[Avodah] Angels and Requests

[Akiva Miller]

.
In the Friday night poem "Shalom Aleichem", we ask the mal'achim to
give us a bracha. We've often mentioned here that some people avoid
this poem because it is either similar to avoda zara, or perhaps might
actually BE avoda zara.

I call your attention to the morning's parsha, Bereshis 48:16, the
pasuk "Hamal'ach hagoel osi." Yaakov Avinu refers to a particular
mal'ach and asks that this mal'ach should give a bracha to Yosef's
sons. At first glance, this seems to be very similar to Shalom
Aleichem. How is this justifiable, in the view of those who consider
Shalom Aleichem to be problematic?

I came up with two possible answers, and I invite the chevra to
critique them, and/or suggest other answers.

1) Perhaps the halachos of avoda zara were less restrictive in those
pre-Sinai days, and making requests to a mal'ach was okay for Yaakov
but not for us. I suppose this is possible, but the centrality of
Monotheism to the avos, it would surprise me.

2) I note that in the immediately preceding pasuk, Yaakov addressed
Hashem. If so, then maybe Yaakov was not asking the mal'ach directly
for a bracha the way we do in Shalom Aleichem. Rather, he was speaking
directly to Hashem, asking Hashem that the mal'ach should give the
bracha. This would solve the problem of "Who was Yaakov praying to?",
but not the problem of "Where do brachos come from?" If the mal'ach is
capable of giving a bracha, that too smacks of avoda zara, doesn't it?

All comments are welcome.

Akiva Miller