Angelic · Archangels · c. 650 CE

Azrael

Also called Azra'il, Malak al-Mawt, The Angel of Death · also recorded as ʿIzrāīl, Izrail, עזראל, عزرائيل (per Wikidata)

The angel of death, who separates the soul from the body. Named as an office in the Qur'an and by personal name only in later tradition.

Public domain · Jean Delville · Wikimedia Commons file page

18attested

Single lineage

CelestialArchangelJewish Islamic

Azrael is an office before he is a person, and the corpus should be precise about the join. The Qur'an speaks of the angel of death who is charged with taking souls, without giving a name; the name Azrael belongs to later tradition, and the elaborate descriptions — the eyes, the wings, the ledger of the living — belong to later tradition still. What is consistent across all of it is the framing: the separation of soul from body is a commission carried out on instruction, not a predatory act, and the angel has no discretion in it. That is precisely the distinction Western popular culture collapses when it draws Death as a figure with intentions of its own.

Identity

Where does the name come from?

Where it was actually worshipped

None. The office is older than the name; the weighing and recording it involves is done at Kynopolis by Anubis and in the Hall of Two Truths, not anywhere Islam built.

A figure with temples and a figure that only ever existed on a page are different kinds of thing, and the difference is easy to lose once both are entries in a list.

At a glance

Vitals

Also known as

Azra'ilMalak al-MawtThe Angel of DeathʿIzrāīlIzrailעזראלعزرائيل

First attested: Qur'an & Hadith · 7th c. CE onward
Named there as: Malak al-Mawt
Rank: Archangel
Order: Archangels
Base of operations: None. The office is older than the name; the weighing and recording it involves is done at Kynopolis by Anubis and in the Hall of Two Truths, not anywhere Islam built.
Era: c. 650 CE
Traditions: Jewish, Islamic
Placed in: The Great Archangels The Offices of the Mala'ika

Traits

Domain: Death, the taking of souls
Traditional form: Many-eyed; a face for every living being

Stats

Source base18/100

AuthorityOne of the four great archangels

Texts naming it1

Powers attributed2

Known connections

Identified with

Anubis Yama

2 attributed

What is it said to do?

Where these powers cluster

The 2 offices attributed to Azrael, grouped by kind. Segment width is the share of powers falling in each category.

A bar dominated by one colour means a specialist; an even spread means a figure the sources credit with almost anything.

knowledge1
transformation1

knowledge

Records Deedsno text cited

transformation

Conducts Souls Qur'an & Hadith

1 texts

Which texts say so?

Qur'an & Hadith7th c. CE onward

Malak al-MawtAngel of death

Charged with taking souls at the appointed term; the personal name Azra'il belongs to later tradition, not the Qur'an.

Connections

What is it connected to?

Historical depiction of Anubis, Egyptian Guide of the Dead

Identified with Anubis

Psychopomp and weigher of the dead.

Historical depiction of Yama, Vedic Lord of Death

Identified with Yama

The same office: the one who receives the dead and judges them.

Placement

Where does it sit in the hierarchies?

The Great Archangels

Named elsewhere → Azrael

The angel of death, named in later tradition.

alongside Uriel, Israfil, Metatron, Raziel

The Offices of the Mala'ika

The great archangels → Azra'il

Takes souls at the appointed term.

alongside Gabriel, Michael, Israfil

Answered from the sources

Common questions

Which texts mention Azrael?

ColossiansOne records 1 text naming Azrael: Qur'an & Hadith. The earliest is Qur'an & Hadith (7th c. CE onward), which gives the name as Malak al-Mawt.

Is Azrael the same as Anubis?

ColossiansOne records the link as "identified with" rather than as simple identity. Psychopomp and weigher of the dead. Where texts disagree about whether two names denote one figure, the disagreement is shown rather than resolved.

What rank is Azrael?

Azrael is ranked as Archangel in Qur'an & Hadith. Rank in this material is a claim made by a particular text, not a fixed property of the figure.

How else is Azrael spelled?

The name appears as Malak al-Mawt, Azra'il, The Angel of Death, ʿIzrāīl, Izrail and עזראל, among others. Variation on this scale is the norm: these names cross Ugaritic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin and vernacular transmission, and each step reshapes the spelling. Every profile records the name as each text gives it.

What is Azrael said to do?

The sources credit Azrael with 2 distinct powers or offices, including Records Deeds and Conducts Souls. Each is attributed on the profile to the text that claims it. ColossiansOne describes what the texts say; it does not endorse the claims or reproduce them as instruction.

How old is Azrael?

The earliest attestation in this corpus dates to c. 650 CE. That is when the name first appears in a surviving text, which is a lower bound rather than an origin — a figure known from three tablets was probably named in many more that did not survive. Azrael is classified as celestial in ColossiansOne.

Nearest in the corpus

If Azrael is what you came for, these are next

Chosen by proximity rather than by popularity: the same pantheon first, then the same rank, then the same kind of figure.

Gabriel

Archangel · Archangels / Chief Princes

100

The messenger. The angel who explains Daniel's visions, announces two births in Luke, and in Islam delivers the entire Qur'an.

Celestialc. 400 BCE

5 sources5 powers

Michael

Archangel · Archangels / Chief Princes

100

The warring archangel: prince of Israel in Daniel, captain of the host in Revelation, and the only angel the New Testament calls an archangel outright.

Celestialc. 400 BCE

6 sources6 powers

Raphael

Archangel · Archangels / Chief Princes

The healer, whose name means 'God heals'. He spends the Book of Tobit disguised as a human travelling companion, which makes it the longest sustained portrait of an angel anywhere in the biblical corpus.

Celestialc. 200 BCE

3 sources5 powers

Uriel

Archangel · Archangels / Chief Princes

'Fire of God' — the archangel of the fourth seat, never named in the canonical Bible, and formally struck from the approved list by a Roman synod in 745.

Celestialc. 200 BCE

2 sources4 powers

Raguel

Archangel · Archangels / Chief Princes

The archangel who takes vengeance on the world of the lights — and one of those condemned by name at the Roman synod of 745.

Celestialc. 200 BCE

1 sources3 powers

Remiel

Archangel · Archangels / Chief Princes

Set over those who rise — the archangel of the resurrection and of true visions.

Celestialc. 200 BCE

1 sources3 powers

The book behind Azrael

Every claim on this profile is attributed to one of these. It is public domain, listed oldest first, and each links to a full text where one is freely available.

Qur'an & Hadith
Various · 7th c. CE onward · Arabic
Read Qur'an & Hadith in full ↗
Cover: Public domain · AnonymousUnknown author · Wikimedia file page

Corpus last revised 29 August 2026. A reference site’s credibility rests on being maintained, so this is the date the sourced records last changed — not the date the page was rebuilt.

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