at scandals given to the little ones, who are committed by God to their charge, 46 if they do not know them? How could they otherwise represent to God the afflictions of his people, as the prophets so often mention? In the first chapter of Zacharias the good angels (and the devil in the first and second chapters of Job) are said to walk over the earth, and to lay before God both the prayers and good works, and the neglects and sins of men; not as if he by his own all-piercing eye did not see them, but as witnesses of their actions, the ministers of divine providence in its dispensations towards them, and the patrons and defenders, or the accusers of our souls.

The church has always invoked, and paid a religious honour to the holy angels. 47 Origen teaches, that they assist us in our devotions, and join their supplications to ours. “The angel of the Christian,” says he, “offers his prayers to God through the only high priest; himself also praying for him who is committed to his charge.” 48 He tells us, that the angels carry up our prayers to God, and bring back his blessings and gifts to us; but that Christians do not invoke or adore them as they do God. 49 He addresses a prayer to the angel of a person who is going to be baptized, that he would instruct him. 50 The martyr Nemesian and his companions, writing to St. Cyprian, say: “Let us assist one another by our prayers, and beg that we may have God and Christ and the angels favourers in all our actions.” 51 St. Gregory Nazianzen writes: “The angelical powers are a succour to us in all good.” 52 He prays the good angels to receive his soul at the hour of death; and threatens the devil with the sign of the cross, if he should approach him. 53 St. Ephrem says of heaven: “Where all the angels and saints of God reign, praying the Lord for us.” 54 He repeats, that the angels with joy offer our prayers to God. 55 The English Protestants have retained in their book of Common Prayer the collect of this day, in which we desire Almighty God “to grant that, as his holy angels always do him service in heaven, so, by his appointment, they may defend and succour us upon earth.”

If we desire to live for ever in the company of the holy angels, we must lead on earth the life of angels. We must learn here to converse with God by assiduous prayer and holy contemplation, and to walk in his presence by frequent aspirations, withdrawing our minds, as much as we can, from a vain distracting world; adoring and loving God, rejoicing in him, bending our wills cheerfully under all his appointments, and studying with our whole strength to obey his law, and fulfil his holy will in all things. We must also work our minds into the holy temper and dispositions of the blessed angels, putting on the same perfect humility, the same uninterrupted tranquillity, constancy, meekness, patience, pure and vehement love of God, and zeal for his glory, with all other virtues. Neither do certain transient acts suffice to denominate a person meek, humble, or virtuous; these dispositions must be wrought into his very frame, and be the firm, habitual, permanent, reigning affections of his soul. They must, as far as our state will allow, be pure without allay, or mixture of anything inordinate or irregular. No one can be admitted into the society of the spotless angels, or stand in the presence of a God of infinite purity and sanctity; no one can find a place in the region of the blessed, who is not perfectly without spot or blemish: There shall not enter into it any thing defiled. 56 All infection of inordinate passions or vicious self-love, must be purged away. How great a task have we upon our hands! but how noble and happy is the pursuit! Perfectly to subdue all our passions, to counteract and reform all our vicious inclinations, and to acquire, cherish, and constantly improve all virtues. This is not done by broken and interrupted essays and attempts, but by a vigorous and constant application of the means, and repeated fervent acts of all virtues.

Note 1. See Baillet, Thomassin, &c. [back]

Note 2. This festival has been celebrated in the church with great solemnity ever since the sixth century. It was enacted in the ecclesiastical laws of King Ethelred in England, in the year 1014, “That every Christian who is of age, fast three days on bread and water, and raw herbs, before the feast of St. Michael, and let every man go to confession and to church barefoot.—Let every priest with his people go in procession three days barefoot, and let every one’s commons for three days be prepared without anything of flesh, as if they themselves were to eat it, both in meat and drink, and let all this be distributed to the poor. Let every servant be excused from labour these three days, that he may the better perform his fast, or let him work what he will for himself. These are the three days, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, next before the feast of St. Michael. If any servant break his fast, let him make satisfaction with his hide, (bodily stripes,) let the poor freeman pay thirty pence, the king’s thane a hundred and thirty shillings; and let the money be divided to the poor.” See Sir Henry Spelman’s Councils, vol. i. p. 530, and Johnson’s Collection of the Canons of the Church of England, t. 1, an. 1014. Michaelmas-day is mentioned among the great feasts in the Saxon Chronicle on the year 1011; in the Saxon Menology of the ninth century, published by Mr. Wanley (in Lingue. Aquilon. Thes. l. 2, p. 107,) and in the English Calendar published by Dr. Hicks. (in his Saxon Grammar, p. 102, &c.) [back]

Note 3. See Du Cange, Descript. Constantinop. [back]

Note 4. Rom. xiii. 7. [back]

Note 5. S. Bern. Serm. de Obed. [back]

Note 6. Gen. xviii. 2. [back]

Note 7. Dan. x. 5, 9. [back]

Note 8. Exod. xxiii. 21. [back]

Note 9. Hebr. ii. 16. [back]

Note 10. Isa. vi. 3. [back]

Note 11. Apoc. iv. 8. [back]

Note 12. Ibid. v. 11. [back]

Note 13. Ps. cii. 20, 21. [back]

Note 14. Job i. 6, xxxviii. 7. [back]

Note 15. Gen. xvi. 8, xxi. 17. [back]

Note 16. Gen. xxii. 19. [back]

Note 17. Dan. iii. 49. [back]

Note 18. Dan. vi. 22. [back]

Note 19. Act. xii. 7. [back]

Note 20. Act. v. 19. [back]

Note 21. Act. vii. 52, and Heb. ii. 2. [back]

Note 22. Apoc. i. 1. [back]

Note 23. Dan. viii. ix. x. [back]

Note 24. Exod. xiv. 21, and Numb. xx. 16. [back]

Note 25. Jude 9. [back]

Note 26. Apoc. xii. 7. [back]

Note 27. Luke xvi. 23. [back]

Note 28. Matt. xxiv. &c. [back]

Note 29. Ps. ciii. 4, cii. 20. [back]

Note 30. Ps. xxxiii. 8, cx. 11, Baruch vi. 6. [back]

Note 31. Gen. xxxii. 26. [back]

Note 32. Gen. xlviii. 26. [back]

Note 33. Job i. [back]

Note 34. Luke xxii. 41. [back]

Note 35. Dan. x. 13. [back]

Note 36. Dan. xi. 1. [back]

Note 37. Dan. xii. 1. [back]

Note 38. Deut. x. 8. [back]

Note 39. Lucas’s Inquiry after Happiness, t. 1, ch. 3, p. 74. [back]

Note 40. Zachar. i. 12. [back]

Note 41. Job xxxiii. 23. [back]

Note 42. Tob. xii. 12. [back]

Note 43. Apoc. viii. 3, 4. [back]

Note 44. Gen. xlviii. [back]

Note 45. Isa. vi. [back]

Note 46. Matt. xviii. [back]

Note 47. St. Paul condemns a superstitious worship of angels, (Coloss. ii. 18,) and the ancient council of Laodicea declares the same to be idolatry. (Can. 35, t. 1, p. 468.) Here is meant a superstitious worship introduced by certain heretics. St. Jerom and St. Clement of Alexandria (l. 6, Strom. p. 636,) testify, that many Jews at that time adored the angels and stars. Among the heretics of the infant church, the Simonians, Cerinthians, and several others, pretended that this world was framed and governed by angels, with many ridiculous extravagancies concerning them, as we read in St. Irenæus, St. Clement of Alexandria, St. Epiphanius, Tertullian, St. Austin, and Theodoret. Hence these heretics worshipped the angels, some in an idolatrous manner, others with superstitious notions and practices. This worship was evidently superstitious, and highly criminal, and was condemned as such. But we must not hence infer, says Balsamon, (who flourished in the twelfth century,) that the honour which is due to the angels was ever censured. (Comm. in Can. Conc. Laodic.) Estius thinks the superstitions of these heretics regarded the Genii or imaginary tutelary spirits of the idolaters, who derived their notions of them from a corrupted tradition concerning the angels, and who ascribed to them several divine attributes. At least these superstitions belonged to the fables of those heretics who ascribed to angels the framing of this world, and such a government of it as cannot, without idolatry, or at least without abominable superstition, be given to any creatures. [back]

Note 48. L. 8, contra Cels. p. 400. [back]

Note 49. L. 5, ib. p. 233. [back]

Note 50. Hom. i. in Ezech. p. 391. [back]

Note 51. Inter ep. S. Cypr. 77, p. 330. [back]

Note 52. Or. 43, p. 664. [back]

Note 53. Carm. 22, t. 2, p. 94. [back]

Note 54. L. de. Locis Beatis. [back]

Note 55. S. Ephr. l. de Virginit. p. 129. [back]

Note 56. Apoc. xxi. 27. [back]

Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73).  Volume IX: September. The Lives of the Saints.  1866.

SOURCE : http://www.bartleby.com/210/9/291.html


Saint Michel combattant le dragon, représentation de Satan, 
Livre d'heures d'Étienne Chevalier, enluminé par Jean Fouquet, 1452 à 1460 :


San Michele Arcangelo


el Nuovo Testamento il termine "arcangelo" è attribuito a Michele. Solo in seguito venne esteso a Gabriele e Raffaele, gli unici tre arcangeli riconosciuti dalla Chiesa, il cui nome è documentato nella Bibbia. San Michele, "chi come Dio?", è capo supremo dell'esercito celeste, degli angeli fedeli a Dio. Antico patrono della Sinagoga oggi è patrono della Chiesa Universale, che lo ha considerato sempre di aiuto nella lotta contro le forze del male.

Patronato: Polizia, Radiologi, Droghieri

Etimologia: Michele = chi come Dio?, dall'ebraico

Martirologio Romano: Festa dei santi Michele, Gabriele e Raffaele, arcangeli. Nel giorno della dedicazione della basilica intitolata a San Michele anticamente edificata a Roma al sesto miglio della via Salaria, si celebrano insieme i tre arcangeli, di cui la Sacra Scrittura rivela le particolari missioni: giorno e notte essi servono Dio e, contemplando il suo volto, lo glorificano incessantemente.


Il 29 settembre la Liturgia della Chiesa ricorda la festività di San Michele Arcangelo. In un’epoca in cui le forze del male hanno enorme libertà di azione, fuorviando e rapendo anime, la figura di San Michele assume un valore di prim’ordine. Il suo nome deriva dall’espressione «Mi-ka-El», che significa «chi è come Dio?» e poiché nessuno è come l’Onnipotente, l’Arcangelo combatte tutti coloro che si innalzano con superbia, sfidando l’Altissimo.  Nella Sacra Scrittura è citato cinque volte:  nel libro di Daniele, di Giuda, nell’Apocalisse e in tutti i brani biblici è considerato «capo supremo dell’esercito celeste», ovvero degli angeli in guerra contro il male.

Nella Tradizione Michele è l’antitesi di Lucifero, capo degli angeli che decisero di fare a meno di Dio e perciò precipitarono negli Inferi. Michele, generale degli angeli, è colui che difende la Fede, la Verità e la Chiesa. Dante (1265-1321) illustra mirabilmente la bellezza e la potenza di questo Principe celeste e la sua solerzia nel proteggere il genere umano dalle insidie di Satana. Nelle litanie dei Santi pregate in Purgatorio da coloro che in terra furono invidiosi, San Michele è il secondo nominato, dopo Maria Santissima, segno del suo grande potere di intercessione (Purgatorio XIII, 51).

Maria Vergine e l’Arcangelo Michele sono associati nel loro combattimento contro il demonio ed entrambi, iconograficamente parlando, hanno sotto i loro piedi, a seconda dei casi, il serpente, il drago, il diavolo in persona, che l’Arcangelo tiene incatenato e lo minaccia, pronto a trafiggerlo, con la sua spada. Il suo culto è molto diffuso sia in Oriente che in Occidente, ne danno testimonianza le innumerevoli chiese, santuari, monasteri e anche monti a lui intitolati. In Europa, durante l’alto Medioevo, furono edificati in suo onore tre gioielli di devozione, di storia, di architettura ed arte: l’abbazia di Mont Saint-Michel in Normandia, La Sacra di San Michele sul Monte Pirchiriano, in Piemonte e il santuario del Monte Gargano in Puglia. Difensore della Chiesa, la sua statua compare sulla sommità di Castel Sant’Angelo a Roma ed egli è protettore del popolo cristiano, come un tempo lo era dei pellegrini medievali contro le insidie che incontravano lungo la via.

Leone XIII (1810-1903), il 13 ottobre 1884, dopo aver terminato di celebrare la Santa Messa nella cappella vaticana, restò immobile una decina di minuti in stato di profondo turbamento. In seguito si precipitò nel suo studio. Fu allora che il Papa compose la preghiera a San Michele Arcangelo. Successivamente racconterà il Pontefice di aver udito Gesù e Satana e di aver avuto una terrificante visione dell’Inferno: «ho visto la terra avvolta dalle tenebre e da un abisso, ho visto uscire legioni di demoni che si spargevano per il mondo per distruggere le opere della Chiesa ed attaccare la stessa Chiesa che ho visto ridotta allo stremo. Allora apparve San Michele e ricacciò gli spiriti malvagi nell’abisso. Poi ho visto San Michele Arcangelo intervenire non in quel momento, ma molto più tardi, quando le persone avessero moltiplicato le loro ferventi preghiere verso l’Arcangelo».

Dopo circa mezz’ora fece chiamare il Segretario della Sacra Congregazione dei Riti, ordinandogli di far stampare il foglio che aveva in mano e farlo pervenire a tutti i Vescovi della Chiesa: il manoscritto conteneva la preghiera che il Papa dispose di far recitare al termine della Santa Messa, la supplica a Maria Santissima e l’invocazione al Principe delle milizie celesti, per mezzo del quale si implora Dio affinché ricacci il Principe del mondo nell’Inferno. Tale supplica è caduta in disuso. Nessun Pontefice ha abrogato questa preghiera dopo il Santo Sacrificio e neppure il Novus Ordo la nega, anche se dagli anni Settanta si prese a non più recitarla, privando la Chiesa di una preziosa arma di difesa.
Autore: Cristina Siccardi



Skopje, Macedonia


Il nome dell’arcangelo Michele, che significa “chi è come Dio ?”, è citato cinque volte nella Sacra Scrittura; tre volte nel libro di Daniele, una volta nel libro di Giuda e nell'Apocalisse di s. Giovanni Evangelista e in tutte le cinque volte egli è considerato “capo supremo dell’esercito celeste”, cioè degli angeli in guerra contro il male, che nell’Apocalisse è rappresentato da un dragone con i suoi angeli; esso sconfitto nella lotta, fu scacciato dai cieli e precipitato sulla terra. 

In altre scritture, il dragone è un angelo che aveva voluto farsi grande quanto Dio e che Dio fece scacciare, facendolo precipitare dall’alto verso il basso, insieme ai suoi angeli che lo seguivano. 

Michele è stato sempre rappresentato e venerato come l’angelo-guerriero di Dio, rivestito di armatura dorata in perenne lotta contro il Demonio, che continua nel mondo a spargere il male e la ribellione contro Dio. 

Egli è considerato allo stesso modo nella Chiesa di Cristo, che gli ha sempre riservato fin dai tempi antichissimi, un culto e devozione particolare, considerandolo sempre presente nella lotta che si combatte e si combatterà fino alla fine del mondo, contro le forze del male che operano nel genere umano. 

Dante nella sua ‘Divina Commedia’ pone il demonio (l’angelo Lucifero) in fondo all’inferno, conficcato a testa in giù al centro della terra, che si era ritirata al suo cadere, provocando il grande cratere dell’inferno dantesco. Dopo l’affermazione del cristianesimo, il culto per san Michele, che già nel mondo pagano equivaleva ad una divinità, ebbe in Oriente una diffusione enorme, ne sono testimonianza le innumerevoli chiese, santuari, monasteri a lui dedicati; nel secolo IX solo a Costantinopoli, capitale del mondo bizantino, si contavano ben 15 fra santuari e monasteri; più altri 15 nei sobborghi. 

Tutto l’Oriente era costellato da famosi santuari, a cui si recavano migliaia di pellegrini da ogni regione del vasto impero bizantino e come vi erano tanti luoghi di culto, così anche la sua celebrazione avveniva in tanti giorni diversi del calendario. 

Perfino il grande fiume Nilo fu posto sotto la sua protezione, si pensi che la chiesa funeraria del Cremlino a Mosca in Russia, è dedicata a S. Michele. Per dirla in breve non c’è Stato orientale e nord africano, che non possegga oggetti, stele, documenti, edifici sacri, che testimoniano la grande venerazione per il santo condottiero degli angeli, che specie nei primi secoli della Chiesa, gli venne tributata. 

In Occidente si hanno testimonianze di un culto, con le numerosissime chiese intitolate a volte a S. Angelo, a volte a S. Michele, come pure località e monti vennero chiamati Monte Sant’Angelo o Monte San Michele, come il celebre santuario e monastero in Normandia in Francia, il cui culto fu portato forse dai Celti sulla costa della Normandia; certo è che esso si diffuse rapidamente nel mondo Longobardo, nello Stato Carolingio e nell’Impero Romano. 

In Italia sano tanti i posti dove sorgevano cappelle, oratori, grotte, chiese, colline e monti tutti intitolati all’arcangelo Michele, non si può accennarli tutti, ci fermiamo solo a due: Tancia e il Gargano. 

Sul Monte Tancia, nella Sabina, vi era una grotta già usata per un culto pagano, che verso il VII secolo, fu dedicata dai Longobardi a S. Michele; in breve fu costruito un santuario che raggiunse gran fama, parallela a quella del Monte Gargano, che comunque era più antico. 

La celebrazione religiosa era all’8 maggio, data praticata poi nella Sabina, nel Reatino, nel Ducato Romano e ovunque fosse estesa l’influenza della badia benedettina di Farfa, a cui i Longobardi di Spoleto, avevano donato quel santuario. 

Ma il più celebre santuario italiano dedicato a S. Michele, è quello in Puglia sul Monte Gargano; esso ha una storia che inizia nel 490, quando era papa Gelasio I; la leggenda racconta che casualmente un certo Elvio Emanuele, signore del Monte Gargano (Foggia) aveva smarrito il più bel toro della sua mandria, ritrovandolo dentro una caverna inaccessibile. 

Visto l’impossibilità di recuperarlo, decise di ucciderlo con una freccia del suo arco; ma la freccia inspiegabilmente invece di colpire il toro, girò su sé stessa colpendo il tiratore ad un occhio. Meravigliato e ferito, il signorotto si recò dal suo vescovo s. Lorenzo Maiorano, vescovo di Siponto (odierna Manfredonia) e raccontò il fatto prodigioso. 

Il presule indisse tre giorni di preghiere e di penitenza; dopodiché s. Michele apparve all’ingresso della grotta e rivelò al vescovo: “Io sono l’arcangelo Michele e sto sempre alla presenza di Dio. La caverna è a me sacra, è una mia scelta, io stesso ne sono vigile custode. Là dove si spalanca la roccia, possono essere perdonati i peccati degli uomini…Quel che sarà chiesto nella preghiera, sarà esaudito. Quindi dedica la grotta al culto cristiano”. 

Ma il santo vescovo non diede seguito alla richiesta dell’arcangelo, perché sul monte persisteva il culto pagano; due anni dopo, nel 492 Siponto era assediata dalle orde del re barbaro Odoacre (434-493); ormai allo stremo, il vescovo e il popolo si riunirono in preghiera, durante una tregua, e qui riapparve l’arcangelo al vescovo s. Lorenzo, promettendo loro la vittoria, infatti durante la battaglia si alzò una tempesta di sabbia e grandine che si rovesciò sui barbari invasori, che spaventati fuggirono.
Tutta la città con il vescovo, salì sul monte in processione di ringraziamento; ma ancora una volta il vescovo non volle entrare nella grotta. Per questa sua esitazione che non si spiegava, s. Lorenzo Maiorano si recò a Roma dal papa Gelasio I (490-496), il quale gli ordinò di entrare nella grotta insieme ai vescovi della Puglia, dopo un digiuno di penitenza. 

Recatosi i tre vescovi alla grotta per la dedicazione, riapparve loro per la terza volta l’arcangelo, annunziando che la cerimonia non era più necessaria, perché la consacrazione era già avvenuta con la sua presenza. La leggenda racconta che quando i vescovi entrarono nella grotta, trovarono un altare coperto da un panno rosso con sopra una croce di cristallo e impressa su un masso l’impronta di un piede infantile, che la tradizione popolare attribuisce a s. Michele. 

Il vescovo san Lorenzo fece costruire all’ingresso della grotta, una chiesa dedicata a s. Michele e inaugurata il 29 settembre 493; la Sacra Grotta è invece rimasta sempre come un luogo di culto mai consacrato da vescovi e nei secoli divenne celebre con il titolo di “Celeste Basilica”. 

Attorno alla chiesa e alla grotta è cresciuta nel tempo la cittadina di Monte Sant’Angelo nel Gargano. I Longobardi che avevano fondato nel secolo VI il Ducato di Benevento, vinsero i feroci nemici delle coste italiane, i saraceni, proprio nei pressi di Siponto, l’8 maggio 663, avendo attribuito la vittoria alla protezione celeste di s. Michele, essi presero a diffondere come prima accennato, il culto per l’arcangelo in tutta Italia, erigendogli chiese, effigiandolo su stendardi e monete e instaurando la festa dell’8 maggio dappertutto. 

Intanto la Sacra Grotta diventò per tutti i secoli successivi, una delle mete più frequentate dai pellegrini cristiani, diventando insieme a Gerusalemme, Roma, Loreto e S. Giacomo di Compostella, i poli sacri dall’Alto Medioevo in poi. 

Sul Gargano giunsero in pellegrinaggio papi, sovrani, futuri santi. Sul portale dell’atrio superiore della basilica, che non è possibile descrivere qui, vi è un’iscrizione latina che ammonisce: “che questo è un luogo impressionante. Qui è la casa di Dio e la porta del Cielo”. 

Il santuario e la Sacra Grotta sono pieni di opere d’arte, di devozione e di voto, che testimoniano lo scorrere millenario dei pellegrini e su tutto campeggia nell’oscurità la statua in marmo bianco di S. Michele, opera del Sansovino, datata 1507. 

L’arcangelo è comparso lungo i secoli altre volte, sia pure non come sul Gargano, che rimane il centro del suo culto, ed il popolo cristiano lo celebra ovunque con sagre, fiere, processioni, pellegrinaggi e non c’è Paese europeo che non abbia un’abbazia, chiesa, cattedrale, ecc. che lo ricordi alla venerazione dei fedeli. 

Apparendo ad una devota portoghese Antonia de Astonac, l’arcangelo promise la sua continua assistenza, sia in vita che in purgatorio e inoltre l’accompagnamento alla S. Comunione da parte di un angelo di ciascuno dei nove cori celesti, se avessero recitato prima della Messa la corona angelica che gli rivelò. 

I cori sono: Serafini, Cherubini, Troni, Dominazioni, Potestà, Virtù, Principati, Arcangeli ed Angeli. La sua festa liturgica principale in Occidente è iscritta nel Martirologio Romano al 29 settembre e nella riforma del calendario liturgico del 1970, è accomunato agli altri due arcangeli più conosciuti, Gabriele e Raffaele nello stesso giorno, mentre l’altro arcangelo a volte nominato nei testi apocrifi, Uriele, non gode di un culto proprio. 

Per la sua caratteristica di “guerriero celeste” s. Michele è patrono degli spadaccini, dei maestri d’armi; poi dei doratori, dei commercianti, di tutti i mestieri che usano la bilancia, i farmacisti, pasticcieri, droghieri, merciai; fabbricanti di tinozze, inoltre è patrono dei radiologi e della Polizia. 

È patrono principale delle città italiane di Cuneo, Caltanissetta, Monte Sant’Angelo, Sant’Angelo dei Lombardi, compatrono di Caserta. 

Difensore della Chiesa, la sua statua compare sulla sommità di Castel S. Angelo a Roma, che come è noto era diventata una fortezza in difesa del Pontefice; protettore del popolo cristiano, così come un tempo lo era dei pellegrini medievali, che lo invocavano nei santuari ed oratori a lui dedicati, disseminati lungo le strade che conducevano alle mete dei pellegrinaggi, per avere protezione contro le malattie, lo scoraggiamento e le imboscate dei banditi. 

Per quanto riguarda la sua raffigurazione nell’arte in generale, è delle più vaste; ogni scuola pittorica in Oriente e in Occidente, lo ha quasi sempre raffigurato armato in atto di combattere il demonio. 

Sul Monte Athos nel convento di Dionisio del 1547, i tre principale arcangeli sono così raffigurati, Raffaele in abito ecclesiastico, Michele da guerriero e Gabriele in pacifica posa e rappresentano i poteri religioso, militare e civile.

Autore: Antonio Borrelli



The wooden church in Stoboru, Sălaj county, Romania

Santi Michele, Gabriele e Raffaele Arcangeli

29 settembre

Il Martirologio commemora insieme i santi arcangeli Michele, Gabriele e Raffaele. La Bibbia li ricorda con specifiche missioni: Michele avversario di Satana, Gabriele annunciatore e Raffaele soccorritore.


Prima della riforma del 1969 si ricordava in questo giorno solamente san Michele arcangelo in memoria della consacrazione del celebre santuario sul monte Gargano a lui dedicato.


Il titolo di arcangelo deriva dall’idea di una corte celeste in cui gli angeli sono presenti secondo gradi e dignità differenti.


Gli arcangeli Michele, Gabriele e Raffaele occupano le sfere più elevate delle gerarchie angeliche.


Queste hanno il compito di preservare la trascendenza e il mistero di Dio. Nello stesso tempo, rendono presente e percepibile la sua vicinanza salvifica.

Martirologio Romano: Festa dei santi Michele, Gabriele e Raffaele, arcangeli. Nel giorno della dedicazione della basilica intitolata a San Michele anticamente edificata a Roma al sesto miglio della via Salaria, si celebrano insieme i tre arcangeli, di cui la Sacra Scrittura rivela le particolari missioni: giorno e notte essi servono Dio e, contemplando il suo volto, lo glorificano incessantemente.

Il 29 di settembre la Chiesa commemora la festa liturgica dei santi Arcangeli:

San MICHELE


San GABRIELE


San RAFFAELE


Michele (Chi è come Dio?) è l’arcangelo che insorge contro Satana e i suoi satelliti (Gd 9; Ap 12, 7; cfr Zc 13, 1-2), difensore degli amici di Dio (Dn 10, 13.21), pretettore del suo popolo (Dn 12, 1).


Gabriele (Forza di Dio) è uno degli spiriti che stanno davanti a Dio (Lc 1, 19), rivela a Daniele i segreti del piano di Dio (Dn 8, 16; 9, 21-22), annunzia a Zaccaria la nascita di Giovanni Battista (Lc 1, 11-20) e a Maria quella di Gesù (Lc 1, 26-38).


Raffaele (Dio ha guarito), anch’egli fra i sette angeli che stanno davanti al trono di Dio (Tb 12, 15; cfr Ap 8, 2), accompagna e custodisce Tobia nelle peripezie del suo viaggio e gli guarisce il padre cieco.
La Chiesa pellegrina sulla terra, specialmente nella liturgia eucaristica, è associata alle schiere degli angeli che nella Gerusalemme celeste cantano la gloria di Dio (cfr Ap 5, 11-14; Conc. Vat. II, Costituzione sulla sacra liturgia, «Sacrosanctum Concilium», 8).


Il 29 settembre il martirologio geronimiano (sec. VI) ricorda la dedicazione della basilica di san Michele (sec. V) sulla via Salaria a Roma.


SOURCE : http://www.santiebeati.it/dettaglio/21625



Église des Saints-Archanges, 9 Bis Rue Jean de Beauvais, 75005 Paris


Voir aussi : http://rouen.catholique.fr/spip.php?article1966

http://www.spiritualite-chretienne.com/anges/ange-gardien/hierar04.html