Meanwhile the gist of the coming apocalyptic epoch – is the revelation of Jesus Christ simultaneously as God and as man, in the joint action of His two natures. What it will mean, we just should get to know.

Archangel Michael and his angels

In events of the Apocalypse it is mentioned of about hundred angels, who are carrying out concrete functions. Others places in the New Testament notes “many thousands” (Jud.14), “myriads” of angels (Heb. 12:22). Who are angels? They are beings whose

main feature is that unlike man, they are not endowed with any earthly flesh.

The icon: Archangel Michael and his angels. Russia, 19^>th century

They were created long before man and were designated to assist God at the different phases of natural evolution and human history. Possessed of an individual self-awareness and free volition, some angels have got into dispute with God and even have come to counteraction Him in diverse ways and extent. The Archangel Michael is the head of the angels who did not swerve from their devoted fidelity to their Creator.

Who ranks first on his nature, angel or man? In other words, is possession of an earthly body an advantage or drawback?

On the one hand the human body bears within its incredibly complex and rich structures the seal of Divine Wisdom, along with the fullness of natural life and an inexhaustible potential for development. Even after death the human soul differs in principle from an angel's namely in that it retains the full memory of the life of that body which it temporarily, prior to resurrection, has part with. Though some angels possess of ability to settle themselves in the bodies of animals or human beings and feed on their energies, no one of angels will ever have such full knowledge in respect of the human body, not one can have so intimate and profound a bond and unity with every single cell and molecule, which by the nature are peculiar to the human soul.

Yet, on the other hand, how great the misfortunes and limitations are that the body imposes upon man! Hunger, disease, the possibility of being subjected to every conceivable violence, rooting to the spot, ageing and the inevitably of death, all these woes and frailties to which human flesh is subject are unknown to the angel.

Still biblical tradition unreservedly places man above angel. The Holy Scriptures qualify only man as created in God's "image" and "likeness" (Gen. 1:26-27).

Hence it is stated that “we are to judge angels" (1 Cor. 6:3), "for it is not to angels that He has subjected the world to come" (Hebr. 2:5).

Archangel Michael. Mon. of  St. Catherin, XIII

Man's distinguishing feature from angel, to wit, his natural body, comprises part and parcel of God's image within man and symbolizes the supreme human worth.

As for the body's sorrowful, morbid condition, that is due to the violation of being's Divine order, wherein the highest serves the lowest and the strongest the weakest. For in our mundane order of living, the sinful soul exploits the body for sake of pleasure or vanity instead of painstakingly fostering it as God's invaluable creation, preparing it to the future resurrection.

What is the designation of angels?

It is to serve humbly in the effort to redeeming and creatively cultivating of nature and mankind, yet withal take up spiritual arms in warring against their mutinous brothers who work violence against nature and the human race.

That is what the Archangel Michael and his angels do.

The Archangel Michael is mentioned thrice in the Revelation of Daniel. Thus the "man" whom Daniel beholds, and who, to judge from the description is very Jesus Christ as God, tells the prophet of His struggle against the