destroying angels

Noun

destroying angel (plural destroying angels)

1. Any of a group of four deadly toxic mushrooms in the Amanita genus: Amanita bisporigera, Amanita ocreata, Amanita verna, and Amanita virosa.
   • The doctors ran some tests and confirmed I'd eaten the destroying angel. I was the third person that year to be admitted after eating one. The two before me hadn't survived.2010 November 13, Richard Eshelman, Sophie Haydock, “Experience: I nearly died after eating wild mushrooms”, in The Guardian, →ISSN

   Synonyms:

   angel of death, death angel

2. In the Hebrew Bible, an entity sent out by God on several occasions to punish opponents.
   • Again, I wonder with a sudden fear whether it is likely that our good old clergyman can be wrong, and Mr. and Miss Murdstone right, and that all the angels in Heaven can be destroying angels.1849 May – 1850 November, Charles Dickens, chapter 4, in The Personal History of David Copperfield, London: Bradbury & Evans, […], published 1850, →OCLC