Херувимы

They shock the world when they walk. How difficult it is to say anything about the nature of the cherubim is evident from the fact that Christian theology did not immediately come to a definite conviction about whether the cherubim should be considered real beings or only symbols, images to represent the properties and actions of God. Among the ancient church writers who touched upon this issue, the second opinion prevailed. Under the influence of Philo, who considered the cherubim either symbols of the creative and royal power of God (De Vita Mosis 5, 3), the goodness and omnipotence of God, or even symbols of the two hemispheres (De cheruvim p. 112), Clement of Alexandria, on the basis of the unconditional prohibition of any images in the tabernacle, does not allow that the cherubim, the images of which the tabernacle had, were real beings, but sees in them symbols of flowing time (wings), two poles or two hemispheres (Strom. 5, 6). Tertullian also held a similar opinion about the cherubim, as his explanation of the passage in Gen. 3:24 about the cherub and the flaming sword: “God separated paradise from human habitation by a hot zone of the earth” (Apol. 4, 7). Blzh. Jerome cites a number of attempts known to him to symbolically explain the cherubim (besides those indicated - also in the sense of the constituent parts of the human being, the 4 elements of the world and the 4 gospels; he himself is partly inclined towards the latter. Commentary on Ezekiel 1; preface to the commentary on Matthew). And blzh. Theodoret hesitates in recognizing the independent existence of cherubim: in his opinion, “Scripture calls everything powerful cherubim; so it says: “sitting on the cherubim” instead of “reigning with strength” and “mounting the cherubim and flying” instead of “appearing with much glory.” It is impossible not to notice that such a view of the cherubim, not to mention the fact that it is directly dependent on Philo’s views on this subject, belongs to church writers, with whose opinions the church did not agree on other subjects of Christian teaching. The view of the church itself on this subject is expressed by its great fathers and teachers of the 4th and subsequent centuries. According to them, cherubim are disembodied spirits (Zlat. Hom. m Gen. 23), from the heavenly hierarchy, the highest and closest to God (Orig. ed. Connel I. 392, 821 according to Ch.), gifted with reason (Cyr. Hier. Catech 2), the more filled with perfect vision, the closer they contemplate the lordship of God (Grig. V. Hom. 24) and continually praise God (Amv. Te Deum). The essay “on the heavenly hierarchy” assigns the cherubim the first place in this hierarchy after the seraphim. Although the doctrine of cherubim as personal beings begins to be revealed in the church from the 4th century, this does not mean that it did not exist earlier in the consciousness of the church. This latter is proven by the fact that Clement of Alexandria, who held a different view of the cherubim, cannot renounce the view of the cherubim as personal beings: he calls them (ibid.) “song-speaking spirits.” By the end of the ecumenical councils, there was no longer any hesitation in the church on this issue (St. Theodore the Studite calls the cherubim “the highest of all and closest to God” Fr. Ch. 449). Jewish exegetes (Rashi, Aben-Ezra, Abarbanel, Maimonides), Catholic (with Thomas Aquinas) and partly Protestant (Cliphon, Keil,) agree on this relationship with the Orthodox. Being personal and rational beings, cherubim are so superior to the concept of the spirit that a person forms on the basis of observations of his soul that Holy Scripture warns us with the same care against any human-likeness in their presentation, with which it warns against this human-likeness in the presentation of God. This increases the difficulty for us to understand the nature and being of the cherubim. This also explains some hesitation in ancient Christian dogma in recognizing them as personal beings. Not having the limitations that the human personality has, their personality is less imaginable to us than the personality of the angels, about which we can form an approximate idea from our soul, considered apart from the body. In the vision of St. Ezekiel, this side of the cherubim, their elevation above the ordinary limitations of the individual, is expressed by their diversity, the combination of several persons in each cherub. In this regard, the difference between cherubim and other incorporeal spirits, from angels, is noteworthy: angels, the sons of God (Job 1:6), are everywhere endowed with a clear and definite form, namely human, not excluding the leader of the heavenly armies himself (Joshua 5:13, etc.). Cherubs do not have a strictly defined appearance: in different cases they appear in different forms, and this appearance does not always resemble a human one. Such a deep abyss separates them not only from people, but also from angels, to whom they are not numbered in Holy Scripture. By the variety of species in which cherubim appear, they resemble the Holy Spirit, which one of the Persons of the Holy Trinity never chose a human image for his appearance and on different occasions chose different images (wind, fire, dove); the reason for this correspondence lies in the extraordinary mystery here and there, which does not admit of any greater earthly similarity 7 . Regarding the cherubim, the Jews had the conviction that they, like God, could not be represented in any sensual image. This conviction was reflected in the opinion of Josephus that the cherubim of the Holy of Holies had such a form that no mortal had ever seen. (Ant. 3, 6, 5). The main feature of the cherubim, which explains their other features, is their special closeness to God. In the figurative language of ancient sacred writers, this closeness was indicated by the expression that God “sits on cherubim.” In the symbolism of the tabernacle and the church, this closeness was expressed in the fact that the cherubim extended their wings over the place in the tabernacle from where God was revealed and where His Glory rested. In Ezekiel, this closeness is expressed by the fact that the wings of the cherubim extend under the very firmament or sky on which the throne of God is located, so that this firmament seemed to rest on the wings or heads of the cherubim (1:22, 23). In the Apocalypse, cherubim also occupy the closest place to the throne of God: it is “ap. John (4:4, 6; 5:6), depicting the kingdom of glory he saw, represents all its members in the form of three concentric circles: the periphery is formed by angels, the second circle is formed by 24 elders (symbols of the firstborn of the church of the Old Testament and New Testament), the inner circle is formed by ἐν μέσῳ τοῦ Θρόνου καὶ κύκλῳ τοῦ Θρόνου (O. Ch. 462). Cherubim belong to the closest region of God, as if attached to His throne (Gitz. on Chapter 1 Excurs). Their relationship to this throne is such that they are completely unimaginable and inconceivable outside of this throne: “they can never leave the throne of God and be sent like angels” (Geph. 19). They carry out all the commandments of God and, in general, all their activities from their places, under the throne of God, without leaving there (cf. Ezek. 10:7; Apk. 7:6; 15:7). Such closeness to the throne of God cannot but be accompanied by consequences for the cherubim, about which it is as difficult to form an idea as it is difficult to form one about God. Only one thing can be said: thanks to this closeness, cherubim, to a higher degree unattainable for other creatures, can partake of all the perfections of God. “The communication of the being of God, the power of His holy presence, operates in the area occupied by the cherubim” (Geph. 8). It is therefore difficult to imagine to what degree all spiritual powers must reach in the cherubim. The most complete description of the cherub from the side of his spiritual personality, so to speak, is given by St. Ezekiel in chapter 28, where he compares the king of Tire with a cherub. The Prophet gives a detailed enumeration of those qualities and advantages of this king, by which he is a kind of cherub on earth. (v. 14). This enthusiastic description of the king and the cherub behind him begins with the general proposition that the one described is chotem thachnit “completes the building,” “the height of harmony” (“the height of perfection” Ch. 466), according to LXX “the seal of likeness,” i.e. beyond which the likeness to God cannot go. He is “full of wisdom,” “a crown of beauty” (v. 12). His heart and mind (לב) are such that he has apparent reason to consider (nathan) his mind to be the mind of God himself (v. 2). And in various symbols of Chapter 1. Ezek. Cherubs are also attributed properties close to divine. Having four faces, they can see everywhere and everything at the same time. When moving, they do not need to turn (a property to which Ezekiel draws special attention to the reader, repeating a remark about it several times), due to which their movement occurs with such unhinderedness and speed that they are close to omnipresence. Therefore, their feet are described in a manner similar to how the feet of God are described (Ezek. 1:7: cf. Apk. 1:15). The movement of the cherubim is likened to the movement of light (v. 13). Their movement is never subject to any external impulse, but to some mysterious, internal one, thanks to which it is always free and at the same time in accordance with the intention of Him who sits on them (v. 12), as if they really had the heart (lev) of God within them (28:2). With one flap of their wings they make a sound קוֹל like the voice of God himself (v. 23) when He speaks (10:5). Since God is life (1 John 1:2), the closeness in which the cherubim stand to Him cannot but significantly influence the very nature of their life. Standing at the very source of life (Ps. 35:10), they must have a particularly high degree of life. Just as, in comparison with the life of God, created life barely deserves this name (which is why God is called life itself), so these highest bearers of life deserve primarily the name living, חַיּוֹת, ζῷα. In this thought, the cherubim appear to the prophet not so much in human form, but in the form of animal creatures, whose very name is taken from life. Each of the cherubim possesses such a fullness of life, which is equal perhaps to the sum of all earthly life, of which this sum can give some idea, which in the vision of the prophet is expressed by the union in one cherub of representatives (“kings” according to the rabbinic explanation 1:10) of the entire animal kingdom on earth 8 . But, of course, everything that can be known about the cherubim, about their inner essence and life, and what could be shown to the prophet from this essence and life, can only give the most distant concept of these creatures of the most heavenly world. Therefore, the main feature of the cherubim should remain their impenetrable mystery for us 9, which their animal appearance can also speak of, as it speaks of the extraordinary mystery of the Holy Spirit, surpassing the mystery of the other persons of the Holy Trinity, His animal symbol. If the nature and life of the cherubim are so mysterious, then their activities, their impact on our world, and the attitude in which they became from time to time towards the earth and humanity cannot be accessible to human understanding. This activity need not be defined or characterized, but only a comparison of biblical passages speaking about it can be made, in the hope that such a comparison will throw at least a weak ray of light on this sacred and terrible darkness. The service (function) most often attributed to cherubim in the Old Testament is participation in the appearances of God on earth. They “form the immediate environment in which the supreme God is pleased to appear in the world” (Fr. Ch. 425). But, as we have seen, not every appearance of God on earth is accompanied by cherubim. They are accompanied by the appearances of God, especially majestic and important ones, those phenomena to which the Old Testament appropriates the name of the appearances of the Glory of God. How much this participation in the manifestations of the Glory of God is an essential part in the activity of the cherubim is shown by the ap. Paul, and probably all Jewish theology of that time, the epithet “cherub of glory” 10. In relation to the Glory of God, i.e. its appearance on earth, the participation of cherubim is defined in the Holy Scriptures by two concepts: overshadowing and bearing. When the Glory of God appears, cherubim overshadow it and carry it. Directed towards the same subject, the one and the other type of ministry of the cherubim cannot be significantly different; most likely these are modifications of the same ministry of the cherubim, which can be defined by the expression that the Glory of God “rests on the cherubim”, and which in biblical language is briefly indicated by the preposition “on” על: “The glory of the God of Israel is on them (halehem) from above” (Ezek. 11:22), “God sits on the cherubim” (Ps. 79:2). Cherubim can overshadow the Glory of God only because it rests on them and because they are its bearers. And the Glory of God or God uses them for His appearance and walking on earth, obviously so that they overshadow this Glory or the place where it is discovered and manifested. Those. Both the attitudes of the cherubim to the Glory of God - overshadowing it and wearing it - do not differ significantly from each other and are rather two names for the same object on different sides of it. In view of this service of the cherubim, their images were placed on the lid of the Ark of the Covenant, which was extremely important in the church: the high priest sprinkled the blood of the sacrifice on it on the great day of atonement; track. from it absolution was given to “the whole congregation of the sons of Israel” (hence its name “kapporet”). From it, God revealed himself to the high priest: “Tell Aaron not to enter into the sanctuary at all times through the veil before the mercy seat that is on the ark, lest he die, for above the mercy seat I will appear in a cloud” (Lev. 16:2). “The place of reconciliation of the whole people, kapporet is God’s own dwelling place, where He makes Himself known as the Holy One of Israel and reveals Himself in His glory as the really present God” (Geph. 4). If we could talk about that point in space that God chose for His appearance on earth in the Old Testament, then such a point was located precisely on the lid of the Ark. It was this lid that the cherubim overshadowed with their wings: “and the cherubim will have their wings spread upward, covering the lid with their wings” Ex. 24:20). In the vision, chapter 1. In Ezekiel, the cherubim also carry out this service, as can be seen from the fact that their wings are stretched out exactly as the wings of the cherubim were stretched out over the capporet (v. 9). The prophet attaches very important importance to this circumstance: he returns to it two more times during the chapter (vv. 11 and 23). But in chapter 1 of Ezekiel, the service of the cherubim to the Glory of God is described from the second of its two indicated sides - from the side of their carrying the Glory of God, since the Glory of God that appeared to the prophet was not the resting, resting Glory of God that dwelt in the tabernacle and church, but the Glory of God, ready to leave the church, Glory in its movement. Hence the attention paid in the description of the prophet to the organs and instruments of movement of the cherubim - wings, wheels. How significant in the ministry of the cherubim is their relationship to the glory of God, which is expressed in the concept of overshadowing, and how accurately and completely this word (“overshadowing”) characterizes their ministry, can be seen from the fact that it also became an epithet of the cherubim: “overshadowing cherub” “הַסּוֹכֵךְ” Ezek. 28:14 was as common an expression as "cherub of glory." What is the meaning and what purpose did this overshadowing of the Glory of God by the cherubim have? The best answer that exegesis gave to this survey is the following. The cherubim made (built) for the presence of God a kind of church סוֹכְכִים cf. סֻכֹּת tabernacle). By the church, the shelter made up of the wings of cherubim, the terrifying radiance of the revealed God is so restrained, limited and moderated (continetur, obducitur, obtemperatur) that it can be tolerated by the weakness of created beings and especially human. There are places in Holy Scripture that make it clear that once the revealed God is not restrained (continetur) by this cherubic shelter, for example. when He just enters it (this cover) or leaves it, everything surrounding (the sanctuary) is filled with divine radiance and a wonderful cloud, in other cases enclosed between the cherubim (Lev. 16:21), to such an extent that people cannot be near (1 Kings 8:10. Compare Ezek. 10:3, 4; 2 Chron. 5:13; Exod. 40:34). What is revealed to people is always covered by some kind of veil. This especially applies to the cloud, covered with which God usually appears. (Rom. 13:14). To this we must add that it is necessary to moderate the Glory of God when it is discovered on earth when this discovery reaches a force unbearable for the earth and humanity, when God comes into rare and exceptional proximity to the earth (as in Chapter 1 of Ezek.). The throne of God, inaccessible to the earth, which is carried by the cherubim (v. 26), they bring so close to the earth that God, without leaving heaven, walks or hovers over the earth. This explains the psalmist’s prayer that God would appear on earth on the cherubim themselves (Ps. 79:2). The Cherubim provide for the Divinity on earth such an environment of manifestation and influence that is possible for the Divine only outside the earth, above it. Appearing on cherubim, God can develop activities on earth that are unbearable for it without this. This is the little that can be said, and then only in the form of conjecture and assumption, the most important of the biblical passages speaking about cherubim. Other places that talk about them make additions here, perhaps the most unexpected and barely explainable from the established main provisions. Although, as has been said, cherubim do not appear in Holy Scripture without God seated on them and His throne surrounded by them, the very first biblical passage mentioning them does not say anything about this connection. We mean the cherubim who guarded paradise: “God placed, וַיַּשְׁכֵּן, actually “settled,” cherubim to the east near the Garden of Eden (הַכְּרֻבִים, LХХ: τά χερουβιμ, and not singular כרוב, as Ezek. 10:7; 28:14) and a flaming sword (לַהַט הַחֶרֶב, coll. “flame of the sword”) turning, הַמִּתְהַפֶּכֶת to guard the way to the tree of life” (Gen. 3:24). Although, as has been said, the cherubim appear here separately from God, this isolation of theirs is only apparent: if paradise was planted by God himself, i.e. could arise on earth only under the condition of some direct influence of God on the earth, then its protection from sinned humanity required the same direct influence of God, which was possible only through the cherubim. Only this mediation does not take away the high character of spontaneity from the action of God. One thing can be said about the guarding of paradise by the cherubim, as mysterious as its performers themselves, 11 that it was completely unlike any human guarding. Although at first it was visible 12, it ended with something that, for human reasons, diligent conservation should not end with: the disappearance of paradise from the face of the earth. The strength and dignity of the guards in this case must guarantee that the disappearance is only visible and imaginary, and not real. That the earth could subsequently have something that more or less corresponded to the ancient paradise is shown by those biblical passages in which one or another country is not only compared to the Garden of Eden (Gen. 12:10), but is also directly called by it. Ezekiel directly assigns this name (Garden of Eden) to the place occupied by ancient Tire (28:13). According to Ezekiel, this paradise is guarded and overshadowed by a cherub, the likeness and representative of which is the king of Tire. The reason for calling Tire a paradise and its king a cherub is for the prophet Ch. O. the abundance of precious stones in this king and in his kingdom, which (the stones) are first enumerated (v. 12), and then united in one general name, “stones of fire” (v. 14); in the same way, for the area of ​​​​ancient paradise, this abundance of precious stones served as the main distinguishing feature (Gen. 2:12). The riches of the earth thus are placed in some relation to the cherubim, through whom alone in this case the protective power of God can be sufficiently manifested. Along with the biblical passage (Gen. 3:24), where the cherubim are taught a beneficial attitude toward the earth, a number of passages seem to assign them punitive functions, due to which some biblical scholars are inclined to consider them an instrument of God’s wrath in contrast to the seraphim, instruments of God’s mercy (Kr.). In one vision of St. Ezekiel, it is the cherub who gives the destroying angel coals from under the wheels so that he can throw them at the wicked city and burn it (10:7). In the Apocalypse, when the Lamb opened each of the first 4 seals, which contained terrible disasters for the earth, the “animals” - the cherubim, in turn say to the seer, as if in a feeling of satisfaction: “Come and see” (6:18). But these passages testify rather to the collateral and secondary participation of the cherubim in the punitive judgments of God than to the main and direct one, which is transmitted to other angels (in Ezekiel 10, the cherub gave coals to the destroying angel, probably simply because he did not dare to come close enough to the Glory of God to get them from there himself). The cherubim acquire a rather restrictive influence on the judgments of God. So, when, after the third seal, such poverty came on the earth that it was necessary to eat by measure and weight (a black horse and a rider on it, having a measure in his hand), “a voice was heard among the 4 living creatures, saying: a quinix of wheat for a denarius and three quinixes of barley for a denarius, but do not damage oil and wine” (Apoc. 6:6), i.e. The cherubim subordinate only the lower, although more necessary, products of the earth to the destructive power of the horseman, and exclude the best products of the earth from under his influence. These cherubim are assigned “the duty of holding back the forces of the divine will that are destructive for people” (Rom. 24; perhaps in accordance with their duty to moderate the manifestation of the Glory of God on earth). The activity of God in relation to the world, which in any case is mediated by cherubim in one way or another, after creation can only be providential, and cherubim are one of the instruments of Providence, but an instrument of course of special power. While the Glory of God dwelt in Israel on the cherubim, Israel was such an object of God's providence as no other nation was before or after it. The removal of this Glory of God from Israel was accompanied by the loss (as it is said) of such exclusive attention to him from Divine Providence. And it is characteristic that this removal can only be accomplished through the medium of cherubim. “And the Glory of the Lord departed from the threshold of the House and stood over the cherubim. And the cherubim lifted up their wings and rose up from the earth before my eyes” (10:18, 19). In addition, this removal seemed to be difficult, with some slowness and regret. The glory of God passes several times from the threshold of the church to the cherubim and from the cherubim to the threshold of the church, which it was supposed to throw (9:3; 10:4, 18). And leaving the city, doomed to be burned and slaughtered, she still stopped, “over the mountain that is east of the city” (11:23). Immediately and suddenly, the special attitude towards Israel of God into which he had become so long ago could not be changed. Centuries passed before the final rejection of Israel. But it began during the time of Ezekiel and its entire course was shown to this prophet. He saw how the Glory of the Lord ascended onto the cherubim to come out to them from the criminal city and people. During the time of St. Ezekiel, in the providence of God, there was a kind of shifting of the center of gravity, passing from Israel to the whole world. In these species, the cherubim, which were the instruments of this exclusive craft, are equipped with so many instruments of movement, special legs and wheels, making it possible for them to move to all ends of the earth indifferently. Under the care under which Israel alone had hitherto been, God now took the whole world. Chaldea and Egypt, Greece and Rome now had to stand in the same relation to God as Israel alone had hitherto stood in. For such a turn in the direction of His providential activity, God needed to “raise up His power,” “shake heaven and earth,” and shake the foundations of all earthly life. For such a shock, He needed to appear on cherubim, which “shake the world when they walk” (Targ. on Ezek. 1:7). What happened in the era of Ezekiel and what he beheld in Chebar in a vision, as we again saw, had a great analogy with what was accomplished through Moses at Sinai. But this analogy is an analogy of the opposite. The Glory of God, which had rested in Israel since the Sinai legislation, now passed “from the threshold of the house to the cherubim” (10:18) to be removed from the criminal people. Israel could console itself with the hope that she would return to him as described in chapters 40–48. Ezek. time. But of course, everything that happened to Israel once will not happen again at that mysterious time 13. It can be said (with Vicer and Rin) that the changeability and instability of the image of cherubs was necessary by the very essence of the matter, but not because “the idea of ​​cherubs is the idea of ​​diversity and variability” (Baer). The entire fullness of created created life is visible not only in the entire appearance of the cherubim (Apoc.), but also in each one separately (Geph. 19) “In them lies the divine breath of life, once communicated to creatures, in pure, undisturbed energy and revelation” (Geph. on v. 12). The same mystery, by a significant coincidence, surrounds the very name “cherub”, about which one could say, “Why are you asking about this name? it’s wonderful.” The word כרוב is given many different and even opposite meanings, which are borrowed not so much from philology as from the idea of ​​cherub (which is why the etymology of this word cannot shed any light on the being and nature of cherubs). Ancient church writers (Clim. Alex., Augustine, Dionysius Areop., Jerome, Theodore Stud.) followed by medieval theologians (Richard Saint-Victor, Rabanus the Maurus, Thomas Aquinas), translate keruv “fullness of knowledge,” probably suggesting in this word a combination of two roots - nacar to delve into, in Piel - to know and rav - many (Phil. Zap. on Gen. 3:24) Although in Ezek. 28:16 The cherub-like king is convicted of perverting his former true title, but wisdom cannot be considered such a distinctive feature of the cherubim that they take their name from it. – The same must be said about another (Cornelius a Lapide) word production keruv from ke-like and rav-teacher - “like a teacher.” Teaching of any kind is nowhere acquired by the cherubim, and until the times close to the Savior, “teacher” does not have the meaning. – More plausible is the opinion of those who decompose the word into ke-like and rav-many, “similar to that which is many,” or “like many.” (Michaelis, Natur and Offenb. 13, 146). Confirmed by the multi-composition of Ezekiel's images for cherubim, this opinion is philologically untenable: the particle “ke” cannot merge with the name into one word. – Therefore, the production of the ancient Jewish exegetes keruv from ke and ravi רביא youth cannot be accepted, moreover, the last word is from the era of the Babylonian captivity. – Against the word production from racav to ride (a rearrangement of syllables common in the Hebrew language) it is said that the chariot is not a constant attribute of the cherubs. – The word production of the new Catholic theologians, confirmed by the idea of ​​cherub, from קָרוב close cannot be accepted in view of the very sharp difference in Heb. language between כ and ק; allowing mutual substitution only in Arabic and Chaldean. – Rationalists assimilate the word keruv, of course, of Babylonian origin, from kurubu great and powerful (Del. Hand – Wörterbuch 352), which word served as an epithet for the king and queen, rubuu “bright and great” (Wo lag das Par. 154); karabu – “to show mercy” (Haupt in Kr.). “The closest relationship of the cherubim to the Glory of God, which appeared in the Holy of Holies, to the Shekinah, and not the majesty of the cherubim alone, gave the Apostle Paul the reason to call them χερουβίμ δόξης (Fr. Ch. 458). Here is the best that is said: “The Garden of Eden is its own place of life, in which the fullness of life coming from God and communicated to creation is revealed in the purest and most excellent way: the place of the original guardian of paradise - man - (after his fall) was taken by a cherub; the world, once real for man, has now become only ideal for him: the cherub belongs to it” (Geph. 1:12). “Man was to be a cherubim on earth, as a cherubim was a man in heaven (Ezek. 1:5); after the fall of man, the cherub takes the place of the perfect man who once owned paradise and will one day take possession of it again (Kurtz, Herz. 1. p.) It is difficult to say what kind of “flame of the sword” it was that surrounded paradise. Such an expression can mean not only a flaming or fiery sword (which would be expressed cherev esch. Rom. 18), but also a very rapid movement of the sword, from which the sparkling of fire seems to arise (Trib. 8). From the fact that the “flame of the sword” is placed next to the cherubim, as an independent one, it is clear that it is not conceived in the hands of the cherubim and m.b. did not stand with them in any material connection. It is possible that the cherubim were not visible, but were only supposed to be behind that flame or sword, which was the image or sign of their appearance. Fire accompanies the appearance of the cherubim or is produced by their appearance in the present vision of Ezekiel (1:13; cf. v. 4) “The first people are expelled by God from paradise, and God sends heavenly spirits who, being equipped with symbols of God’s judgment, personify the punishing truth of God in an image understandable to man” (Fr. Ch. 470). Hence the difference between the new church and the cult of Israel in 40–48 chapters. with the cult and tabernacle of Moses: a difference that almost entailed (in the age of Christ) the exclusion of the book of Ezekiel from the canon by the synagogue (Chagiga 13a). You might be interested in: