ANGELS, DEMONS & THE OTHERWORLD · LESSON 3 OF 13 · 16 MIN
The Angelic Hierarchies
The nine choirs, from the Seraphim to the guardian angels — where they come from and how magicians use them.
The Bible mentions heavenly beings often but never sets them in order. It names seraphim, cherubim, archangels and angels, and Paul's letters add thrones, dominions, principalities, powers and "might". Around 500 CE a Syrian Christian writing under the name of Dionysius the Areopagite — a convert of Paul's in Acts 17, so later scholars call him Pseudo-Dionysius — wove these names into a single ladder of nine choirs. His Celestial Hierarchy shaped every later picture of heaven, and through Agrippa and the grimoires it shaped ceremonial magic.