Why Ben Nez and Labbiel Each Show the Cosmic Staff at Work

Ginzberg reads Ben Nez holding back the south wind and Labbiel becoming Raphael through wise counsel as twin pictures of how the angelic order operates.

Louis Ginzberg's Legends of the Jews, the early-twentieth-century compilation of midrashic and aggadic narrative, holds two passages that show specific angels performing the structural work that keeps the cosmos running. One passage describes the vast distances between heavens, the catalogue of regions north and south of the inhabited earth, and the angel Ben Nez holding back the south wind with his pinions to prevent the world from being consumed by fire. The other passage tells how the angel Labbiel led the third band of angels consulted about humanity's creation to accept God's plan, with his reward being a new name and role as Raphael the Healer.

Both passages share one structural claim. The angelic staff has specific operational responsibilities. The cosmos runs because particular angels do particular jobs. The work is operational rather than ornamental.

What it means for the heavens to be five hundred years apart

Ginzberg's account of Ben Nez and the heavenly realms opens with the structural scale of the cosmic system. It takes five hundred years to walk from earth to the first heaven. Five hundred years to cross from one end of a heaven to the other. Five hundred years to get to the next heaven. The midrashic tradition that Ginzberg compiles uses these figures not as literal travel times but as the structural assertion that the cosmic distances are vast beyond ordinary comprehension.

The earth itself is a small inhabited region within a much larger system. Only about a third of the earth is inhabited. The rest is divided equally between water and desolate wilderness. The Ginzberg tradition records this structural picture to position the reader within the vast scale of the design. The reader's inhabited world is a tiny fraction of the cosmic geography.

How does Ben Nez's pinions keep the world from burning?

The midrash catalogues the territories beyond the inhabited zone. Beyond the eastern lands lies Gan Eden with its seven sections at different degrees of piety. Beyond the great western ocean lie islands and endless steppes of serpents and scorpions. To the north lie the reserves of hellfire, ice, darkness, and storms, demons and malign spirits in territory so vast it would take five hundred years to traverse. To the south lies the opposite extreme: a chamber of intense heat, a cave of smoke, the forge of blasts and hurricanes. The symmetry frames the inhabited zone as the moderate middle that requires constant cosmic balance to remain habitable.

The angel Ben Nez, the Winged, holds back the south wind with his powerful pinions. Without him, the entire world would be consumed by fire. The fury of the southern blasts is constantly tempered by the north wind, which moderates regardless of what other wind is blowing. The midrash compiles this as the structural fact that the habitable middle of earth requires specific angelic intervention to remain habitable.

The reader is being shown that what feels like ordinary weather is actually the operational work of an angel doing his structural job. Ben Nez does not appear in popular angelological catalogues alongside Michael and Gabriel. His function is specific rather than political. The cosmic system requires both the famous archangels and the specialized weather-controlling angels. The midrashic tradition records both as the structural truth of how the angelic staff operates.

What it means for Labbiel to lead his troop to wise acceptance

Ginzberg's account of Labbiel beyond the firmament takes up the angelic staff from a different angle. There were heavenly debates before humanity was created. Some angels questioned God's plan with the words from Psalm 8:5, what is man that thou art mindful of him. These angels paid the price for their skepticism. Labbiel commanded the third band of angels consulted about humanity's creation. He had learned from the mistakes of those who came before.

Labbiel gave his troop a structural warning. You have seen what misfortune overtook the angels who said what is man that thou art mindful of him. Let us have a care not to do likewise, lest we suffer the same dire punishment. God will not refrain from doing in the end what he has planned. Therefore it is advisable for us to yield to his wishes. The structural argument was not theological but practical. Resistance to the plan would cost the angels their position. Acceptance would align them with the plan's direction.

How Labbiel's reward of becoming Raphael shows the structural design

Labbiel's angels spoke the accepted form. Lord of the world, it is well that you have thought of creating man. Do you create him according to your will. As for us, we will be his attendants and his ministers and reveal to him all our secrets. The acceptance pleased God. He changed Labbiel's name to Raphael, the Rescuer. The midrash explains the structural significance. The host of angels had been rescued by Labbiel's sage advice. The name change recognized the rescue.

Raphael, the name itself, means God heals. Labbiel was appointed the Angel of Healing, the keeper of celestial remedies, the divine doctor who holds the blueprints for all the medicines used on earth. The structural reward for the wise acceptance was operational responsibility for healing. The angel who steered his troop away from misfortune received the role of steering humanity away from misfortune through medicine and remedy.

The two passages converge on the same structural picture. The angelic staff performs specific operational work that the cosmos requires. Ben Nez holds back the south wind so the inhabited zone does not burn. Raphael holds the remedies so humanity can find healing. Both operations are essential. Neither is ornamental. The world is configured to require these specific angelic functions rather than to run without them.

The Ginzberg tradition teaches that the reader's daily life depends on this angelic operational staff in ways they rarely notice. The weather that does not burn them depends on Ben Nez. The medicines that heal them trace back to Raphael's celestial remedies. The structural reality is that the cosmic operations the midrash describes are the same operations that the reader experiences without seeing the angels who perform them.

What the two passages leave for the reader to hold

Ginzberg trusts the reader to feel both the scale and the specificity that the angelic staff embodies. The cosmic distances are vast. The angelic responsibilities are specific. The reader's inhabited zone exists because particular angels do particular jobs that prevent the extremes from consuming the middle. The two passages close with a composite image. A Ben Nez whose pinions hold back the south wind. A Labbiel who led his troop to wise acceptance and received the new name and role of Raphael the Healer. A vast cosmic geography in which the inhabited middle is the structural achievement of angelic staff working at their specific assignments. A reader, situated in that middle, recognizing that they live in the operational space the angels maintain.