Barachiel and Baraqiel: Angels named outside Scripture

Investigating angel lore is a tricky subject. There are a lot of false leads and made-up information, as well as careful distinctions that need to be considered. One issue is that angel names tend to derive from Hebrew, and there is no standard spelling when they’re translated into English. There are often small name variations that all refer to the same creature. However, for the angel known as Barachiel, spelling differences indicate a crucial distinction. “Baraqiel” and “Barachiel” are two names that look like spelling variations but in fact refer to two different entities. ‪Baraqiel (spelled in Hebrew as בַּרַכְאֵל) and Barachiel (spelled as ברקאל) have a one-letter difference in the original Hebrew/Aramaic script, and are likewise very close when spelled with Roman letters (“q” vs. “ch”). Which is which?

Is Barachiel in the Bible?

“Baraqiel” is the name of one of the leaders of the fallen angels listed in the Book of Enoch, an ancient document that was not included in the Bible. Though it did not become part of the canon of scripture, it was highly influential on the early Christians and seems to have been taken as authoritative by them. You can read more about Enoch in our other article on the topic.

Barachiel, on the other hand, seems to be the name of one of the “good” or unfallen angels and has been acknowledged over the centuries across both Catholic and Orthodox tradition.

Neither the good angel Barachiel nor the fallen angel Baraqiel are mentioned in the Bible. The only angels mentioned by name in the Bible are the holy archangels Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, and Uriel—though other angels have been acknowledged by Christians over the centuries. Christian groups who use the shorter canon of scripture probably won’t recognize Raphael and Uriel because they only appear in the traditional canon of Christian scripture, which is the Greek translation used by the early Church.

Who are the twelve archangels?

The idea that there are twelve archangels instead of seven is a Kabbalah idea, not a Christian one. Kabbalah is what you might call an occult form of Jewish mysticism, a non-Christian (and even anti-Christian) offshoot of Rabbinic Judaism.

Christian groups, on the other hand, tend to acknowledge seven archangels, but they haven’t always agreed on which angels are included in the list.

The tradition of believing in seven archangels comes from the ancient idea that there were seven powers in the heavens. This belief was shared by ancient pagans and Jews, since everyone acknowledged that there were seven “planets”: the sun, the moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. While the ancient pagans thought of these powers as gods who ruled the world—Mercury was identified as Hermes, Venus was Aphrodite, Jupiter was Zeus, et cetera—ancient Jews and Christians instead believed that God ruled the universe through powerful angelic beings who were his servants. Consider, for example, verses like Psalm 104: “Who makes his messengers spirits, and his servants flames of fire” (my translation). It was obvious to the early Christians that the planets and other powers of heaven were not the gods of the Greeks, who were consumed by petty desires and vices, but obedient angelic servants of the Lord of lords and God of gods—hence the conclusion that there are seven archangels.

Who are the seven archangels? The early Christians took the names of the first four from scripture: Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, and Uriel. The other three appear in lists by some of the most influential church fathers, such as St. Dionysius the Areopagite and St. Gregory the Theologian, and across various traditional sources in Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy, and Catholicism.

The Book of Enoch lists Raguel, Saraqael, and Remiel, along with Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, and Uriel, in a list of “the names of the holy angels who watch mankind” (1 Enoch 7:1). Catholicism generally affirms these names, which you can see in the Catholic Encyclopedia, and lists Izidkiel, Hanael, and Kepharel as variants of Raguel, Sariel, and Jerahmeel. Eastern Orthodoxy gives the names Barachiel, Salathiel, and Jehudiel (or Jegudiel or Gudiel) for the other three.

Interestingly, Barachiel is depicted in certain Eastern Orthodox icons along with the other archangels:

You can see Barachiel in the upper-right corner with a name in his halo that looks like it starts with “bapax.” Where does authoritative knowledge of Barachiel come from? Barachiel is mentioned in the Lives of the Saints by St. Demetrius Rostov, a Russian saint who published a lengthy, multi-volume work that chronicled the lives of the saints. As a miracle-working saint who had a variety of heavenly visions, he had the divine insight to know things about the archangels.

Similarly, the Catholic saint Amadeus of Portugal had an ecstatic vision and conversation with the archangel Gabriel in which he prayed to archangels he referred to as Jegudiel, Gabriel, Selaphiel, Michael, Uriel, Raphael, and Barachiel.

How should we interact with angelic beings?

While angelic names and powers are certainly interesting, it’s important to stay within the bounds of what can be demonstrated by holy tradition—such as the Bible, the teachings of the early church, and the writings of the saints. It’s easy to get caught up in internet speculation about these creatures. There are many New-Age and esoteric websites that will tell you all sorts of things about various angelic powers, but where they get this information isn’t clear—which is a reason to be wary.

Why? Because mankind has been deceived by fallen angels before, which is what both Genesis and Enoch are about. The promise of knowledge and the power that knowledge gives were key themes in both the Fall of Man as depicted in Genesis 2 and the Fall of the Angels, as depicted in 1 Enoch (and cross-referenced in Genesis 6:4). Further, you might be surprised by the number of modern-day occult practices that have formed around interaction with angelic beings.

As a result, though both the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches believe that there are seven archangels with particular names, they have advocated for a certain amount of caution with these matters.

According to the Catholic Directory on Popular Piety and the Liturgy, “the practice of assigning names to the Holy Angels should be discouraged, except in the case of Gabriel, Raphael and Michael whose names are contained in Holy Scripture.”

Orthodox Christians celebrate the “Synaxis of Archangel Michael and the Bodliless powers” in November, and gives them names in iconography, but beyond that the Eastern Orthodox only really have practices, feasts, and prayers associated with those angelic beings that are named in the Bible.