About Angels

With the entrance of Mrs. Marcel to the classroom, English class was officially in session. The students all took their seats as she announced the task of the day.

"Today, I want to take a small break from reading comprehension and have you all write a short story instead. It doesn't matter what it is about as I am not got going to be grading you on its content as much as I am looking at your sentence structure and use of proper punctuation."

Listening to this, Jasmine started to look forward to this assignment as she had been thinking about writing a story based off her recent dreams.

A tale about angels! Wouldn't that be great?

But there was a small problem. Most stories had some moral or message to convey, yet what would be hers? This left her a bit stumped.

As Mrs. Marcel continued with her explanation of the importance of brainstorming and how to go about creating their stories for the assignment, Jasmine thought on this. The diagram that the teacher suggested using seemed to be of some aid to Jasmine in this endeavor.

This was an individual assignment and not a group assignment, so she couldn't exactly ask Liliana for help. Not that her friend could be much of a help as she seemed to be preoccupied with what to write about in the first place.

Stuck with her predicament, the lunch bell didn't seem to be able to come fast enough for Jasmine. She really wanted to visit the library again and do a little more research on angels.

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When the lunch break came, Jasmine was one of the first out the door and after splitting up from Liliana, she immediately headed to the library. She wasn't alone as there were a few other students there who were busy studying.

Taking a seat at one of the computers available in the library, she started her web search and started pouring over the information she could find on angels. She would take a few notes as she found something interesting every so often in her notebook and the idea for her short story began to form.

Online, she found the information about the hierarchy of angels again. In order, they were the Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones, Dominions, Virtues, Powers, Principalities, Archangels and finally, the rest of the angels.

The Seraphim were the highest order of angels and were described as six-winged beings of light and fire. Although she didn't recall anything like that in her dreams, she couldn't help but wonder how dazzling would they be.

Metatron, the Voice of God, was the leader of the Seraphim and was described as being an eight-winged angel. Why he was different? Who knows?

Second to the Seraphim were the Cherubim. Funny enough, her web search pulled up search results of little winged babies like those you would see on Valentine's cards, but the description of the Cherubim according to the Book of Enoch was drastically different.

The Cherubim were four-winged angels and the guardians of the Garden of Eden. However, their physical description got a little more frightening as they supposedly had four faces: one of a man, one of a lion, one of an ox and the last of an eagle. How freaky would that be?

According to the Book of Enoch, the Thrones took the form of a winged wheel of fire, but in Jasmine's dreams, Uriel was one of the Thrones and he definitely wasn't some winged wheel. He had a rather human appearance if you disregarded his set of black wings, that is. So, Jasmine quickly ignored some of the physical descriptions coming from the Book of Enoch at this point.

The Thrones were a class of angels that promoted peace and harmony. Yet this didn't mean that they were just punching bags. They took on the task of meting out divine judgement and justice while maintaining harmony amongst the cosmos. So, they kind of sounded like the courts of heaven to Jasmine.

The fourth class of angels were the Dominions and from her dreams, she could remember that Astaroth was a part of them and had overseen the investigation. Thus, it was of little surprise to her when she read that the Dominions regulated the division of tasks and duties amongst the angels in heaven.

In fifth, the Virtues were responsible for the miracles on Earth. So, when a blind man recovered his sight or a miraculous healing of the sick occurred, it was attributed to one of the Virtues. This made some sense to Jasmine as she remembered that Raphael was a healer in heaven and the chief of the Virtues in her dreams, though he didn't seem all that virtuous to her.

With that thought in mind, she couldn't help but wonder about Belial in her dreams. What did he do that was so virtuous to become the deputy chief of the Virtues anyways?

The Powers that was led by Lucifer in Jasmine's dream were sixth in the class ranking of angels. Seconded by his brother, Michael, the Powers were the warriors and army forces of heaven that were charged with the duty to execute law and order within the cosmos.

It seems that they are both the police and the military of heaven, Jasmine thought. However, being led by Lucifer, that would certainly be a recipe for disaster, right?

Following the Powers was the Principalities, who presided over other angels in guiding and assisting the leaders of the world in administration. In a way, they were the advisors of the kings and lords of the land on Earth, but also were above them.

Thinking of how unreadable Sariel was from her dreams and how Levana was uneasy around him, made her unconsciously shudder. He was the chief of the Principalities, but he acted so inhumane. To think that he was advising any world leaders on how to govern was a scary thought. No wonder there are so many ruthless dictators and cold politicians in the world, Jasmine thought.

Information of the Archangels that followed after the Principalities on the classes of angels was confusing. Mostly because what she found about the archangels was that they were some of the named angels in the other orders. Why they would be ranked near the bottom of the order of angels yet be named chiefs of some of the higher orders didn't make sense to Jasmine.

Even the names of the archangels didn't seem to be fixed in her web searches. Some sources named Michael, Raphael, Gabriel and Uriel as archangels, but then varied wildly on any others after these four.

But if Michael, Raphael and Uriel held positions in the higher order of angels, then would the other chiefs and deputies be archangels too? What about Gabriel? Did Gabriel hold a position in one of the higher order of angels as well and she just didn't know about it yet?

The inconsistencies frustrated Jasmine and she ended her research at this point. She had enough to write her short story for class and that is all that mattered right now.