Today’s episode is brought to you by Endel.  

When we think of angels, it’s easy to imagine  them as winged beings that are glorious and pure.  

From gilded armours to perfect faces, the concept  of the angel has transcended through generations  

and has gone on to become the inspiration  for art and literature, where the angel is  

featured as an immaculate human with wings  and a pinnacle of all that is righteous.  

Even today, many people place a significant amount  of importance upon the angels of God - those who  

to some, are the conduits by which their prayers  will be met. They are, for the most part,  

benign beings that bring about warmth, comfort  and safety and while descriptions of them do vary,  

seldom are they reported as wicked or scary.  

This contradicts one idea from the bible where  characters who are descended upon by angels  

are normally struck with both distress and horror  - to the point that they are unable to even stand.  

You’ll notice that frequently when angels  make their presence known in the bible,  

they tell those who are listening ‘not to  be afraid’, providing us with an idea that  

the real angels are quite hard to digest. We see this in Isaiah’s account when he finds  

himself in the hall of the Seraphim, angels  who were considered to be six winged creatures  

that represented fire. Unable to cope with their  sheer presence and the holiness about them, Isaiah  

becomes stricken and panics that he is damned, for  he was not dressed properly for such an occasion.  

The Seraphim, though inadvertently struck  the fear of God into Isaiah, and whilst they  

prove to be helpful and forgiving, they are not  creatures that he feels particularly at ease with.  

The same could be said for Ezekiel  who discovered the Cherubim,  

where he described them as possessing four heads,  one of a human, one of an ox, one of an eagle  

and one of a lion. But perhaps one of the most  strangest and downright weirdest creatures that  

are thought to exist within scripture are the  Ophanim - those that are believed by some to be  

just a mechanism of God’s chariot and by others  to be angelic beings with significant powers.  

The reason why they are called the  Ophanim is because in ancient hubraic,  

the word Ophanim was thought to have meant  wheels. It was also believed that the word  

could be spelled as auphanim or ofanim, as well as  a third variation as ‘galgalim’. In other beliefs,  

Ophanim are also described as spheres  or whirlwinds, or again the very wheels  

that were attached to the chariot of god and the  reason for all three of these ideas can likely  

be pinpointed in the visions seen by Ezekiel. Before we dive into the meat and bones of today’s  

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It was thought to be sometime into the Neo  Babylonian period when Ezekiel and ten thousand  

Jews were captured by the Babylonians  and brought to a village named Tel-abib.  

During this time, Ezekiel finds himself one day by  the river Chebar and he is approached by God, who  

supplies him with what is known as the Inaugural  Vision. The vision consists of some pretty wild  

and extraordinary things, but as far as the  Cherubim and the Ophanim go, Ezekiel tells us,  

“As I looked at the living creatures, I saw a  wheel on the ground beside each creature with its  

four faces. This was the appearance and structure  of the wheels: They sparkled like topaz, and all  

four looked alike. Each appeared to be made like  a wheel intersecting a wheel. As they moved,  

they would go in any one of the four directions  the creatures were faced; the wheels did not  

change direction as the creatures went. Their  rims were high and awesome, and all four rims  

were full of eyes all round.” (Ezekiel 1:15-18) The ‘living creatures’ that Ezekiel sees here  

are indeed the cherubim as he  confirms in the prior passage,  

but he spends an equal amount of time taking in  the sight of these four wheels - these Opahnim.  

He describes them as glistening like topaz  and that all four assembled to make the shape  

of one wheel intersecting another. He also adds  that whilst they appeared independently mobile,  

they only moved wherever the cherubim were  facing, which has since led some to believe  

that the Cherubs controlled the Ophanim, or was a  symbol for their outranking of them. He continues  

to state that they do not appear to ever change  their direction, and that all the rims of their  

being were covered with eyes. But with this passage alone,  

it only raises our intrigue as to what these  wheels were and what exactly their function was.  

Ezekiel is able to paint a somewhat vivid picture  of what these wheels looked like, but perhaps  

what makes them so stark and fascinating is how  elusive they are. These wheels are not something  

that appear frequently throughout the bible and  the fact that God allows Ezekiel to see them  

only teases the idea that they do have some  significance that we are not grasping.  

One interesting idea that further supports  the notion that these wheels were the wheels  

of God’s chariot comes from a song of  praise by David in Psalm 18, where we are  

told “He (God) mounted the Cherubim and flew. He  soared on the wings of the wind.” (Psalm 18:10)  

In this rather unique imagery, it could be said  that Cherubim had more of a practical function  

as they served as God’s vehicle, or a means  for which to transport him across the sky,  

or from heaven to earth. The Cherubim in  this instance become the chariot and by this,  

the wheels that they are seen to manipulate  become the wheels of that very chariot chariot.  

But Ezekiel does not make this connection, but  is instead taken aback by what he continues  

to witness. He tells us, “When the living  creatures moved, the wheels beside them moved;  

and when the living creatures rose  from the ground, the wheels also rose.  

Wherever the spirit would go, they would go, and  the wheels would rise along with them, because the  

spirit of the living creatures was in the wheels.  When the creatures moved, they also moved; when  

the creatures stood still, they also stood still;  and when the creatures rose from the ground,  

the wheels rose along with them, because  the spirit of the living creatures  

was in the wheels.” (Ezekiel 1:19-21) Here, he essentially confirms the idea  

that the wheels were controlled by the Cherubim,  and that they did indeed have power over these  

elements, and that wherever the cherubim went,  the Ophanim would go too. He also adds that the  

very spirit of the Cherubim exists within  the Ophanim, suggesting that on some level,  

perhaps these strange creatures are extensions of  the angels, as opposed to being angels themselves.  

Touching once again upon the chariot idea  as hinted by the song of David in Psalm 18,  

one might also say that the Cherubim  were the drivers of the chariot  

and the wheels were merely just that -  wheels. With this idea, they are not angelic  

and they do not have sentience, but instead  are more along the lines of machinery.  

Yet, the idea that the Ophanim were indeed angels  - perhaps, the weirdest of angels given their  

appearance, remains to be consistent within some  communities and traditions. We can agree from  

Ezekiel’s account that despite their association  to the Cherubim, there is nothing particularly  

angelic about the Ophanim. They do not appear to  have human characteristics like all other angels,  

they do not speak and bring prophecies  and they do not appear to even have wings.  

Reference of them is made  in the second book of Enoch,  

where see Enoch ascend before the throne of God.  He tells us, “ I saw there a very great light,  

and fiery troops of great archangels, incorporeal  forces, and dominions, orders and governments,  

Cherubim and seraphim, thrones and many-eyed ones,  nine regiments, the Ioanit stations of light,  

and I became afraid, and began  to tremble with great terror,  

and those men took me, and led me after them,  and said to me:Have courage, Enoch, do not fear,  

and showed me the Lord from afar, sitting  on His very high throne.” (2 Enoch 20:1-2)  

Whilst again not specifically  mentioned as ‘Ophanim’,  

Enoch does refer to them as the ‘many-eyed ones’,  which correlates with Ezekiel’s description.  

What’s interesting here is that he later  identifies all the present entities  

including the Cherubim, Seraphim and these ‘Many  Eyed Ones’ as being men and that these men took  

him and led him to the throne of God, where they  reassured him he was safe. Whilst hard to say  

given that Enoch does not explicitly determine  these Many Eyed Ones to be the Ophanim,  

it could be said that in this story, that the Many  Eyed Ones did maintain some characteristics of men  

and that instead of wheels, they possessed a more  expected and relatable form. They also share the  

same compassion as the Cherubim and the Seraphim  and seek to comfort Enoch when he would otherwise  

panic, thus suggesting another layer of benignity  to these otherwise misunderstood creatures.  

The second book of Enoch continues  to tell us of the Many Eyed Ones  

that, “And the Cherubim and  Seraphim standing about the throne,  

the six-winged and many-eyed ones do not depart,  standing before the Lord’s face doing his will,  

and cover his whole throne, singing with gentle  voice before the Lord’s face: Holy, holy, holy,  

Lord Ruler of Sabaoth, heavens and earth  are full of your glory.” (2 Enoch 21:1)  

Here, we get a sense that the Many  Eyed Ones guard the throne of heaven  

and along with the Cherubim and the Seraphim, they  will remain here for eternity at the beck and call  

of God. It is also established that they sing with  gentle voices, which yet again humanizes the Many  

Eyed Ones and portrays them as a more relatable,  perhaps even as a charming set of characters.  

With the Many Eyed Ones singing, it could also be  associated with several Jewish prayers known as  

the Kedusha, where the Ophanim are told to offer  praise upon God and glorify him as the creator.  

Whilst the second book of Enoch refers to them  as the Many Eyed Ones, the first book of Enoch  

refers to them directly as Ophanim and they are  said here to also guard the throne of heaven  

and that together with the Seraphim and the  Cherubim, they do not sleep. Enoch tells us here,  

“And round about were Seraphim, Cherubim and  Ophanim: And these are they who sleep not. And  

guard the throne of His glory.” (1 Enoch 71:1) There appears to be some variation in  

these very angels when it comes to both  their ranking and their closeness to God.  

Most commonly in Jewish expositions of angelic  hierarchy, the significance and purpose of the  

Cherubim, Seraphim and the Ophanim seldom  seem to coincide across all traditions.  

To some, the Cherubim are the closest to God  and as mentioned before, they are his chariot.  

More significantly, they are much more prominent  in the bible and actually appear to Ezekiel,  

thus giving them the edge at least in terms  of recognition. The Seraphim by comparison  

are also seen in a variety of ways  including as a caretaker to God’s throne,  

and as the bible shows in Isaiah’s vision, the  Seraphim can be viewed as absolvers of guilt.  

To more conservative Judaisim though, the  Seraphim are more symbolic in nature.  

These inconsistencies, if you will, are  the same for the Ophanim in Jewish beliefs,  

with some believing them to be the closest  of all the angels to God (as told to us by  

medieval Jewish philosopher Maimonides) or as ‘the  thrones’, another classification of angels. Many  

other Jewish philosophies confirm this idea that  the thrones and the Ophanim are one in the same  

and one of the ways that this is done is by  one interpretation of Daniel’s Vision, where  

Daniel tells us he sees God in his chariot. He  states, “As I looked, thrones were set in place,  

and the Ancient of Days took his seat.  His clothing was as white as snow;  

the hair of his head was white like  wool. His throne was flaming with fire,  

and its wheels were all ablaze.” (Daniel 7:9)  With this idea, the thrones become established  

as the wheels of God’s vehicle and are set  in place before he takes his seat upon it.  

A quote from American spirituality writer Rosemary  Ellen Guiley sums up the notion of the thrones  

and the Ophanim being the same quite concisely,  where we are told “The 'thrones'; also known as  

'ophanim' (offanim) and 'galgallin', are creatures  that function as the actual chariots of God  

driven by the cherubs. They are characterized by  peace and submission; God rests upon them. Thrones  

are depicted as great wheels containing many  eyes, and reside in the area of the cosmos where  

material form begins to take shape. They chant  glorias to God and remain forever in his presence.  

They mete out divine justice and maintain  the cosmic harmony of all universal laws.”  

As we can see, going by this interpretation,  the thrones - or the Ophanim - lose their more  

typical angel appearance and again resume the more  biblically accurate depiction as a mechanism.  

In any case, one might say that the function  of the Ophanim, whilst intriguing and novel,  

is not essential to believers, which is why  concrete information about them is so scarce.  

Whether it be from the characters of the  bible themselves or scholars who studied them,  

the wheels are only vital in their accordance  to God. They serve to remind believers  

that their mystique and uncanny form is just  one of many of the creations that God has made  

that man cannot understand and in some cases, it  might serve to humble believers into realising  

that they do not have all the answers.  It also brings God’s enginerial ingenuity  

into the limelight, for whilst many may take for  granted the way in which the world was created,  

elements like the Ophanim remind them of how much  of mechanical mastermind a supreme being like God  

must be - especially given we to this day would  not be able to create something so unusual.  

Others might see the Ophanim as a representation  of God himself, in that because they are covered  

with eyes, the eyes become symbolic of God  being all-seeing. If the Ophanim have a  

multitude of eyes and spin omnidirectionally, then  it would be believed that they can see everything  

from every angle. This would imply then that God  could very well do the same - as we know he can  

from very specific mentions in the bible that  God is everywhere and God knows everything.

Whether or not the Ophanim are actually angelic  beings or simply a mechanism that allows for  

multi-dimensional travel, may not necessarily be  so significant in the grand scheme of things given  

that their role appears to be more useful to God  than to mortals. Notice how in both Ezekiel and  

Daniel’s account, they only see these wheels, but  the wheels don’t seem to have much impact on them-  

nor do they seem to be of any real merit to  either character beyond their fascinating design.  

But do let me know your thoughts and ideas on  the Ophanim in the comments below and as always,  

if you’ve enjoyed today’s episode then don’t  forget to give it a thumbs up and don’t forget  

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