Four Faces

Today’s first reading from Ezekiel does not include all of the following text, so I include it here:  “…As I watched, a great stormwind came from the North, a large cloud with flashing fire, a bright glow all around it, and something like polished metal gleamed at the center of the fire.  From within it figures in the likeness of four living creatures appeared.

This is what they looked like: They were in human form, but each had four faces and four wings, and their legs were straight, the soles of their feet like the hooves of a bull, gleaming like polished brass. Human hands were under their wings, and the wings of one touched those of another.  Their faces and their wings looked out on all their four sides; they did not turn when they moved, but each went straight ahead.

Their faces were like this: each of the four had a human face, and on the right the face of a lion, and on the left, the face of an ox, and each had the face of an eagle. Such were their faces. Their wings were spread out above. On each one, two wings touched one another, and the other two wings covered the body….” 

Quite the beasts coming out of that great northern stormwind!   Sounds like something we’d view on Cable TV’s Science Fiction channel.  Actually, they are cherubim, but not with the typical angel-like look we tend to associate with heavenly beings.

What makes this description so intriguing are the winged creatures’ four faces: lion, ox, human, and eagle. In his treatise "Against Heresies," St. Irenaeus suggested: “The first living creature was like a lion symbolizing His effectual working, His leadership, and royal power.  The second was like a calf, signifying His sacrificial and sacerdotal order.  But the third had, as it were, the face as of a man, — an evident description of His advent as a human being.  The fourth was like a flying eagle, pointing out the gift of the Spirit hovering with His wings over the Church.  And therefore, the Gospels are in accord with these things, among which Christ Jesus is seated.”  For lack of a better explanation, I’ll go with Irenaeus – one of the early Church Fathers (around 200 AD).

For those of us Catholics sometimes criticized as being two-faced (hypocritical or deceitful) – and that happens to all of us at one time or another – we might simply reply that we’re actually four-faced.  We four-faced followers of Jesus listen to the Word given to us by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

Deacon David Pierce