17. Speculations on The Sin of The Angels

I. It is generally taken for granted that pride was the sin of the angels. It is a sin of the intellect; it is one that accommodates itself to the strongest natures as well as to the meanest; high virtue, and position, and excellence are a direct incentive to it; it seems to disorganize the relation of the creature to its Creator more directly than any other sin. But as to the particular form which pride took in the angels there is much speculation. Some have supposed that it was spiritual luxury, or unbridled delight in themselves, their talents, their dignity, their beauty, without subordination to God.This accords with the Scripture: “Thy heart was lifted up with thy beauty; thou hast lost thy wisdom in thy beauty” (Ez. xxviii. 17). They would thus be seekers of themselves and their private advantage and pleasure, and not of the glory of God. They would make self the aim of their existence, putting it up as a kind of god in the place of the Supreme Goodness which ought to be the object of all created action, love and service. This form of sin is very prevalent in our experience. Men delight in any excellence, natural or inherited, which they possess, and turn God’s gift into a source of continual offence against Him and men. They give themselves full credit for it, and never refer it to its giver or use it for His glory. They worship themselves by reason of it and not God.

II. There is another form of pride which affects a different class of minds amongst men. It is a spirit of self-sufficiency and independence, an impatience of all authority and restraint, an attitude of defiance and revolt. This was one of the offences of Israel against the Lord: “Thou hast broken My yoke, thou hast burst My bands, and thou saidst I will not serve” (Jer. ii. 20). This sin is common on earth, and is supposed by some to have been the sin of Satan and his angels. In the earlier stages of this form of pride among us, there is not professedly any revolt against God, only against His authority as delegated to others; there is a disinclination to recognize any manifestation of divine truth or law except one’s own reason and conscience, or rather, one’s own prejudices and whims. The development of this spirit quickly leads to restiveness under the sense of God’s overruling authority, angry criticism of the dispositions of His Providence, and finally a positive hatred of God on account of His tranquil supremacy which even men’s blasphemies cannot perturb. God continually commands you to be lowly-minded, to bow your neck to the yoke, to submit to authority, to make yourself the servant of all. If you do this you are His.

III. It is very generally supposed that the satanic revolt was connected with the revelation of the Incarnation of the Son of God. He is first-born of all beings; all creatures are produced through Him; in His name all are required to adore on earth, in heaven or in hell; and there is no other name in which salvation is bestowed. As this is true of all beings as well as man, it is thought that the mystery of the Incarnation may have been revealed to the angels, as the efficient cause of the glory they were to receive; and that they were required to pay homage to the Second Divine Person in His human nature; and that they refused to humble themselves to the Godhead when united to a nature inferior to their own. This view harmonizes with the words of Our Lord where He speaks of the hatred of Satan as being anterior to His human existence, and identical with that of His Jewish enemies: “You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth” (John viii. 44). Humble yourself before Jesus. Confess Him and glorify Him in the Gospel history, in the Church, in the Most Holy Sacrament. Under these three manifestations the Incarnation is at this day the great object of Satan’s hatred, and of the attacks of fallen spirits angelic and human.