I spend some time entertaining angels with the Grimms

I'm taking an online class in fantasy and science fiction, so am re-reading a lot of favorite novels. In the coming weeks, I'll post my essays for the class. This one is about Grimm's fairy tales:

Several stories in the Grimm collection seem to take inspiration from the directive in the Old Testament, "... entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares" (Hebrews 13:2). These stories' plots all take the same general path--someone meets a stranger and is rewarded for offering food, shelter, or assistance--but the Grimm brothers invite readers to think more deeply about who is likely to offer succor to the angels, and who the "angels" are likely to be.

The strangers/angels in these stories are often disfigured--e.g., a dwarf ("Three Little Men in the Forest" and "The Golden Goose"), a woman with unusually large teeth ("Mother Hulda"), or a wild man (as in "Bearskin," a story not in the Crane collection). Often the strangers/angels are importunate, even rude, in their demands for help. Nothing about them seems to promise reward. In every story, the strangers/angels are scorned twice by other characters, as if to suggest that the general run of humanity is self-absorbed and selfish. 

The characters who help the strangers in the stories are either poor maidens (as in "Mother Hulda" or "Three Little Men in the Woods"), or fools (as in "The Golden Goose" and a story not in the Crane edition, "Dummerling"). These characters have the least to give because of their poverty and supposed lack of brains. Yet they are readiest givers, and they expect nothing in return. 

If these tales examine the "entertaining angels unawares" theme, then the Grimms urge readers to consider that the angels nowadays may appear repellent to most of us (think of the homeless, the addicted, or the mentally ill). In the Grimm tales, those who recognize common humanity with these individuals are rewarded with riches and happy marriages ... metaphors, surely, for heavenly reward. Those rewarded are not the clever, rich, or influential. In these stories, the Grimms seem to say, empathy born of poverty or being thought a "fool" are blessings in disguise.