"If you seek an angel with an open heart... You shall always find one." Anonymous
SALT LAKE CITY - Where do angels live? To read and enjoy Edward Lucie-Smith's wonderful "The Glory of Angels" is to learn there are angels all around us all the time.
Lucie-Smith introduces us to images of angels created as far back at the 11th century. He offers paintings, icons, tapestries, sculptures, mosaics, frescos, murals, illuminated pages and drawings of angels, as they have been perceived throughout the centuries.
In chapter four we learn of angels who guard us, those who warn us, angels who comfort us, who fight for us and angels who instruct us. Chapter three introduces us to the archangels. Angels from many lands are seen in chapter seven; angels of the modern world in chapter eight.
Dante Alighieri, in pondering the hierarchy of angels, wrote,
"The three Divine are in this hierarchy,
First the Dominions, and the Virtues next;
And the third order is that of the Powers,
Then in the dances twain penultimate
The Principalities and Archangels wheel;
The last is wholly of angelic sports.
These orders upward all of them are gazing,
And downward so prevail, that unto God
They all attracted are and all attract."
From the book's cover, which opens like church doors, to its last page, we see angels of every type and purpose, and in a special section on Saint Michael the Archangel we see the fallen angels, who chose not to live with God, and who became more and more grotesque the further they fell.
Each of the archangels has a special section and depictions by artistic masters such as Giovanni Domenico Vinaccia and Piete Bruegel the Elder.
Drawing from the writings of such theologians as St. Thomas Aquinas, the book inspires the reader to meditate on the beings that accompany us everywhere we go.
We share our faith in angels with people from many lands and religious traditions. They may not be called angels, but have similar supernatural identities and responsibilities. There is a Russian icon of the Archangel, a detail from a Chinese sculpture of a celestial being, celestial beings from Iran, Japan and India as the Islamic tradition, which holds the belief in angels as an article of faith.
"And whoever disbelieves in God and his angels and his books and his messengers and the last day, he indeed strays far away." (The Qur'an)
Certain images from Scripture have been favorites of artists worldwide and throughout time, and "The Glory of Angels" reveals these favorite scenes again and again. There also are images of what angels do for us today. "They are our guardians, our ministers, our brothers and fellow citizens. They bear our souls to heaven, they present our prayers to God."
There is much to be seen, pondered over and delighted in "The Glory of Angels." It would make a much-loved gift as we near the holiday season.
"The Glory of Angels," by Edward Lucie-Smith, Collins Design, an imprint of Harper Collins Publishers, New York, hard cover, 192 pages, $35.
Stay Connected With Us