History and the Doctrine of Guardian Angels

[sdi]

I stumbled across the following (modern) folk prayer the other day:

May the angels walk beside you always, offering wisdom in times of uncertainty, courage in the face of fear, luck in moments of opportunity, and protection in times of vulnerability.

The prayer is fine as far as it goes, even though I have a tendency to be dismissive of modern folk spirituality: my default response is to look down on such things. The reason for this, I think, is that spirituality is and must be descended from mystical experience, and it is difficult to authenticate the mystical experiences of others; lacking better tools, I favor time as a filter to separate the wheat from the chaff, and so the more archaic the belief, the more likely it is to have had merits worth preserving. However, I realized today that I am being rather unfair to this prayer in particular.

As you all surely know by now, I am very fond of my guardian angel, and so, in an effort to understand them (or as an offering to them, which I suppose is the same thing), I have been tracing the doctrines about these kinds of beings for a while. The earliest source I have found so far is Hesiod, Works and Days ll. 121–6 (tr. Hugh G. Evelyn-White):

αὐτὰρ ἐπεὶ δὴ τοῦτο γένος κατὰ γαῖ᾽ ἐκάλυψε,—
τοὶ μὲν δαίμονες ἁγνοὶ ἐπιχθόνιοι καλέονται
ἐσθλοί, ἀλεξίκακοι, φύλακες θνητῶν ἀνθρώπων,
οἵ ῥα φυλάσσουσίν τε δίκας καὶ σχέτλια ἔργα
ἠέρα ἑσσάμενοι πάντη φοιτῶντες ἐπ᾽ αἶαν,
πλουτοδόται: καὶ τοῦτο γέρας βασιλήιον ἔσχον—,
[...]

But after the earth had covered [the golden] generation—they are called pure spirits dwelling on the earth, and are kindly, delivering from harm, and guardians of mortal men; for they roam everywhere over the earth, clothed in mist and keep watch on judgements and cruel deeds, givers of wealth; for this royal right also they received;— [...]

Translation is treason, and Evelyn-White's is no exception, but as best as I can discern with the help of several dictionaries, Hesiod outlines here the following five tenets:

• Guardian angels live on the earth with us (as contrasted with the gods in heaven, the silver generation in the underworld, etc.).

• Guardian angels are morally good and guide us in right behavior.

• Guardian angels protect us from spiritual harm.

• Guardian angels encourage us through difficult situations.

• Guardian angels dispense good fortune.

Astute readers will note that these five points are the exact same ones from the folk prayer I mentioned above, merely rearranged. One might be inclined to see Providence ensuring continuity of doctrine over the last three thousand years, and if that is so, then it makes for a good antidote to my conservative tendencies.

I suspect Hesiod's teachings go back further still, either to Egypt or Mesopotamia (though I despair of tracing it back any further than that). If anyone knows of textual references from either, I would be grateful.

Comments

[thinking_turtle]

Thanks for the thought inspiring post! Hesiod talks about spirits, and specifically those who roam around. It seems to me that a personal guardian angel stays with you, while a nature spirit guides those who wander close by. What makes you translate spirit as guardian angel?

[sdi]

Simply that the Greeks themselves did! The word δαίμων ("dæmon") literally means "divinity;" it can refer to any divine being, but usually to those inferior in power to the gods, and especially the tutelary deities of a person, family, city, or location. The Platonists and Neoplatonists especially talk about it because of Socrates and Plotinus were well-known for stories about their dæmons. Plutarch even tells a silly story where Socrates' angel protects him from being trampled by pigs, which reads like it could come from any modern book of angel stories, like Sophy Burnham's Book of Angels.

While I take my own interpretation of things a lot, this isn't one of them! Thomas Taylor translates the word as "angel" in a variety of places, dictionaries and encyclopedias often gloss "dæmon" or "genius" as "guardian angel," etc. Personally, I think Evelyn-White's "pure spirits" is suspect: "spirits" can refer to ghosts or the like in English, but dæmon cannot (Greeks would use the word σκιά, "shade," for that); similarly, "nature spirits" would be Greek νύμφη ("nymph").

Per the dictionary, "holy guardian angels" would be a fine translation of "δαίμονες ἁγνοὶ." It seems to me that Christian translators routinely shrink from using religious terms when translating, though: Sir Charles Abraham Elton footnotes this section in his translation with a lengthy polemic against paganism, and Frederick William Henry Myers apologizes for applying the term "saint" to Plotinus!

[thinking_turtle]

Thanks for the additional information! So the word demon changed from the Greek "divinity" to the current "source or agent of evil". According to etymonline.com this happened when Christian writers used the word demon to refer a "heathen idol".

[sdi]

Yup, you have it exactly. And to be fair to the Christians, the philosophers also talk about evil dæmons—dæmons can be good or bad, just like humans can—but Hesiod, here, is obviously referring to beneficent beings.

The term δαίμων ("dæmon") was gradually displaced by ἄγγελος ("angel," meaning "messenger"), which was used both by the Christians for their literal divine messengers (e.g. Gabriel to Mary) and by the late philosophers for one of the higher degrees of dæmons. Iamblichus, for example, gives the divine hierarchy as gods, then archangels (ἀρχάγγελος, "commander-angel"), then angels, then dæmons, then heroes, then men. (On the Mysteries II vi.) I hadn't thought about it before, but it seems to me that these degrees relate to Hesiod's five ages of men...