The Book of Enoch Read online

  The Book of Enoch: Scripture, Heresy, or What?

  By Brian Godawa

  ABSTRACT: Many Christians are afraid to attribute truth value to ancient books outside the canon of the Bible. They fear that somehow the authority of Scripture will be compromised or worse, other texts may be falsely considered as Scripture. The book of 1 Enoch is one of those controversial books that has a long history of squabbling over its veracity and influence on Bible interpretation. This is an introduction to the ancient book of 1Enoch, its content, its history, its affirmation in the New Testament, and its acceptance and rejection by the Christian Church.

  In recent years, there has been a rise of interest in the subject of giants called “Nephilim” and the Sons of God called “Watchers” in the Bible. Much of this interest swirls around the End Times crowd and involves speculation that approaches the absurd. Visions abound of an impending return to “the days of Noah,” with cloned Nephilim among us, the Antichrist coming in a UFO, and Watchers masquerading as alien saviors. It makes for fascinating and entertaining reading. But regardless of such flights of futuristic fanciful fantastique, the fact remains, the Bible does talk about a bizarre event in antediluvian days (before the Flood) that involves these strange Nephilim creatures – whatever they are.

  Genesis 6:1–4

  When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose. Then the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years.” The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of man and they bore children to them. These were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renown.[1]

  There is an ongoing historical controversy over what exactly happened in those ancient days. Several views have been held by orthodox Christian Church fathers and later theologians. The most popular view in ancient Judaism and the early Church was that the Sons of God were supernatural angelic beings who mated with human woman and their offspring were giants. More recent scholarly views argue that the Sons of God were either tyrannical kings who claimed divinity in their royal lineage, or human descendants from the “righteous” line of Seth who violated holiness and intermarried with the “unrighteous” line of the daughters of Cain. In these modern views, the Nephilim tend to be understood merely as mighty warriors of an ancient era.

  I will not be arguing for any of these views in this article, but rather, I will be addressing the ancient Book of Enoch because it has made a significant impact on the current Watchers/Nephilim controversy. The theological scandal is that the book includes a very clear supernatural interpretation of Genesis 6 with angelic Watchers mating with humans who birth giants that walk among us. But even more, it expands upon that view with a detailed story of how these Watchers influenced mankind with occultic revelations and how the patriarch Enoch condemned the Watchers and their giant offspring who had become violent bloodthirsty cannibals.

  If the book is a reliable source, it certainly adds to the controversial flames with this fantastic interpretation, but honest pursuers of truth should not discount any textual assessment because of a preconceived fear of where it may lead. We must follow the truth no matter where it leads us.

  Many Christians are now quoting the Book of Enoch as if it were Scripture, or at least a true interpretation of Scripture in order to prove their supernatural view. Others are dismissing it as obvious fabricated legend without merit, or worse, heresy. Regardless of one’s interpretation, this esoteric ancient manuscript warrants an examination because of its popular and scholarly influence in its mysterious connection to the Bible.

  Enoch in the Bible

  The ancient patriarch Enoch is surely one of the most enigmatic characters in all of Bible history. Outside of genealogies, he is only mentioned in one brief sentence in the Old Testament. But that single sentence has drawn volumes of speculation because it is so fascinating and mysterious.

  In Genesis 4:17 we read about a son of Cain named Enoch, after whom, a city was built. But this is not our man. The Enoch we are looking at is the son of Jared, before the Flood, whose son was Methuselah, the oldest man in the Bible (Gen. 5:19-21). The text says that Enoch only lived 365 years, compared to the much longer time spans of those around him, reaching as high as Adam’s 930 years and Jared’s 962 (Methuselah’s record was 969).

  Whether these ages are literal or symbolic, Enoch was on earth for only a short time because, as the text says, “Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him” (Gen. 5:24). The phrase “walked with God” is used of Noah right after this and its context is righteousness and purity in a wicked generation filled with violence and corruption (Gen. 6:9-12). But it also carries the connotation of a direct and immediate relationship with God beyond mere obedience.[2] Enoch had a holy intimacy with the Creator that separated him from the world around him.

  This righteousness sheds light on the unique phrase that Enoch “was not, for God took him” (5:23). As Old Testament scholar Gordon Wenham points out, the idea of “was not” cannot merely be a poetic way of saying “died,” because every other reference to the death of the men in that same genealogy is “and he died” (eight times). In contrast, Enoch is the only one with this peculiar wording “and he was not.” But this reflects the same wording used of Elijah’s translation to heaven in a chariot of fire, thus avoiding death (2 Kgs 2:1-10).[3]

  The New Testament confirms this interpretation of translation to heaven in Hebrews 11:

  Hebrews 11:5

  By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God.

  The writer of Hebrews holds up Enoch as an example of the righteousness of faith under the Old Covenant. Even before Messiah came, even in the primeval era of humankind, faith was the expression of right standing before God.

  The only other reference to Enoch is in the epistle of Jude where Enoch is quoted as a righteous man condemning the wicked of his generation.

  Jude 14–15

  It was also about these [evil blasphemers] that Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones, to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.”

  I will have more to say about this passage shortly, but for now, let me just make the point that the three Biblical passages about Enoch paint a picture of a righteous man, in holy communion with God, during a time of great evil before the Flood, who prophesied judgment upon evildoers, and as a result of his God pleasing faith, was translated into heaven by God before he could die.

  It is easy to see why Enoch has captivated the imagination of believers through history with his mysterious introduction, cryptic behavior, and aura of holiness. And it is also easy to see why he captivated the imagination of ancient Jews writing extra-Biblical literature during the Second Temple period.

  The Books of Enoch

  There are actually three “Books of Enoch.” They are numbered but also go by the names of the language they are written in. Thus 1 Enoch is referred to as Ethiopian Enoch, 2 Enoch is called Slavonic Enoch, and 3 Enoch is called Hebrew Enoch. They are all considered to be Pseudepigrapha. Though this word literally means “false writings,” or writings attributed to an author who did not write them, J.H. Charlesworth argues that “rather than being spurious, the documents considered as belonging to the Pseudepigrapha are works written in honor of and inspired by Old T
estament heroes.”[4]

  This newer denotation illustrates the attempt to distance the literature from the notion of deliberate deception and to highlight its sacred value to the community of faith. One is reminded of how the Pentateuch is often attributed to Moses, yet it remains anonymous and shows distinct signs that argue against his sole authorship.[5]

  Loren Stuckenbruck complains that the modern notion of “falseness” in Pseudepigraphal authorship is an anachronism that fails to capture the ancient acceptance of anonymous writers using “ideal” authorship as a means of uniting the ancient past with the present and future in sacred connection. “They presented themselves, in effect, as voices about the readers’ remote past out of the remote past… This, in turn, would make it possible for the audience to participate imaginatively in that world in order to re-imagine and gain perspective on the present.”[6]

  As Charlesworth explains, the Pseudepigrapha includes a large body of manuscripts from various locations and authors that were composed around the period from 200 B.C. to about A.D. 200. They are either Jewish or Christian in origin, they are often attributed to ideal figures in Israel’s past, and they usually claim to contain God’s message, building upon ideas and narratives of the Old Testament.[7] Some of the other well known Pseudepigrapha include Jubilees, The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, Psalms of Solomon, the Apocalypses of Ezra and Baruch and many others.[8]

  Though 2 and 3 Enoch also contain material about the patriarch Enoch and his alleged visions and experiences, they do not carry the weight or influence that 1 Enoch has had on ancient Judaism and Christianity. 2 and 3 Enoch are both written much later and are plagued by diverse traditions of manuscript variations. 2 Enoch was most likely written sometime in the 2nd century after Christ. 3 Enoch shows evidence of later Jewish mysticism and claims authorship by a Rabbi Ishmael relating his visions of Enoch written anywhere from the 3rd to the 6th century A.D.[9]

  But the book that is traditionally intended when referring to “the book of Enoch” is the Ethiopian 1 Enoch. Its oldest sections are considered to have been written as early as 300 B.C., but the only complete manuscript we have available is an Ethiopic translation from 400-500 A.D.[10] Though early Church Fathers and the Ethiopian Church had been familiar with the text, it had been considered lost to Western scholarship until its rediscovery and introduction in the 1800s. The most recent discoveries in the 1950s of Enoch fragments among the Dead Sea Scrolls in Qumran suggest that the original language was Aramaic.

  What is the Book of 1 Enoch?

  1 Enoch belongs to the genre of literature called “apocalyptic” or “apocalypticism.” “Apocalypse” in Greek simply means “revelation” or “disclosure.” John Collins, an expert in apocalyptic literature defines it as a genre “with a narrative framework, in which a revelation is mediated by an otherworldly being to a human recipient, disclosing a transcendent reality which is both temporal, insofar as it envisages eschatological salvation, and spatial, insofar as it involves another, supernatural world.”[11] Yarbro Collins adds a point of clarification to the definition that apocalyptic is “intended to interpret present, earthly circumstances in light of the supernatural world and of the future, and to influence both the understanding and the behavior of the audience by means of divine authority.”[12]

  Apocalyptic literature has the common elements of 1) being written as comfort to people who are suffering contemporary oppression 2) by referring to God’s victory in history over oppressive forces 3) using fantastic imagery to express spiritual reality 4) in esoteric or symbolic terms in order to avoid outright suppression by the reigning powers in authority.

  The well known books in the Bible of Daniel and Revelation are considered apocalyptic in their genre as Daniel and John are ushered into heaven and receive revelation about coming earthly historical events cloaked in poetic language to communicate the spiritual and theological meaning behind those events. They too are written as comfort to believers suffering persecution. They both contain symbolic fantastic imagery and are esoteric significations of governing authorities.

  Most scholars believe that the Book of Enoch is really five different books that were written in different time periods and redacted together by editors until it became its current version before A.D. 100. But there is no manuscript evidence for this theory and the oldest version that we have of the books are fragments among the Dead Sea Scrolls that indicate all five in one corpus.[13]

  The five different “books” are subdivided with their approximate dates thus: [14]

  1. The Book of the Watchers (Chapters 1–36)3rd century B.C.

  2. The Book of Parables (37–71)1st century B.C.

  3. The Book of Heavenly Luminaries (72–82)3rd century B.C.

  4. The Book of Dream Visions (83–90)2nd century B.C.

  5. The Book of the Epistle of Enoch (91–107)2nd century B.C.

  1. The Book of the Watchers (Chaps. 1-36). This is the book that carries the most amount of interest for our examination. It most likely predates the Hellenistic period, being completed by the middle of the 3rd century B.C.[15] It is announced as an oracle of judgment by Enoch. It tells a detailed narrative of two hundred heavenly Watchers who rebel against God in heaven led by Semyaza and Azazel. They come to earth on Mount Hermon, mate with human women, and produce bloodthirsty hybrid giants as their progeny, leading to the Great Flood. It contains details about the Watchers and their names, along with the occultic secrets they reveal to mankind that violate the holy separation of heaven and earth. It describes Enoch’s heavenly commission as a prophet and accounts of his cosmic journeys into heaven to proclaim judgment upon these foes of God.

  2. The Book of Parables (Chaps. 37-71). This appears to be the latest portion of Enochic texts, dating to about the end of the 1st century B.C. It is a recounting of Enoch’s cosmic journey and vision of judgment upon the fallen angels and their wicked human counterparts, juxtaposed against the elevation of “the holy, the righteous, the elect.” It also includes descriptions of astronomical phenomena such as the source of the wind and rain. The unique and important contribution of these chapters is the vision of God’s throne room drawn from the book of Isaiah and Daniel 7 that depicts the “Ancient of Days,” the heavenly host that surrounds the throne, and the “Son of Man” as vice regent, also referred to as the Elect One, the Righteous One, and the Messiah (Anointed One). Scholars point to this book as influential in the development of the doctrine of the Son of Man leading to the New Testament Gospels.[16]

  3. The Book of Heavenly Luminaries (Chaps. 72-82). These are probably the earliest of Enochian texts with roots in the Persian period between 500 and 300 B.C.[17] It describes Uriel the angel showing Enoch the astronomical, cosmological and calendrical laws that verify the authority of the solar calendar.

  4. The Book of Dream Visions (Chaps. 83-90). Enoch recounts two dreams he saw to his son Methuselah before his marriage. The first dream is a brief warning about the coming Flood. The second dream is a complex allegory using animals to represent the history of the world from Adam to the Hellenistic period they were in, with a projection into the future judgment. The date for this book is around 165 B.C., the time of the Maccabean revolt, which is roughly where the history allegory ends.

  5. The Epistle of Enoch (Chaps. 92-105). Composed sometime in the 2nd century B.C., this document records Enoch’s exhortation to his children to remain righteous in their wicked generation. He predicts woes of suffering, shame, misery, and judgment for the wicked who are rich, oppress the righteous, and worship idols. He predicts justice, comfort, eternal life, and glorification like the stars for those who remain pure.

  6. Additional “Books” (Chaps. 106+). These last pieces are like appendices added onto the book of Enoch as additional chapters. Two chapters detail the miraculous birth narrative of Noah. The infant Noah’s face and hair are said to glow white. His father Lamech is frightened that he may be the offspring of a Watcher, but he is reassured by Enoch that this is not the c
ase, but rather that Noah is pure and holy, called to be God’s remnant. Then one chapter, 108, is an additional exhortation by Enoch to Methuselah of the judgment of good and evil in the latter days.

  Lastly, is the Book of Giants. Until the 1950s, the Book of Giants was only known as a Manichean gnostic text from the late 3rd century A.D. But the discoveries of the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran in the 1950s uncovered fragments of an original Book of Giants in Aramaic from the 2nd century B.C. that was the basis for the Manichean expanded alterations.[18] Enochian expert J.T. Milik argues that the Book of Giants should be considered part of the corpus of 1 Enoch texts, but scholars are divided over this conclusion.[19]

  Although we only have precious few fragments of this book, the story can be pieced together of the fall of the Watchers and their mating with humans, producing defiled giant offspring. But the unique aspect of this manuscript is its elaboration of the personal exploits of the giants from their perspective. Several giant sons of the Watchers named Ohya and Hahya (sons of Semyaza) and Mahway have dream visions of the Deluge. Interestingly, the Mesopotamian giant king Gilgamesh shows up in this tale as well, and he helps the giants seek out Enoch to discover the interpretation of their dreams. Enoch responds with a tablet declaring the great Flood to come as their judgment and his own challenge to them to pray for mercy.[20]

  The Book of Enoch and the Canon

  The book of Enoch may be fascinating religious and spiritual storytelling. But there are a myriad of such texts from the Second Temple period of ancient Judaism. What makes Enoch special? Just how was the book of Enoch thought of by ancient Jews before Christ, or for that matter, by Christians after him?