Hey everyone, welcome to Mythology Explained.  In today’s video, we’re going to discuss an  

interesting question: just how many angels,  exactly, betrayed God, were cast out of heaven,  

and became demons. We’re going to begin by  looking at an earlier iteration of the Devil,  

one that portrays him as an instrument of God  used to test humanity, not as the ruler of hell  

and king of demon kind; this will take us into the  Book of Job, which demonstrates how the Devil was  

used in that capacity and wasn’t always viewed  as a fallen figure. Then, we’re going to look  

at the Book of Revelation, which describes the  fall of the angels, and finally, we’re going  

to dive into the various theories that quantify  the angel population and detail the proportion  

of them that fall from heaven and become demons;  one hypothesis postulates there to be 133,306,668.

Let’s get into it.

Satan, also known as Beelzebub, the  Devil, Iblis, Mephistopheles, Lucifer,  

and numerous other infamous names and titles,  wasn’t always viewed through the same lens we  

use in contemporary times - which is to  say perceiving him as the great defiler,  

the nemesis of God, the bane of man,  the corruptor of hearts, the fallen one,  

the leader of Hell’s hordes, the lord of  infernal fire, and so on and so forth.

In fact, the notion of fallen angels is  entirely absent from the Old testament,  

which means accounts pertaining to the  number of angels who forsook Heaven,  

replacing its light with the darkness of Hell,  didn’t exist until the advent of yet later works,  

like the New Testament and the Book of  Enoch. But before we move our focus to that,  

Let’s spend a little time looking at  what could be called Satan’s antecedent,  

which is the earlier conceptualization of  him that’s included in the Old Testament.

In Hebrew, satan means adversary, and Satan, as  an epithet for the Devil, is actually a truncated  

version of ha-satan, meaning the adversary, which,  as originally conceived, referred to a post held  

or duty performed by an angel that served God,  one unfallen. This angel, as directed by God,  

would oppose mankind, bringing strife and  suffering to test resolve, to see if, even  

in the face of unbearable circumstances, people  would keep their faith and remain true to God.

This is demonstrated in the book of Job,  one of the books of the Old Testament.

The story begins in heaven, where God extols  the righteousness of his servant Job to the  

assemblage of angels gathered before him. One  of these angels, called ha-satan in Hebrew,  

approaches God and presents him with this  question: how do you know Job is actually good;  

are you sure it’s not just a superficial  display put on because you reward him?  

Ha-Satan then follows up this question with a  proposal, which is something to this effect:  

Let me go forth. I’ll unleash every sort of  pain imaginable. Then, when he is laid low,  

when truly everything has been taken from him,  let us see if his faith holds true. Stripped of  

everything, made pitiable, let us see if his  dedication to you remains. Said another way,  

it’s a proposal to test whether Job is just  maintaining a facade to reap God’s rewards.  

Ha-Satan descends to the mortal plane and afflicts  Job with every sort of torment. He loses his kids,  

his servants, his fat herds, and he becomes  riddled with boils. Despite all of this,  

though, he still keeps God in his heart. But  eventually, he reaches a sort of breaking point  

and demands that God, who materializes in the  form of a storm cloud, explain why his design  

beset him with hardship. In response, God  takes Job on a sort of tour of the universe,  

pulling back the proverbial curtain, thereby  showing how vast and complex creation really is.  

Through this experience, Job comes to understand  that creation is boundless and ever-changing, that  

not everything that transpires can be a blessing.  Ultimately, this leaves Job with a profound sense  

of humility. He continues life as a God fearing  man, later regaining double what he lost.

This takes us to the New Testament, which  paints the Devil in a less equivocal light.  

Satan ceases to be a tool wielded by God to  oppose humanity, thereby testing its faith,  

instead becoming the opposer of God himself,  making him the great enemy. Originally,  

the Devil was a mighty and majestic angel, by  some accounts presiding over the order of virtues  

and leading the Seraphim, the angels ranked  highest in the nine-tiered angelic hierarchy.

If you want to know all 9 orders check  out the video in the pinned comment.

The pitfalls of pride and ambition are  most commonly cited as what precipitated  

the Devil’s fall, but other versions have been  put forward. In the book of Revelation, the last  

book of the New Testament, the notion of fallen  angels is made quite clear. Here’s the passage:

“And there appeared another wonder in  heaven; and behold a great red dragon,  

having seven heads and ten horns, and seven  crowns upon his heads. And his tail drew the  

third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast  them down to earth…. And there was war in heaven:  

Michael and his angels fought against the  dragon; and the dragon fought… and prevailed not;  

neither was their place found any more in  heaven. And the great dragon was cast out,  

that old serpent, called the Devil, and  Satan, which deceiveth the whole world:  

he was cast out into the earth, and  his angels were cast out with him.”

One interpretation is that one third of  the stars being brushed out of the sky  

by the dragon’s tail symbolizes one third of  the angels falling from heaven. According to the  

Cardinal Bishop of Tusculum, who lived in the 13th  century CE, and corroborated by Alphonso de Spina,  

a Catholic Bishop of the 15th century CE,  the proportion of angels who fell from heaven  

was indeed one third. By their account,  this fallen third totaled 133,306,668,  

meaning the remaining two thirds totaled  266,613,336 and the original grand total,  

every angel pre-fall, was 399,920,004. Apparently  this number, nearly 400 million, was arrived at  

through this line of calculation: there are  nine angelic choirs. Each choir comprises  

6,666 legions. Each legion constitutes 6,666  angels. Multiplying the two figures gives a sum  

of 44,435,556. Finally, multiplying this number by  the number of choirs gives us 399,920,004 angels.

Assuming all of the angels that fell became  demons, the total number of demons who betrayed  

God and joined the Devil, as reckoned here, would  be 133,306,668. And the notion of fallen angels  

becoming demons has been maintained by prominent  members of the clergy, like Thomas Aquinas,  

a friar, priest, and important philosopher  and theologian of the 13th Century CE.

Another version claims it was only 200 angels  who fell from Heaven, and yet another, this one  

expounded by William Auvergne, a 13th century  Bishop of Paris, claims that one tenth of each  

of the nine angelic orders fell. This was further  elaborated upon, explaining that the hierarchy of  

fallen angels mirrored its heavenly counterpart.  This is to say the highest ranked angels,  

after they fell, became the highest ranked  demons, and so on, down each stratification.

As for the total number of angels, there too  are other versions, though none as precise as  

the one already covered. The Third Book of Enoch  states that each prince of heaven is supported  

by 496,000 angels. Also, in Jewish lore there  are theories that yield astronomical numbers,  

such as: there being 11,000 guardian angels  protecting each person, and there being an angel  

for every blade of grass in every patch, field,  or plain that bristles on the face of the earth.

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