Friday, October 18, 2019

Jean Danielou on the Role of Angels in Baptism in Eary Christianity and Baptismal Regeneration


The following is from a monograph on angels from Catholic theologian Jean Danielou on the topic of how early Christians viewed angels having a role in preparing one for baptism as well as their role in the salvific efficacy of baptism. I am reproducing it, not that I am endorsing the theology of Origen et al., on this issue, but as further evidence of how early Christians viewed water baptism, not as a mere symbol, but the instrumental means of receiving a remission of one’s past and then-present sins:

This role of the angels begins with baptism. Baptism is the continuation of the great works of God in both Testaments. It is a new creation. It is a resurrection. It is also the anticipation of the judgment at the end of the world. The same angels who assist the Trinity in the accomplishment of its admirable work are at hand here too as witnesses full of amazement and servants full of zeal. Thus the Shepherd of Hermas shows them working on the construction of the Tower that is built upon the water: that is, the Church, which is established upon baptism. “The tower that you see under construction is the Church . . . It is built upon water because your life has been saved by water . . . [These six young men who are building it] are the angels of God, the first to be set up, to whom the Lord has delivered all creatures, to organize, build, and govern them. It is y them that the construction of the Tower will be accomplished” (Vis., 3, 3, 2-4. See also Sim., 9, 12, 7-8). How could the angels, who are the associates of all the works of God, be anything less in this work of works, which is the Church?

Just as they were at the same time instruments for what was prepared and the witnesses of what was accomplished in the mysteries of Christ, so they are in baptism. They play an active role in the preparations for it. Just as the Apostles were sent visibly to the pagan nations, the angels are sent invisibly to draw them to the Church. “There are other angels who gather the faithful from all nations. Let us think for a moment whether this is not true: just as in a certain city, for example, when as yet no Christians have been born, if someone comes in and begins to teach and work and instruct and lead to the Faith, he afterwards becomes the leader and the ‘bishop’ of those whom he has taught; so also the holy angels will in the future become the leaders of those whom they have drawn together from different nations and made to advance by the work of their ministry” (Hom. In Num., 11, 4) . . . The Sacramentary of Gelasius contains a prayer for the catechumens where they beg God “that He vouchsafe to send His holy angel to preserve His servants and to lead them to the grace of baptism” (Wilson, Gelasian Sacramentary, p. 48). Origen develops this theme with his usual lively manner: “Come, angel, receive him who has been converted from his former error, from the doctrine of the demons . . . Receive him as a careful physician; warm and heal him . . . Receive him and give him the baptism of the second birth” (Hom. In Ez., 1, 7).

Origen clearly associates the angel not only with the preparation for baptism but with baptism itself. This idea is developed by Tertullian, who attributes to the angel a role of the first importance in the sacrament: “Cleansed in the water by the action of the angel, we are prepared for the Holy Spirit . . . Thus the angel set in charge of baptism makes ready the way for the coming of the Holy Spirit by the washing away of sins” (De bapt., 6). It would seem, from a reading of this text, that the baptized person is first of all purified in the water by the angel, and then consecrated by the Holy Spirit” (See Amann, “L’ange de baptême chez Tertullian,” Rev. Sc. Rel., 1981, pp. 206 f.) This strange theory is interesting only for the allusion it contains to the angel of baptism.

The teaching of the Fathers goes no farther than to show the angels assisting at baptism. Origen writes: “At the time that the Sacrament of the Faith was administered to you, there were present heavenly Powers, the ministrations of the angels, the Church of the first-born” (Hom. In Jos., 9, 4). Gregory Nazianzen also thinks that “the angels give glory to the baptism because of its relation with their own sparkling purity” (Or., 40, 4). And Didymus of Alexandria shows them assisting at the sacrament: “On the level of the visible, the baptismal pool gives birth to our visible body by the ministry of the priests; on the level of the invisible it is the invisible Spirit of God who plunges (βαπτιζει) both our body and our soul into Himself and regenerates us with the aid of the angels” (De Trin., 2). Thus both the earthly Church of the priests and the heavenly Church of the angels are ministers of the regeneration operated through the Holy Spirit. (Jean Danielou, The Angel and their Mission: According to the Fathers of the Church [trans. David Heimann; Notre Dame: Christian Classics, 1957], 56-57, 58-60)