Pope Saint Gregory the Great teaches, based on Saint Paul’s writings, that there are nine orders of angels: "We know on the authority of Scripture that there are nine orders of angels -- Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones, Dominions, Principalities, Powers, Virtues, Archangels, and Angels. That there are Angels and Archangels, nearly every page of the Bible tell us, and the books of the Prophets talk of Cherubim and Seraphim."
Nine Orders of Angels
"Saint 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.” (Hom. 34, In Evang.)
Saint Thomas Aquinas teaches the same ninefold pattern at Summa Theologica I, q. 108.
Saint Paul teaches and speaks of Angels and Archangels and refers to the orders of “principality, and power, and virtue, and dominion” in Ephesians 1:21. He also mentions “thrones, dominations, principalities, or powers” at Colossians 1:16.
The term archangel occurs only in Saint Jude and 1 Thessalonians 4:15; but Saint 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.”
Saint Paul gives us the middle five orders and we add to it, “angels, archangels, cherubim, and seraphim” from his writings and the rest of Sacred Scripture. So, that bring us to nine orders or choirs of angels!
+JMJ+
© Article: Dr. Taylor Marshall. 2019. All Rights Reserved. Original Article Here.
© Illustration: Jason Koltuniak. All Rights Reserved, Counting on Faith.
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