Tomorrow night I’m leading a discussion group at home on the subject of angels. Unlike some topics, I don’t have a go-to book on the subject on my shelves so I’ve been doing some searching round the web to get ideas. There is certainly no shortage of material although not all of it has the Bible roots I’m looking for; angels are a popular topic but some of the sources are just masquerading as sources of light and truth! (see 2 Cor 11:14-15)

The best single source I found was a long essay on Angelology on Bible.org, written by the late J Hampton Keathley IIII, although the CARM website is also worth a mention. I also found plenty of YouTube videos with alleged recordings of angels in action but I think I’m going to reserve judgement on those (although I’ve marked on as a potential starting point for the evening).

The Bible actually contains a fairly large amount of references to angels, from beginning to end. However, a lot of what we think we know comes from apocryphal writings, both ones that fit in some Christian canons, like Tobit, and ones that fall largely outside, like Enoch. Further to gnostic fringes of Christian faith, there are other sources like Jewish and Islamic lore, apparently angelic beings in other faiths and perhaps even many of the legends of heroes and gods. Oh, and doubtless much that is made up either as wish fulfilment or to make a fast buck!