It’s been awhile! I decided to skip the Lore Corners since it was NaNoWriMo season—even if I can write these in advance, I don’t want to ruin the mood! But now we’re in December, things are cozy and quiet, and we can get back to thinking about things that aren’t 2k words a day. Or 8k when I get in the mood.
It’d be nice if those were daily, but I also think I would die at 40, so let’s just talk about some angels now.
Many cultures feature something akin to angels, but Christianity has entered public consciousness as the winner of that mental image race.
That said, modern takes on angels got it pretty twisted away from what the bible originally said they look like. There’s a reason why they introduced themselves with “Be not afraid”.
At its basic Christianity-inspired-but-kind-of-mainstream-now core, angels are beings that exist separate from death.
And that’s about all that you can boil it down to, even taking it from pop culture. Some interpretations have them as the spirits of those who have died; some angels are their own thing, separate from humanity. Popular images feature winged humans with some sort of halo or light. Some are seen as guardians, some as love-inducing cherubs, some as holy smiters.
Although, as an aside here, I would be greatly remiss if I did not mention one of the most mainstream but most biblically accurate interpretations of angels: Neon Genesis Evangelion. No, I’m not sorry for pointing it out. Angels should be horrifying and difficult to comprehend. That’s the whole point of how separate they are from humanity.
Some potential spoilers here, but as demons feature in my upcoming novel series Your Local Guides To The Supernatural, so do angels. They’ve been very fun to play with as a worldbuilding tool—to start with, I wanted angels and demons to have an inverse relationship in how they were connected to the magic system in my books, and I also wanted to get very much away from the dark = bad, light = good that is so pervasive in fiction.
Due to existing worldbuilding constraints, I did not get to go full biblical angel in how they appear, but I did get to come close in how they function. They’re described as smelling of ozone, and look to be humanoid but created of pale fire (glowing especially around the head in a nod to a halo). Only archangels have wings; regular angels do not. (Same with demons and archdemons, fun fact. I like foils.)
And they eat people.
It isn’t an evil thing. There are a lot of species that prey on humans, because that’s just how it be in a world full of magical and supernatural critters. Humans just happen to be easy to catch and very common in a highly populated urban setting. A huge chunk of the series is about what it means to be a monster and what kind of morality they possess.
Angels, like ghosts, have a lot of leeway when writing in a modern setting. While heavily informed by Christianity, there is a lot more to play with in mainstream interpretations. You can even buck mainstream Christian influences entirely. There are equivalent concepts of angels in Judaism and Islam, or look to things like Hindu devas or apsaras, Japanese tennin, or if you’d like to stick closer to America, many of North America’s Indigineous peoples have equivalent spirits.
(Note: When using other cultures for research and your own writing, DO THAT RESEARCH! Not everything is for outside use, either. Be respectful, do the work, and know where to get creative and where not to.)
There is a lot to work with if you want to tackle angels in a fantasy, supernatural, magical, or spiritual book. You can even bring them into horror! Please do, in fact; I love angels in horror. Look deeper than the surface, get inspired by what an angel can be in your work, and happy writing!
