Raphael
Raphael ("God has healed")-of Chaldean origin, originally called Labbiel. Raphael is one of 3 great angels in post-Biblical lore. He first appears in The Book of Tobit (a work ecternal to the Hebrew canon, apocryphal in Protestant Scipture,canonical in Catholic). In The Book of Tobit, son Tobias who journeys to Media from Nineveh. It is only at the end of the journey that Raphael reveals himself by name as "one of the 7 holy angels" that attend the throne of God. [See woodcut in the Cologne Bible (1478-1480), picturing various incidents in the story.] In Enoch I,20, Raphael is declared to be "one of the watchers"(q.v.). In Enoch I,22, Raphael is a guide in sheol (i.e., the underworld.) In Enoch I, 40, he is "one of the 4 presences, set over all the diseases and all the wounds of the children of men."[Cf, Rabbi Abba in The Zohar I:"Raphael is charged to heal the earth, and through him...the earth furnishes an abode for man, whom also he heals of his maladies."] According to gamatria (cabala) and Yoma 37a, Raphael is one of the 3 angels that visited Abraham (Genesis 18), the other 2 angels identified usually as Gabriel and Michael. Raphael of circumcision, the patriarch having neglected to observe this rite earlier in life. In The Legends of the Jews I,385, Raphael is the angel sent by God to cure Jocob of the injury to his tigh when Jacob wrestled with his dark adversary at Peniel (the adversary having been identified variously as Michael, Metatron, Uriel, Sammael or God Himself.) Another legend (Sefer Noah) claims ilt was Raphael who handed Noah, after the flood, a "medical book", which many have been the famous Sefer Raziel ( The Book of the Angel Raziel). Among other high offices, Raphael is the regent of the sun (Longfellow refers to him as the angel of the sun), chief of the order of virtues, governor of the south, guardian of the west, ruling prince of the 2nd Heaven, overseer of the evening wings, guardian of the Tree of Life in the Garden of Eden, one of the 6 angels of repentance, angel of prayer, love, joy, and light. Above all, he is, as his name denotes, the angel of healing (cf. Aslepios, ancient Greek god of healing). He is also the angel of science and knowledge, and the preceptor angel of Isaac.[Rf. Barrett, The Magus II.] Raphael belongs to at least 4 of the celestial orders: seraphim, cherubim, dominious, (or dominations), powers. According to Trithemius of Spanheim, the 15th-century occultist, Raphael is one of the 7 angels of the Apocalypse. He is also numbered among the 10 holy sefiroth. And while he is not specifically named as the angel who troubled the waters at the pool in ancient Bethesda (John 5), he is generally so credited. [Rf. Summers, The Vampire in Europe.] Curiously enough (because, perhaps, Raphael has been called a guide in Hell) an ophite diagram represents Raphael as a terrestrial daemon with a beastlike form(!) and is associated with 3 other angels: Michael, Suriel, and Gabriel in the same guise. [Rf. Legge, Forerunners and Rivals of Christianity II, p. 70.] In the canvases of such masters as Botticini, Lorrain, Pollajuolo, Ghirlandaio, Titian, and Rembrandt, Raphael is variously pictured holding a pilgrim's staff and a fish (Tobit); as a winged saint supping with Adam and Eve; as the sociable archangel" ( Paradise Lost V); as a "six-winged seraph"; and as one of the 7 angels of the presence. Reverence to these 7 angels of the presence is made by Blake in his "Milton." In the off-Broadway play Tobias and the Angel, Raphael is represented as a scoffing and jesting angel " knocking sense into the head of Tobias." The file on Raphael is inexhaustible, but one additional legend may be worth repeating here: it is taken from Conybeare, The Testament of Solomon. When Solomon prayed to God for help in the building of the Temple, God and were with the gift of a magic ring brought to the Hebrew king personally by Raphael. The ring, engraved with the pentalpha (5-pointed star), had the power to subdue all demons. And it was with the "slave labor" of demons that Solomon was able to complete the building of the Temple.
From a book: - A Dictionary of Angels including the fallen angels by Gustav Davidson