Angels do die

7-3-2012 | IslamWeb

Question:

Do angels die?

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Answer:

All perfect praise be to Allaah, the Lord of the worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah, and that Muhammad, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, is His Slave and Messenger.

 

It was reported on the authority of Ibn ‘Abbaas that the Prophet, sallallaahu ‘alayhi wa sallam, used to say in his supplication, addressing his Lord: "'Anta-al-Hayy-allathi laa yamoot, wa-al-Jinnu wa-al-insu yamootoon (You are the Ever-Living, the One Who does not die; and both the humans and the jinn die)." [Ahmad]

Commenting on this Hadeeth Ibn Hajar mentioned that it is invalid to consider this Hadeeth as proof that angels do not die. Had we believed in this, he added, it would have been contradictory to the verse in which Allaah The Exalted Says (what means): {Every thing is perishable but He.} [Quran 28: 88] On the other hand it is possible, he stated, to say that angels are implicitly included with Jinn due to the common feature of both being invisible to humans.

Referring to this, the Maaliki scholar Al-Qurtubi transmitted on the authority of Ibn ‘Abbaas that when Allaah The Exalted revealed the verse in which He Says (what means): {Everyone upon the earth will perish.} [Quran 55: 26], the angels said that they were not from the people of the earth and therefore would not perish. Immediately thereafter, Allaah The Exalted revealed the verse in which He Says (what means): {Every thing is perishable but He.} [Quran 28: 88]. After that the angels realized that they would also perish.

In sum, angels will die, and the evidence for this is the verse in which Allaah the Exalted Says (what means): {Every thing is perishable but He.} [Quran 28: 88]

Allaah Knows best.