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Apart from the name what's the difference between a pantheon and the angelic hierarchy?
In particular the Mesopotamian/Babylonian style polytheisms that had 1 supreme god who created lesser but still unimaginably powerful gods to do his bidding? Isn't that similar to a supreme creator god creating the lesser but still unimaginably powerful angels to do his bidding? What's the difference apart from what these lesser beings are called?
For the dishonest like FIREBALL, I'm meaning the definition 1:
pantheon
ˈpanθɪən/Submit
noun
noun: pantheon; plural noun: pantheons
1. all the gods of a people or religion collectively.
"the deities of the Hindu pantheon"
(especially in ancient Greece and Rome) a temple dedicated to all the gods.
2. a group of famous or important people.
"the pantheon of the all-time greats"
3. a building in which the illustrious dead of a nation are buried or honoured.
4 Answers
- ?Lv 77 years agoFavorite Answer
Typically, the difference is this:
**Angels**
angels are not deemed to be "deities"
- they are not deemed to have "spheres of influence", power over specific natural phenomena
- they are not worshiped (or, more specifically, they are not worshiped as deities, are not made offerings, are not recipients of religious devotional praise, etc.)
** Pantheon **
Typically in a pantheon, you have
- multiple deities
- all of the deities are worshiped at least on occasion
- all of the deities have specific "spheres of influence" - things over which they have particular interest and control, such as love, death, war, agriculture, sea, sky, earth, etc. - and it is these spheres of influence that give a believer cause to occasionally worship or make offerings to the various deities
So: yes, they are similar in that the ruler-deity of a pantheon and the Abrahamic God both have many supernatural servants. However: the similarities end there. With few exceptions (magic-based religions such as Wicca), angels are not worshiped and are not deemed to have individual, separate spheres of influence and control over natural phenomena.
- username_hiddenLv 77 years ago
I'm not an expert on any of this, but (based on some rapid Gooling) my take would be that the relationship between Marduk and the other gods of the Babylonian pantheon wasn't as clear cut as the relationship between God and the angelic hierarchy. It seems as though Marduk assimilated / usurped the power of other Gods and his legends reflect this. Unlike the Christian God, he does not seem to be described as a totally sovereign and self -sufficient entity to which everything else (angels / lesser gods included) is dependent for its continued existence.
The other difference I would suspect is that the Babylonian gods probably did not have a glad and willing subservience to their creator in the way that the (non-fallen) angels do to God. Angels are believed to be beings whose wills are freely aligned with God, so that they do not have any ulterior motives or personal ambitions in their relationship to him.
- Anonymous7 years ago
You are right and the angels of God have been represented as Gods in prior history of humanity. But now many reside among us and they are not human.
- 7 years ago
There's less difference between an imaginary god and an imaginary angel than you might think.
