Talk:Fallen angel

• Objective: To prevent edit warring
• Goal: Come to resolution of each sentence, line by line and/or item by item.
• Editors: User:jasonasosa versus User:Esoglou
• Discussion: Open discussion concerning Watchers in 1 Enoch and Grigori (Watchers) in 2 Enoch

A lot of changes in this article since Jan 1st. But just looking specifically at the "Lucifer" section, not sure everything is an improvement. Lucifer was a title of Christ up till the 3rd or 4th Century, and what 100% hard evidence is there in any Jewish source that any Jewish writer identified Isaiah's Morning Star with a fallen angel? In ictu oculi (talk) 08:10, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

I agree that there have been quite a lot of changes since 1 January, and I too am not at all sure that everything is an improvement. But I wonder what source says Lucifer was a title of Christ (since when?) until the 3rd or 4th century. The title Lucifer could have been used of Christ after people began to write of him in Latin. The word "lucifer" (Latin for "morning star") appears only three times in the late 4th-century Latin Vulgate (Job 11:17, Isaiah 14:12 and 2 Peter 1:19) and not as a title of Christ. So what were the earlier writings in which the word was used of Christ? I presume that Adele Berlin and Maxine Grossman are Jewish writers, I mean the editors of The Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion, which says that the Jewish writers of Jewish pseudepigrapha did "misinterpret" Isaiah 14:12 as referring to Satan cast out of heaven as a fallen angel. Esoglou (talk) 12:00, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

User:In ictu oculi, Lucifer as a title of Christ would be out of the WP:SCOPE of this article. Such topic is best discussed at Lucifer. The scope of Lucifer in this article is with the POV that he is a fallen angel: whether from the POV of being Satan, the POV of being an unnamed angel wearing Lucifer as a title, or the POV of having the name Lucifer, who happens to be a fallen angel (Not necessarily Satan). Therefore, there is no 100% hard evidence of who Lucifer is... Maybe the layout of this article is deceiving, and needs to be changed so as to not confuse the audience into thinking that it is a cold hard fact that Lucifer is Satan or a fallen angel. It must be made clear that this is interpretation / POV. Thanks,   — Jasonasosa 15:25, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Hi Esoglou - Lucifer/Phosphorus in 2 Peter 1:19 is taken as a reference to Christ in very early Christian texts, from the Greek and old Latin before the Vulgate. Pre-Lucifer of Cagliari evidently.

The entry for Berlin only says "revised Sarah L Schwartz" that doesn't tell us who/when wrote p651 but the bracketed text (a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12) in "Satan's expanded role describes him as ruler of a demonic host, influencing events throughout the world, cast out of heaven as a fallen angel (a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12). Satan is rarely ... " is not supported by any evidence. Where in Charlesworth's OTP or the DSS is there any such interpretation of Is. 14.12. As far as I know the misreading of Is. 14.12 has no Jewish evidence, but is of Christian origin. That "(a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12)" may be the editor's comment, or forward-looking or who knows. It's a fairly major innovation to be claiming in the article text that Judaism rather than Christians were responsible for the Is. 14.12 reading.

Hi Jasonasosa - why? no, Lucifer as a title of Christ is not outside the scope of this article. If 4th Century Christian reinterpretation of Isaiah 14:12 is relevant in the (non-Jewish) section of the article, then that this is a later Christian reinterpretation/development also goes in. In ictu oculi (talk) 16:33, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

This article is about fallen angels... to include Christ would be to suggest him as a fallen angel. It is defiantly out of scope. That subject belongs on the Lucifer page. I had put the reference on that page at one point, but User:Esoglou omitted my edit entirely. I had not disputed it yet, because I've been planning on gathering more information about how Lucifer ties into Christ as a title or description.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Jasonasosa (talk • contribs)

In ictu oculi may disagree with the Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion and complain that it gives no source for one of its statements, but it is, in Wikipedia terms, a reliable source.

What "very early Christian texts" interpreted 2 Peter 1:19 as a reference to Christ? If any of them did in Greek, why do you suggest that φωσφόρος (lower case) means "Lucifer" (upper case). Surely it means instead "morning star", the Latin for which is "lucifer" (lower case). Not even the King James Version translates φωσφόρος as Lucifer, though it (unlike more up-to-date translations) used "Lucifer" to translate the Hebrew word in Isaiah 12:14 that in Greek appears as ἑωσφόρος, not φωσφόρος. Why does the name of Lucifer of Cagliari suggest to you that Christ was called Lucifer before the time of Lucifer of Cagliari? Certainly, Christ is today called "morning star" (in Latin, lucifer), but certainly not Lucifer, in the Roman Rite Easter Vigil liturgy, but that is later than Lucifer of Cagliari.

(I have corrected a mistake that I made: the Vulgate uses the word "lucifer" (morning star), not the name Lucifer, three times in the nominative and vocative cases, but also twice in the accusative.) Esoglou (talk) 19:21, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

Esoglou, see Augustine's Tractate on John 35 for example - with the Christ-Lucifer arising in Christian's hearts. More to the point would be to ask which early Christian texts interpret 2 Peter 1:19 and don't connect the Lucifer there with Christ? References to the 2 Peter Christ-Lucifer will still common long after Origen became the first to identify the Isaiah Lucifer with Satan. They are today too, in any Catholic or Protestant commentary on 2 Peter.

As for a reliable source this brief bracketed statement "(a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12)" in a brief dictionary entry on Satan - author unknown - in the Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion may not pass WP:IRS as the "best such source" or "source reliable for the statement" ...

Can I ask who added the Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion and made the conclusion currently in the article?

Richard L. Rubenstein The Religious Imagination A Study in Psychoanalysis and Jewish Theology, 1968 cites "Is.14:12-14. 20. Bernard Bamberger, Fallen Angels (Philadelphia: Jewish Publishing Society, 1952), pp. 9 ff. 21. For rabbinic interpretations of Isaiah 14:12-14 as referring to Nebuchadnezzar, cf. Mekilta Shirata (Ed. L.), Vol. II, 18, 1.84-86; p." The relevant quote in Bamberger is Bernard Jacob Bamberger Fallen Angels: Soldiers of Satan's Realm Page 109 2006 "This verse, we have seen, was held by Christians to describe the fall of Satan; perhaps the rabbis introduced it here to preclude such a dangerous interpretation. As they understood it, the first sentence refers to the discomfiture of Babylon's heavenly champion, the second to the downfall of Nebuchadnezzar. In a similar way they understood the third proof text: "My sword hath drunk its fill in heaven;"

That confirms that "(a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12)" is probably simply what it looks like, an editorial note in the brief Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion entry on Satan, expressing the Jewish view, namely "(a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12)" = "(a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12)" it doesn't mean that any Jewish source considers Is.14.12 to be about fallen angel Satan in the later Christian sense. This is a 4th-5th century Christian innovation - see any standard academic study of Satan.

Marc Michael Epstein Dreams of Subversion in Medieval Jewish Art and Literature 1997- Page 141 "The earliest [i.e. Jewish] source for the fall of Satan is 2 Enoch 29:4-5: "One from the order of the archangels [identified as 'Satanail' in manuscript P) deviated, together with the division that was under his authority ...This angel was called Lucifer by the church fathers, due to a misapplication of Isaiah 14: 12. See Davidson 1967: 176. 19. Bereshit Rahbah 19:1 (Midrash ...

That confirms again that "(a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12)" = "(a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12)" an inserted bracketed comment, relating to Christian belief not Jewish. In ictu oculi (talk) 00:45, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I've moved the Lucifer section to after Revelation, added Origen as the originator, and placed a dubious tag on two statements - one being this idea based on "(a misinterpretation of Is. 14.12)" that there is any mention in the Pseudepigrapha of Isaiah 14:12. I don't have either Charlesworth's OTP or DSS to hand at the moment but I am pretty certian Isaiah 14:12 doesn't even appear in the indexes, and if it did it would be in terms of general cosmology consistent with Bamberger above. In ictu oculi (talk) 01:02, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

In Wikipedia you must stick to what reliable sources say, not write on the basis of your own ideas.

Augustine's Tractate 35 on John is given on pages 204-207 of this source, where it is divided into 9 sections. In which section does Augustine speak of "Christ-Lucifer"? I cannot find it. In fact the only mention of Lucifer that I find in all the tractates is on page 21 of the same source, where Augustine speaks, not of Christ, but of an angel who became a devil and whom Augustine links with Isaiah 14:12. In any case, the writings of Augustine, who became a bishop in 395, were not "very early Christian texts". It is no good making claims such as "Lucifer was a title of Christ up till the 3rd or 4th Century", if you cannot produce reliable sources that support them.

Your claim that only as "a 4th-5th century Christian innovation" was Isaiah 14:12 interpreted as referring to a fallen angel (do I misunderstand you?) is contradicted even by a source that you yourself have quoted above: "The earliest [i.e. Jewish] source for the fall of Satan is 2 Enoch 29:4-5". Most scholars place that Jewish writing long before the fourth century. Whether as an editorial note or not, the Oxford Dictionary of Jewish Religion does say the Jewish writers of Jewish pre-Christian pseudepigrapha did the linking of Isaiah 14:12 with the idea of Satan cast out of heaven as a fallen angel. The Jewish Encyclopedia, also, says that what it calls the Lucifer myth was transferred to Satan "in the pre-Christian century". Not one source contradicts these sources. You seem not to have understood that Bamberger is speaking not of pre-Christian Judaism, some strands of which understood Isaiah 14:12 as referring to Satan, but of later Rabbinic Judaism.

If, as you say, Origen was the first Christian to identify the morning star of Isaiah 14:12 with Satan, he may have called Satan Morning Star (ἑωσφόρος, φωσφόρος in Greek), but he did not call Satan Lucifer: Latin was not the language in which he wrote. Esoglou (talk) 11:52, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

The mini article in ODJR is less than a page, is badly written and does not say what you are reading that "the Jewish writers of Jewish pre-Christian pseudepigrapha did the linking of Isaiah 14:12 with the idea of Satan cast out of heaven as a fallen angel." This is you reading this not the mini article saying it.

In any case we don't need to go to an ambiguous passing comment in a short dictionary entry when we have reference works like Charlesworth. If anyone wants to substantiate anything relating to the OTP then Charlesworth is the first place to look. And this claim isn't there.

Augustine is not Jewish. Origen is not Jewish. The problem here is the claim that theses Christian teachings were found in Jewish pseudepigrapha. This is the problem. In ictu oculi (talk) 08:31, 14 June 2014 (UTC)

The first section should be in chronological order. In ictu oculi (talk) 08:39, 14 June 2014 (UTC)

In ictu oculi, I keep saying that the Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion is a reliable source for the sentence: "The Oxford Dictionary of the Jewish Religion states that Satan appears in Jewish pseudepigrapha, especially apocalypses, as 'ruler of a demonic host, influencing events throughout the world, cast out of heaven as a fallen angel', and ascribes the idea of Satan as a fallen angel to a misinterpretation of Isaiah 14:12"; and that, if you wish, you may add to it a citation of some source that outweighs it. You keep removing the sentence on the grounds that what the ODJR states "is a short entry in a tertiary source and shouldn't even be mentioning Is 14:12 when no Jewish source does", and that, "if we want to say something about fallen angels in the pseudepigrapha, we need more competent sources".

Should we bring the matter to the Reliable Sources Noticeboard to see what others think? Esoglou (talk) 06:42, 15 June 2014 (UTC)

User:In ictu oculi, I see you have been quite active on Wikipedia since I posted the above yesterday morning, but have not replied here. Perhaps it is indeed best to consult others. Esoglou (talk) 14:53, 16 June 2014 (UTC)

This section is getting distorted. Why does the Hebrew Bible section have links to the King James Bible? Also, the Oxford Dictionary Jewish Religion does not strictly support the initial sentence. It talks about how Satan is described (which we can and should include), but it doesn't say Satan is specifically not an angel or fallen in that citation; there is some WP:OR going on here. We should be summarizing what the sources say, not adding interpretation of our own. __ E L A Q U E A T E 16:12, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

I agree. But since discussion on a matter closely related has not yet been formally closed (although consensus seems to be emerging), I have thought it best to wait a little more. Still, there is good reason to indicate what are three places referred to. The Bibleverse link to any one English version provides a link that leads also to, I have forgotten how many, other English versions. But if you prefer to have the reader search among the even more numerous versions in various languages, that can be arranged too, as you see. Esoglou (talk) 16:27, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

I can't say that I know which primary texts should be linked for this, if any. I'm not suggesting we should send a reader on a wild chase. Not knowing what text the Oxford Dictionary of Jewish Religion was ultimately basing their interpretations on means that we could be pointing to a translation or tradition or historical era directly at odds with what they're saying. It would be less of an issue if the sentence was more like Satan is mentioned in the Hebrew bible in three places (a, b, c). but as it stands, we're connecting our suggested links to specific interpretations of those passages. I won't futz with it now, as it might be re-written or re-structured to remove my concern...

Because regardless of how the discussion turns out, that encyclopedia entry is built on other mostly available secondary sources; . Ultimately we can probably improve this section to better reflect what the academic sources say, with better balance and context rather than picking out a single argument or a single interpretation. __ E L A Q U E A T E 17:37, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

Misinterpretation: (usually by those whom would not have any have sufficiency in choice).

Free will =:= degrees of freedom.

It is said, that an angel to become angel, has a lesser number of degrees of freedom.

Ibliss itself, is an instance of one whom was forced to make after a break, and that make, generated a sufficient number of degrees of freedom (not lattitudue), for continuance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 186.92.204.150 (talk) 14:45, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

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The lead says that Fallen Angels are

• 1) Satan and his rebelling angels
• 2) Demons
• 3) Watchers

That is the difference between, Demons who were once Angels (number 1 and 3) and other Demons? As I know, some Christians hold, that Demons can be Fallen angels, but also Nehpilim and souls of wicked dead. thus not every demon is a fallen angel, but every fallen angel is a demon. The lead suggests the opposite and I wonder that a Non-demonic fallen angel is distinguished form the other fallen angels?VenusFeuerFalle (talk) 15:20, 8 May 2018 (UTC)

Is there consensus for removing the following: " Note that, beginning by AD 150, the Greek letter eta (η) was iotacized to sound the same as iota (ι); and the Old Slavonic alphabets, both Cyrillic and Glagolitic, made no phonetic distinction between the letters they derived from Greek η and ι.[6] "

Our readers don't need to know why the Greek word was transcribed into Slavonic that way. For that matter, I'm not convinced that any mentioned of the Grigori is needed here unless someone actually wants to elaborate on them. The current info on the watchers is so truncated as to be useless.--Ermenrich (talk) 21:34, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

The current article is missing any info on either Eastern or Oriental Orthodoxy, and is accordingly somewhat biased toward Western Christianity. This seems like a fault that could be fixed rather easily.--Ermenrich (talk) 13:20, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

Yes thank you. I read about fallen angels in Orthodox Church, that they are basically the same than Augustine and European Church positions (With an exception of Ethiopian Orthodox Church and Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church). But there is nothing mentioned about this in the article and it looks biased. I looked up for further inforamtion especially in orthodox churches and actually found some details differing from the Catholic Church (even there just slighty differ). Also I would make a section for the Ethiopian Church and their view regarding 1 Enoch. But unfortuantely I am not sure, if I can add these sections today. I woulddo it not later than tomorrow then.--VenusFeuerFalle (talk) 15:58, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

This article is linked to the German de:Höllensturz. The German article links to War in Heaven, not to this article. The article "Höllensturz" starts with some information on fallen angels, yet this is not the main subject of the article. Bertrand77 (talk) 12:22, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

Reviewing the definitions of Fallen Angels in the article, I would like to notify the readers as well as Wikipedia: The Holy Scripture, of course, does not mention 'Fallen Angels', rather in Jude verse 6 in the NIV states: "And the angels who did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned their own home-these he (Jehovah God) has kept in darkness, bound with everlasting chains for judgement on the great Day." Also, 2 Peter 2:4 from the NIV states: "For if GOD did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell putting them into gloomy dungeons to be held for judgement...."

The one-third of the angels that were cast from heaven because of their sin were cast into hell (gloomy dungeons), bound with everlasting chains, kept for the great Day of judgement.

They are not the demons spoken of the Holy Scriptures. They are not roaming the earth nor the heavens.

Demons themselves are evil sprits that when allowed by the person to come in and control that person.

Demons leader is Satan the devil. He uses them to tempt us and other various controls, such as seizures, muteness, etc.

Liz Sonnier references given in the above statements. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:5B0:292B:328:3DEA:7BA5:D6FF:5C15 (talk) 19:53, 20 August 2020 (UTC)

Mormonism is a major sect of Christianity and their views about fallen angels are unique among Christians.

I am not a Mormon (I am an atheist) but I find their views about fallen angels interesting.

Mormons believe fallen angels used to be the spirit siblings of humans during premortal existence. 2601:C2:2:42CE:5DB:5DE3:F635:502F (talk) 02:55, 23 January 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for your comment,

I proposed a GA for this article years ago. Back then, I could not find much (or nothing at all) about Mormonism and fallen angels. As per WP:PST: "Secondary or tertiary sources are needed to establish the topic's notability and avoid novel interpretations of primary sources.", it can be assumed that Mormonism lacks notability in regards of that matter. The proposed Wiki-Link (Plan of salvation in Mormonism) likewise, relies mostly on primary research. Please consider that Wikipedia permits to use the articles to gain more information (WP:PROMOTION).

According to Latter Day Saint movement, the church counts about 17 million nominal members. Compare this to Alevism counting similarly 10 million to over 20 million adherences. Alevis do believe in fallen angels as well, prominently ʿAzāzīl and Şeytanlar. However, they are not included for the same reason; a lack of secondary sources covering them indicates a lack of notability. It does not mean, it does not exist. It means only, it did not gained scholarly attention.

If something has changed over the years, you are free to add a new section capturing the beliefs of Mormonism. However, please be observant of the Wikipedia editing policies.

with best regards VenusFeuerFalle (talk) 07:49, 23 January 2024 (UTC)