Everyone has a Guardian Angel
June 26, 06
social.moldova.org
That every individual soul has a guardian angel has never been defined by the Church, and is, consequently, not an article of faith; but it is the "mind of the Church", as St. Jerome expressed it: "how great the dignity of the soul, since each one has from his birth an angel commissioned to guard it." (Comm. in Matt., xviii, lib. II).
Around 1990, Iraqi archaeologists found three very rich Assyrian tombs , dating to about 750-700 BC, under the floors of rooms in Ashurnasirpal's harem. One contained this extraordinary gold crown: it has a trellis vine on top, with bunches of lapis-lazuli grapes hanging below it, supported by four-winged robed figures, similar to what is often described as angel, standing on rows of pomegranates and rosettes .
This belief in guardian angels can be traced throughout all antiquity; pagans, like Menander and Plutarch (cf. Euseb., "Praep. Evang.", xii), and Neo-Platonists, like Plotinus, held it. It was also the belief of the Babylonians and Assyrians, as their monuments testify, for a figure of a guardian angel now in the British Museum once decorated an Assyrian palace, and might well serve for a modern representation; while Nabopolassar, father of Nebuchadnezzar the Great, says: "He (Marduk) sent a tutelary deity (cherub) of grace to go at my side; in everything that I did, he made my work to succeed."
Guardian angels called Lamasu which once decorated the Assyrian palaces
|
