Nicole Vamp by Mark Crittenden

No doubt about it – vampires have now come out of cult classics and into mainstream culture, and audiences are discovering what we vamp fans have known for a long time – the supernatural is very, way cool. With the advent of our fanged friends (or foes!) into popular books, movies and tv shows, other supernatural creatures are now entering the spotlight.

Zombies were all the rage in 2009, and it seems that 2010 is shaping up to be the Year of the Angel. From television and Supernatural to film Legion, to the novel Angelology, angels are cropping up everywhere, and I thought I’d take this time today to share with you some of what I learned about researching angel lore for my own novel, Release, which I started writing in Fall ’08 and finished in Spring ‘09.

Release is meant to be a ‘vampire novel’, though when I asked myself the question, “But where do my vampires come from?” I found myself drawling largely from Judeo Christian texts and legends. Stuff not in the Bible, but very interesting (perhaps because it wasn’t in the Bible?). While writing Release, I thought it would be fun to for my vampires to have demon friends, and that lead me (again) to angel lore, in particular, the Nephilim.

The Nephilim do make an appearance in the Bible, though not too much is said about them, just this:

“The Nephilim were on the earth in those days – and also afterward – when the sons of God went to the daughters of men and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.” (Genesis 6:4).

The Book of Enoch and the Book of Jubilees (both apocrypha, i.e., Dead Sea Scrolls not in the Bible) delve into the creatures in much more detail. Quite a story it is, worthy of the best daytime soap opera!

Sometime after Adam and Eve got kicked out of Eden, but before the Flood, About 200 angels were sent to Earth by God to watch over humans. These angels were termed ‘Watchers’ or ‘Grigori’, and they watched the mortals, a little too well! The sons of God (angels) found the daughters of men (human women) to be very beautiful, so much, in fact, that the angels took the women as wives and had children with them – these children were called Nephilim. Unfortunately, the Nephilim were ravenous giants who proceeded to devour every living thing on earth, including most of the human population.

As if marrying mortal women (angels were heavenly creatures and were complete in and of themselves, without the need for wives) and producing Nephilim giants who terrorized the earth wasn’t bad enough, the Grigori also decided to share their angelic knowledge with humans. Azazael taught men how to make weapons and jewelry, and he – gasp! – taught women how to wear eyeshadow and eyeliner. The angels Semjaza and Aramos taught how to use herbs and roots to make spells; Baraqijal and Kokabel taught astrology and constellations, whereas Ezequeel showed his knowledge of the clouds; Araqiel taught the signs of the earth, Shamsiel the signs of the sun, and Sariel the course of the moon.

When God looked down upon the earth and saw the Nephilim eating the mortals, not to mention women wearing eyeliner, He decided at that point that it would be better to start the whole process over after a nice, cleansing flood, leaving a few chosen humans (Noah and his family) to repopulate the earth. I’m thinking that God’s relaxed his ways a lot since we still have weapons, jewelry, and even guyliner on earth today and he’s not freaked out – at least, not yet .

So what happened to the Watchers who started all this nonsense? Well, they got theirs – Azazael got in trouble the most (even though it was Semjaza’s idea to take the mortal women as wives) and for that he got chained to a rock and covered in darkness; the rest of the Watchers were bound and placed in a valley of the earth until Judgment Day.

But what of the Nephilim? They couldn’t help the fact that they were born as ravenous giants, right? God was planning on having them fight each other until the Nephilim were no longer, It was here that Enoch interceded and begged God to show mercy on the giants. God decided that since the Nephilim were being born from angels, spiritual beings, that 10% of their spirits should be allowed to roam the earth and cause trouble for mortals. (see the Book of Jubilees).

Whew! And you thought the Greek and Norse myths had drama!

Of course, there are discrepancies – The Book of Enoch makes no mention of the percentage of Nephilim spirits allowed to roam the earth, whereas the Book of Jubilees, gives the 10% number. All in all, from these stories I think you can see that angels and their lore are fascinating and make for great characters in novels, movies, and shows.

If you’re interested in checking out how I blended vampires with Nephilim, Fallen Angels, and the world at war, then you can buy a copy here: http://ebookundead.com.