Of the nature of this ministry of angels for the good of them that shall inherit salvation, because it belongs not directly unto the present design of the apostle, and would, in the full consideration of it, cause a long diversion from the work in hand, I shall not treat, although it be a matter singularly deserving our meditation.
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242 AN EXPOSITION OF THE [CHAP. I.
For the present it may suffice us to observe, that in the government and protection of his saints here below, both as to the dispensation of grace and providence, God is pleased to make use of the ministry of angels, wherein much of their honour and our safety do con- sist. For a close of the whole, we may only observe the way and manner whereby the apostle proposeth this doctrine of the ministry of angels unto the Hebrews. “ Are they not?” saith he. He speaks of it as a matter well known unto them, and acknowledged by them. Their nature, their dignity, and their office, were declared in the Old Testament. Thence were they instructed, that as to their nature they were spirits; in dignity, thrones, principalities, and powers; in office, ministers unto God, sent out for the good of his church. And therefore these things the apostle in sundry places takes for granted, as those that were already known and received in the church of God, Rom. viii. 88; Eph. i: 20, 21; Col. 1. 16. This doctrine, then, I say, was propagated from the Jews unto the Christians. And from them also came forth much of that curiosity and superstition about angels which afterwards infected the minds of many in the Christian church; for after they were forsaken of God, and began to give up themselves unto vain speculations, there was not any thing wherein the vanity of their minds did more early manifest itself than in their imaginations about angels,—wherein they exercise themselves unto this day. For, to omit their mon- strous figments about the original of devils,—most of whom they affirm to have been begotten by Adam on Lilith, before God formed Eve, and many to have issued from Adam and Eve severally whilst they lived separate an hundred and fifty years after the death of Abel,—as later follies, it is certain that some of them began to vent curiosities about angels in the apostle’s time, Col. ii, 18, and to ex- press their fancies about their names, orders, degrees, and employ- ments. And this they continue yet to do; although they peremp- torily deny that they are to be invocated, or prayed unto,—wherein they are outdone by others. Names they have invented for them innumerable, and those many of them uncouth and insignificant. Orders also, or degrees, they assign unto them; some four, some five, some seven, some nine, some thirteen, according as it hath seemed good unto this or that great master among them. From them the pseudo Dionysius, about the fourth or fifth century after Christ, took the occasion and rise of his operose figment about the celestial hierarchy; though he mixed their inventions with many Peripatetical and Pythagorean notions. Aristotle proportioned the number of the intelligences unto the spheres of the heavens; more he granted not. The Pythagoreans and Platonics asserted all things here below to be influenced by the planets in their orbs, the inferior receiving a communication of virtue from the higher, and imparting
VER. 14.] EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 243
it unto them beneath. So they interpreted the exsection of Saturn by Jupiter, as that of Coelum by Saturn, to be the interception of their procreative influence, that it should not immediately be com- municated unto things below but by them. Out of all these fancies did Dionysius raise his hierarchy. From the Jews he took the disposition of his angels into orders of superiority and rule; from Aristotle their number, placing an order instead of a single intelli- gence, to answer what is taught in the Scripture concerning their multitude; and from the Pythagorean Platonics the communication of light, knowledge, and illumination from God, by the highest to the lowest series or order, and from them to men on earth. And on this foundation, such as it is, are built the discourses of many commentators on this place, in their inquiries whether angels of the superior orders are sent forth to minister for the good of believers; which is denied by many, though by some later expositors, as Estius, Ribera, Tena, 4 Lapide, granted and proved, not without much ado. So hard is it sometimes for men to cast down scarecrows of their own setting up.
It remaineth only that we close our whole discourses on this chap- ter with some observations for our own use and instruction from this last verse; as,—
I. The highest honour of the most glorious spirits in heaven is to minister unto the Lord in the service whereunto he appoints them.
This is the office, this the work of angels; and this is their honour and glory. For what greater honour can a creature be made partaker of, than to be employed in the service of his Creator ? what greater glory, than to stand in the presence and to do the will of the King of heaven? If it be an honour on earth to stand before princes, dying, perishing men, and that unto them in nature and kind equal unto those before whom they stand, what is it for them who by nature are at an infinite distance from the glory of God, to stand before Him who lives for ever and ever? And surely it will be unconceivably woful unto poor souls at the last day, to