Cherubim Guarding Eden

Also known as: Cherubim of Eden, Guardians of Paradise, Guardians of the Tree of Life, Edenic Cherubim, Paradise Guardians

The cherubim whom God stationed east of the Garden of Eden after the Fall, with a flaming sword turning every way, to guard the way to the Tree of Life (Genesis 3:24). They are Scripture’s first angelic guardians of sacred space — a sign at once of humanity’s exile from Paradise and, as the Church reads it, of the way to the Tree of Life that Christ reopens through His Cross and Resurrection. Orthodox tradition identifies them with the Cherubim, the second rank of the celestial hierarchy.