Archangel Raphael - Patron of Doctors, Sick, Travelers, Couples - Help, Guidance, Protection - Cold Cast Bronze Resin

Item Specifics

Condition: New
Material: Cold Cast Bronze Resin
Height: 34 cm - 13,4 inches
Width: 21 cm - 8,3 inches
Length: 14 cm - 5,5 inches
Weight: 1420 g

Raphael is an archangel mentioned in the Book of Tobit and in 1 Enoch, both dating from the last few centuries before Christ.In later Jewish tradition he became identified as one of the three heavenly visitors entertained by Abraham. He is not named in either the Christian New Testament or the Quran, but in later Christian tradition he became identified with healing and as the angel who stirred the waters of the pool of Bethesda in John 5:2-4, while in Islam, where his name is Israfil, he is understood to be the unnamed angel of Quran 6:73 who stands eternally with a trumpet to his lips, ready to announce the Day of Resurrection.
In the Hebrew Bible (the Old Testament) the word 'מלאך' means a messenger, human or supernatural, and when used in the latter sense it is translated as "angel". The original mal'ak lacked both individuality and hierarchy, but after the Babylonian exile they were graded into a Babylonian-style hierarchy and the word archangelos, archangel, first appears in the Greek text of 1 Enoch.At the same time the angels and archangels began to be given names, as attested in the Talmudic statement that "the names of the angels were brought by the Jews from Babylonia".
Raphael first appears in two works of this period, 1 Enoch, a collection of originally independent texts from the 3rd century BCE, and the Book of Tobit, from the early 2nd century BCE. In the oldest stratum of 1 Enoch (1 Enoch 9:1) he is one of the four named archangels, and in Tobit 12:11-15 he is one of seven.
His name derives from a Hebrew root meaning "to heal", and can be translated as "God healed". In Tobit he is both one who acts as a physician and expels demons, using an extraordinary fish to bind the demon Asmodeus) and to heal Tobit's eyes; in 1 Enoch he is "set over all disease and every wound of the children of the people" and binds the armies of Azazel and throws them into the valley of fire.
According to the Babylonian Talmud, Raphael was one of the three angels who appeared to Abraham in the oak grove of Mamre in the region of Hebron. (Gen. xviii; Bava Metzia 86b); Michael, as the greatest, walked in the middle, with Gabriel to his right and Raphael to his left (Yoma 37a). Each was commanded to carry out a specific mission, Gabriel to destroy Sodom, Michael to inform Sarah that she would give birth to Isaac, Raphael to heal Abraham from his recent circumcision and save Lot. Rashi writes, "Although Raphael's mission included two tasks, they were considered a single mission since they were both acts that saved people." The Life of Adam and Eve lists him with the archangels Michael, Gabriel, Uriel, Raphael and Joel, and the medieval Jewish philosopher Maimonides included his name in his Jewish angelic hierarchy.
The New Testament names only two archangels or angels, Michael and Gabriel (Luke 1:9–26; Jude 1:9; Revelation 12:7), but Raphael, because of his association with healing, became identified with the unnamed angel of John 5:1–4 who periodically stirred the pool of Bethesda "[a]nd he that went down first into the pond after the motion of the water was made whole of whatsoever infirmity he lay under". The Catholic church accordingly links Raphael with Michael and Gabriel as saints whose intercession can be sought through prayer.
Protestant denominations in general do not accept Raphael, but the name is widely recognized in church tradition as a result of Protestantism's origins in Catholic Christianity.
Due to his actions in the Book of Tobit and the Gospel of John, Saint Raphael is accounted patron of travelers, the blind, happy meetings, nurses, physicians, medical workers, matchmakers, Christian marriage, and Catholic studies. As a particular enemy of the devil, he was revered in Catholic Europe as a special protector of sailors