GABRIEL (Heb. °hero, or man, or cham pion of God"), among the post-exilic Jews, one of the seven archangels (q.v.). In the book of Daniel and in the third gospel he is the mes senger and interpreter of God. The rabbins represented him as the angel of death to the Israelites, as Azrael was to the Mohammedans. According to the teaching of the Koran he is one of the four angels, of which the other three are Michael, Uriel and Raphael, most highly favored by God. The Gnos tics held that Gabriel was one of the creators of the universe; and Paul warns the Colossians against errors of this kind (Col. it, 18). They also held that Gabriel was one of the celestial law givers; and oratories were erected to him in Asia Minor, where he was worshipped as' a god. One of the old con ceptions of Gabriel was that he was the great culture hero who rid the earth of giants and evil spirits of all kinds; and in the book of Enoch the Creator is represented as command ing: "Go Gabriel, against the giants, the spurious ones, the sons of fornication, and de stroy the sons of the watchers from among the sons of men." The old belief that Gabriel was the messenger of death is still preserved in the north of England in the popular superstition of aGabriel's hounds,* a spectral pack thought to foretell death by their howling at night. They
are believed to be the souls of unbaptized chil dren doomed to wander through the air until the day of Judgment. According to the rab bins Gabriel had distinctly the offices of an ancient culture god. He was the prince of fire; he presided over the ripening of fruit; he taught Joseph the 70 languages spoken at the dispersion of Babel; he helped Michael destroy the host of Sennacherib; he set fire to the temple at Jerusalem and he was the only one of the angels who understood Chaldee and Syriac. According to the Mohammedans he is the great judge destined to weigh men's actions on the last day; and the Koran calls him the Holy Spirit, The Spirit of Truth. He it was who gave the Koran, the book of knowledge, to Mohammed. His characteristics, as thus out lined, correspond to those of Thoth, the Egyp tian culture god and judge of the dead, the giver of all knowledge and the special patron of learning. It' is interesting to note that Gabriel's characteristics become strongly marked after the exile of the Jews to Egypt.