My third current fav part is the before mentioned "I'm sorry" delivered by JA. That boy has created magic with the character of Sam. What range. ::sigh::

You mean JP, yes?

It may not be enforced as such. But in a magical universe violating a sworn oath to a powerful supernatural being probably has bad consequences. Dean being an oathbreaker would probably make him more vulnerable to a whole bunch of stuff.

Lucifer's fall in the first place implies free will on the part of the angels, even if most of them don't actively exercise it.

It seems like that's the case, but they said that angels don't have free will when they were explaining why Anna was wrong and bad, didn't they? Which confused me at the time and still confuses me, so I don't think I can parse the subtleties. But if the stated policy of 'angels have no free will' has changed in recent times, that would be interesting, certainly. Or if it was never the case and just something they all believed for some reason, I suppose.

Or if it was never the case and just something they all believed for some reason, I suppose.

I could see the "do as you are told, OR ELSE" mentality developing amongst the higher-ups as a way of controlling what Zacharaiah referred to as the rank and file. Anna, who was apparently fairly high-ranking, needed to be made an example of.

Speaking of Anna, any guesses/speculation as to whether she is dead or off being "re-educated" somewhere?

any guesses/speculation as to whether she is dead or off being "re-educated" somewhere?

Originally, they'd said punishment for her fall from grace is death, but who knows what's in store for her. Although, it would be very interesting if Anna was actually a player in a bigger, more overarching plan -- God's plan.

So Ruby was Lucifer's ringer and Anna is God's? Interesting.

What I'm wondering is did Lilith know back when she loosed her hounds on Dean and tried to kill Sam that she knew she had to die to break the final seal, and that Sam would be instrumental in that? If, at that point, she didn't, what stopped her from killing Sam? Lucifer?

And also, did she know even at the end, that her death would break the final seal? I know Ruby said she had all the other demons fooled as to her true loyalty, but was Lilith involved in that circle of information?

You mean JP, yes?

Yes...I'll be over in the corner with God.

Angels aren't supposed to have freewill...or maybe I have imagined that as a oft used reason for their jealousy of man.

However, our Angels of this universe do have free will. Lucifer did something to make God mad enough to lock him up. So like Matt said, that makes free will precedent. Then Anna chose to fall. Made the decision and carried it through so these angels totally have free will.

If Prophecy is being carried out there is no reason for God to be in the building. Things are or were on autopilot. His vacation may have been on his calendar all along. Free willing Zach may have taken advantage of that to xerox pictures of his butt, but there is going to Heaven to pay when the Boss gets back.

Juliebird, I think Lilith did know at the end that her death was the final seal, and that's why she recruited Ruby to prep Sam for the job.

As to when she knew this, that's a good question. It's possible she didn't know back at the end of S3, although her takeover of Ruby's body and Ruby's suspiciously quick release from Hell suggest they were probably in cahoots in the matter at that time.

My suspicion is that Lilith was broken free when Jake opened the hellgate in Wyoming. In other words, Azazel's plan had more than one deliverable. He not only had to prep someone to kill Lilith, he had to break Lilith free. I'm also guessing that one reason he made the deal for Dean's life so readily was that he expected John to break and be the one to break the first seal.

When John got out before he was broken, Lilith would have then snapped up Dean's contract.