When did God create the angels?
God never tells us the date on which He made the angels — Genesis opens with the heavens, the earth, and man, and says nothing about the creation of the spirit world. What Scripture does give is one backward glance in the book of Job, where angels are already present and celebrating while the earth's foundation is being laid.
The silence is deliberate
The first thing to notice is that the Bible's opening account leaves angels out entirely, and that this omission is God's choice rather than an oversight.
William KellyMany things of great importance took place that were not recorded historically in Scripture. For instance, at the beginning of the Bible we do not have a single word about the creation of angels. Man would have put it there if he had written a Bible, instead of God referring to it incidentally elsewhere as something already done. For God, in writing the Bible through inspired witnesses, does not state when He made angels. Why not? Because it does not fall within His design to disclose it as history.
What Job 38:7 lets us see
The one window we are given shows angels not being made, but reacting — they are already a settled company when God turns to the visible world.
J. N. DarbyThe creation of angels is not recorded historically, but that of this visible universe is; then they, already created as a separate body of beings, show their interest in the works of God — "the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy."
From this, writers draw the conclusion by inference rather than by direct statement.
A J PollockWe are not told when and how the angels were created, but we read that at the creation of the earth "all the sons of God shouted for joy" (Job 38:7). Who can these be but the angelic host? If so, their creation must have come before that of the world.
Before matter itself
The point reaches further than most people assume. Angels do not simply predate humanity; they predate the physical universe, and one writer places their making earlier than the act described in the Bible's first sentence.
William Kelly"In the beginning" in Genesis 1:1 is clearly the first recorded action of God in calling the universe into being, the creation of angels (it would seem from Job 38:7) being earlier. It was the beginning of time on the largest scale. But in John 1:1 the phrase goes back into the eternity that came before, because it expresses the being of the Word who was God and created all (v. 3), trace it back as far as you may.
Created — and therefore not eternal
However early they came, angels are on the creature side of the line. Whatever their rank, they owe their existence to the same Word who made everything else.
An Outline of Sound WordsNor does Genesis 1 tell us of the creation of angels, "which excel in strength," and which are higher in rank and station than men. Scripture does tell us of angels, God Himself saying to Job, "Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? … when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy?" (Job 38:4–7). The angelic hosts, the mighty cherubim, the seraphim beneath God's throne, the principalities and powers of heaven, all the great beings that are normally invisible to men, came into being by "the Word," for "all things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made."
Why Genesis passes over them
The reason for the gap lies in the purpose of the book. Genesis is written for a particular reader, about a particular creature and his accountability to God.
J. N. DarbyIn Genesis we have what addresses itself to man in his responsibility, the first Adam placed in it, and what he needs to know. We may have God's counsels in types, but no more; it is the sphere of responsible man, with man in it. The existence of God is assumed, the creation of angels is not spoken of; but first the creation of the heavens and earth needed to be known by us, then the forming of this scene in which we live.
Highest first, not lowest first
The sequence also cuts against the idea that life climbs steadily upward from the simple to the complex. The most exalted creatures came first.
William KellyI deny the assumption first from this, that God made angels before He made man. I suppose you will not dispute the fact that angels are a superior class of beings. Now we know for certain that when the foundations of the earth were laid, "the morning stars sang together," as Job says, "and all the sons of God shouted for joy." God has therefore taken pains to guard against such a system.
Commentators differ on a detail of the verse. Some read "the morning stars" as a poetic parallel for the angels themselves; another allows they may be literal stars, and if so, those too existed before the earth — Leslie M. Grant notes that Genesis 1:16 "is likely not chronological, but a notice of a creation prior to the history of the fourth day."
Summary
- No date. Scripture never records when angels were made; God mentions their existence only in passing, as a fact already accomplished.
- One window. Job 38:7 is the single glimpse: angels were already there, singing, when the earth's foundation was laid.
- Before matter. They came before man and before the material universe — earlier, on one reading, than the creating act of Genesis 1:1.
- Still creatures. Cherubim, seraphim, principalities and powers all came into being through the Word; age does not make them eternal.
- Man's book. Genesis stays silent because it is written about responsible man on earth, not about the unseen ranks above him.