On the Number of Angels

Patristic Exegesis of the "100 Sheep"

Our Lord said “Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance…Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.” (Luke 15:7, 10) and “See that you do not despise one of these little ones; for I tell you that in heaven their angels always behold the face of my Father who is in heaven. What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them has gone astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go in search of the one that went astray? And if he finds it, truly, I say to you, he rejoices over it more than over the ninety-nine that never went astray.” (Matthew 18:10-13)

While this does not appear to reveal much at first glance, interestingly, some of the Fathers took this as a revelation of the number of angels which did not fall. Hence, the “one sinner” consists of the number of the elect, whereas the “ninety-nine” are those angels who never fell.

One of the greatest Patrologists in the history of the Church, Dionysius Petavius, gives a short explanation of this teaching in his Dogmata theologica: “Some of the ancients thought that the proportion between the number of men and Angels is as one to ninety-nine, because the parable of the man who had one hundred sheep seems to suggest this: one sheep was lost, and leaving the ninety-nine he went to seek it and carried it back upon his shoulders. That single sheep is commonly believed to signify human nature, while the ninety-nine represent the Angels.” (De Angelis, Lib. I, Cap. XIV, n. 9)

In the Dictionnaire de Théologie Catholique, G. Bareille in the article titled Ange d’apres les Peres repeats this same idea: “The angels are very numerous; but how many are there? This is something that none of the Fathers has stated. Some of them, however, in order to give an approximate idea, took as the basis of their estimation the parable of the sheep. The ninety-nine sheep that remained faithful would represent the angels, while the stray sheep would represent mankind, so that the numerical proportion of angels to men would be ninety-nine to one.”

Cornelius a Lapide mentions this possible interpretation in his commentary on Matthew 18: “Many generally, by the ninety-nine sheep feeding upon the mountains understand the holy angels, who have the fruition of God in Heaven, who have never sinned. By the hundredth sheep which went astray, they understand the whole human race which sinned in Adam, and which, that He might redeem, and bring it back into the way of salvation, Christ as it were left the angels, and came down from Heaven, and was made man…Gather from hence how vast is the multitude of the angels, which as greatly exceeds the number of all the men who have been, or are, or ever will be, as ninety-nine exceeds one.”

In this article, I want to give a little bit of a “quote mine” of the different authors who mention this interpretation. Although, this is by no means exhaustive, it will give a good idea of the number of fathers who affirm this reading.

St. Hilary of Poitiers (d. 367): “But by the one sheep is to be understood one man, and under this one man is comprehended the whole human race. He that seeks man is Christ, and the ninety and nine are the host of the heavenly glory which He left.” (PL 9, 1020)

St. Cyril of Jerusalem (d. 386): “Behold, O man, before what multitudes you shall come to judgment. Every race of mankind will then be present. Reckon, therefore, how many are the Roman nation; reckon how many the barbarian tribes now living, and how many have died within the last hundred years; reckon how many nations have been buried during the last thousand years; reckon all from Adam to this day. Great indeed is the multitude; but yet it is little, for the Angels are many more. They are the ninety and nine sheep, but mankind is the single one.” (PG 33, 904)

St. Gregory of Nyssa (d. 394): “Since, then, this was the sum of our calamity, that humanity was exiled from the good Father, and was banished from the Divine oversight and care, for this cause He Who is the Shepherd of the whole rational creation, left in the heights of heaven His unsinning and supramundane flock, and, moved by love, went after the sheep which had gone astray, even our human nature. For human nature, which alone, according to the similitude in the parable, through vice roamed away from the hundred of rational beings, is, if it be compared with the whole, but an insignificant and infinitesimal part.” (Contra Eunom., lib. xii, cap. i)

St. Ambrose (d. 397): “Rich therefore is that Shepherd, of whose hundredth portion we all are, who has innumerable flocks of Angels, Archangels, Dominations, Powers, Thrones, and others, whom He left on the mountains; who, since they are rational, rightly rejoice in the redemption of men.” (PL 15, 1756)

St. Cyril of Alexandria (d. 444): “We may hence understand the extent of our Savior’s kingdom. For He says there are a hundred sheep, bringing to a perfect sum the number of rational creatures subject to Him. For the number hundred is perfect, being composed of ten decades. But out of these one has wandered, namely, the race of man which inhabits earth.” (CaLuke.C15.L1.13)

Pope St. Gregory the Great (d. 604): “For since a hundred is a perfect number, He Himself had a hundred sheep, seeing that He possessed the nature of the holy angels and men. Hence he adds, Having a hundred sheep.” (CaLuke.C15.L1.12)

Ibid., “One sheep then perished when man by sinning left the pastures of life. But in the wilderness the ninety and nine remained, because the number of the rational creatures, that is to say of Angels and men who were formed to see God, was lessened when man perished; and hence it follows, Does he not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, because in truth he left the companies of the Angels in heaven. But man then forsook heaven when he sinned. And that the whole body of the sheep might be perfectly made up again in heaven, the lost man was sought for on earth…” (CaLuke.C15.L1.15)

Smaragdus of Saint-Mihiel (d. 840): “The hundred sheep signify the totality of angels and men. But one went astray, that is, the human race sinned. He left the ninety-nine upon the mountains, that is, the nine orders of angels in heaven, and came to seek the one in the valley of tears. When it is found, there is greater joy over it than over the ninety-nine who had not gone astray.” (Commentaria in regulam Sancti Benedicti, cap. xxvii)

Theophylact (d. 1107): “The heavenly powers thus are called sheep, because every created nature as compared with God is as the beasts, but inasmuch as it is rational, they are called friends and neighbors.” (CaLuke.C15.L1.20)

St. Anselm (d. 1109): “The Lord found the sheep when He restored man, and over that sheep that is found there is more joy in heaven than over the ninety and nine, because there is a greater matter for thanksgiving to God in the restoration of man than in the creation of the Angels. Wonderfully are the Angels made, but more wonderfully man restored.” (Enarrationes, cf. CaMatt.C18.L3.BedeapAnselm)

Glossa Ordinaria, “‘More than over the ninety-nine,’ etc. If by the ninety-nine just who did not go astray and who have no need of repentance the angels are understood, it seems greater to justify the impious than to create and preserve the just; for although both are works of equal power, the former is of greater mercy and of greater joy.”

Ibid., “‘If there were a hundred.’ The Lord had a hundred sheep when the number of rational creatures (angels and men) remained complete, that is, in its perfection. But one went astray when man sinned.”

St. Thomas Aquinas (d. 1274): “The hundred signifies the universality of rational creatures. Ninety-nine is the same number as nine, only multiplied, for nine multiplied by ten makes ninety. This number, namely nine, falls short of ten in unity. Hence by these sheep he signifies all rational creatures…The sheep which went astray signifies the human race. And why…these ninety-nine signify angels who were left in the mountains, i.e., in the heavens…” (Matt.C18.L2.n1510-1511)

NOTE: There was also a citation from St. Augustine but I lost the reference. Oh well!