Chapter 2

The Enoch Figure*

It is strange that the man to whom the Bible gives only a few brief sentences should be the colossus who bestrides the Apocrypha as no other.¹ Everywhere we catch glimpses of him. He is identified with more other great characters than any other figure of the past. He is the most mysterious, individual, and unique of characters, yet he is the most universal type of them all. How can we account for "the extraordinary strength and pervasiveness of the Enoch legend"?²

The theologians of another day saw in his name an index of both his uniqueness and his universality. Enoch (Henoch) is "the one-and-only," Greek hen, "one," Latin unicus, "only, sole"; but at the same time he is Everyman, the universal "I," from the Semitic anokh. He is often identified with Enosh, "the Man" or human being par excellence.³ The name Enoch is usually derived from the root ḥanakh, meaning basically to taste,⁴ hence to test, "to give attention to"; from this is derived, in turn, the idea of teaching or training,⁵ designating Enoch as the "first vehicle of . . . the genuine gnosis."⁶ A related meaning is "to consecrate," making Enoch the "consecrated one, from whom authentic solutions [are] to be expected touching the secrets of this world and the one beyond."⁷ This puts the figure of Enoch, A. Caquot avers, "in the center of a study of matters dealing with initiation in the literature of Israel."⁸ Enoch is the great initiate who becomes the great initiator.⁹

A recent study that declares the Hebrew meaning of the root to be "unknown" suggests instead the Canaanite khanaku, meaning "follower" (Gefolgsmann), that is, in the way of the initiate.¹⁰ The idea is strengthened by "the great role which Enoch plays in Qumran," with its impressive "prophetic initiation."¹¹ The Hebrew book of Enoch bore the title of Hekhalot, referring to the various chambers or stages of initiation in the temple. "I will not say but what Enoch had temples and officiated therein," said Brigham Young, "but we have no account of it."¹² Today we do have such accounts.

These interpretations of Enoch's name and office are supported by his best-known epithet, that of Metatron. While some would derive it from the Latin metator, "guide"¹³ or "leader,"¹⁴ others prefer the Greek metathronos, the one "with the throne"¹⁵ or "he whose throne is [the most glorious] next to [meta] the Throne [that is, the 'Throne of Glory'; or 'the throne greatest next to the Throne']."¹⁶ Others insist that the derivation still remains unsolved and that "the Metatron combines various traits derived from different systems of thought."¹⁷ K. Kohler went so far as to trace it to Mithra, noting especially the prominence of the fiery chariot (Hebrew merkābāh) in various Oriental cults.¹⁸ "I have seventy names," says Metatron Sar ha-Pānīm, "matching the 70 tongues of the world, and all of them are the name of the King of Kings of Kings, but my King calls me Na'ar [the Lad]. I asked him: 'Why is such a one called the Lad?' He answered me: 'I am Enoch the son of Jared!'"¹⁹

Matthew Black would see in Enoch's mystical epithet of Metatron a means of transmitting "the Enoch figure" to later times under the philosophical epithet of "Man as the measure (metron) of all things," designating at once "the elect Community, and the Head of the elect . . . the immortalized patriarch, the elect One, the Son of man."²⁰ The tendency today is to define Enoch as the eponymous perennial head of any of the many groups of sectaries that broke off from the rest of Judaism or Christianity from time to time, the society of the elect, some little aspiring Zion that withdrew from the wicked world and fancied itself as the elect community of Israel hiding in the wilderness. The Enoch-figure is both a teacher-leader and a hider.²¹

The combination of certain traits—independence, intelligence, compassion, and power—is Enoch's signature, setting him apart from all others by the superlative degree to which he possesses them.

His is the independent intelligence always seeking further light and knowledge. He is the great observer and recorder of all things in heaven and earth, of which God grants him perfect knowledge. The great learner, he is also the great teacher: Enoch the Initiator into the higher mysteries of the faith and secrets of the universe; Enoch the Scribe, keeper of the records, instructor in the ordinances, aware of all times and places, studying and transmitting the record of the race with intimate concern for all generations to come. He offers the faithful their greatest treasure of knowledge. He is the seer who conveys to men the mind and will of the Lord.²²

Enoch is the great advocate, the champion of the human race, pleading with God to spare the wicked and "refusing to be comforted"²³ until he is shown just how that is to be done. He feels for all and is concerned for all. He is the passionate and compassionate, the magnanimous one who cannot rest knowing that others are miserable. He is the wise and obedient servant, the friend and helper of all, hence the perfect leader and ruler.²⁴

For his work Enoch is endowed with power—the power of the priesthood. ²⁵ He had but to speak the word of the Lord and mountains shook and rivers turned from their courses.²⁶ He is the king who is given power from on high to organize and lead the people of God in their migration and in the building of their city and in the great missionary program that went out from it. He is their leader as both priest and king, the founder and director of their sacred society on earth.²⁷

But since the "Enoch-figure" meets us everywhere, we are constantly confronted with questions of identity. How can Enoch be "identified" (as he has been) with Adam, Seth, Methusaleh, Melchizedek, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Levi, Moses, Elijah, Job, Isaiah, Daniel, Ezra, Baruch, Zerubabel, Zadok, Lehi, Zosimus, John the Baptist, Peter, John, Rabbi Ishmael, and Joseph Smith? For that matter, how can each member of that list (a sampling only) be identified with one or more others in the roster? Religious literature abounds in facile metaphor and allegory, but that is something else; a reading of John 14—17 or 3 Nephi 10 will make it clear that when these people are declared to be "one," it really means something, amounting to an actual fusion of persons. In the above list each one has his own peculiar intimate relationship with Enoch—we have seen in passing how Joseph Smith as the president in Zion took the name on certain occasions—and since all their stories cannot be told here, certain of the more important ones must serve.

At the head of the list comes Noah, with whom Enoch shared the common mission of warning mankind against the coming Flood; the Enoch story overlaps with the Noah story in a way that scholars have found disturbing and have attributed to bungling and confusion. Here the Joseph Smith version in the book of Moses proves most enlightening, for while the same overlapping is very apparent, it is also explained with perfect clarity. The trouble is that God addresses Enoch as if he were Noah and Noah as if he were Enoch. "At a very early date," writes Van Andel, "the Noah Tradition and the Enoch Tradition are interwoven. The connection lies in the figures themselves. Their righteousness shows much similarity and their works make them interesting both for an Enoch-circle and a Noah-circle."²⁸ The points of resemblance between the two figures—their preaching mission, their speaking with God face to face, their importance as key figures in "a turning point in history," and so on, suggest "how easily the Noah Tradition can be woven through that of Enoch and vice versa."²⁹ "Which of the two traditions is older," Van Andel leaves for further investigation,³⁰ but the mixing of the figures accounts for the mingling of the texts, suggesting to R. H. Charles that the book of Enoch is "built up on the debris of" an older Noah saga.³¹ Sir F. G. Kenyon, on the other hand, gives priority to Enoch at least in the Michigan Codex "in its original state . . . containing a fragment of a Book of Noah, of which other portions are interspersed elsewhere in Enoch."³² Though scholars following the standard German procedure formerly insisted that the Noah elements were a corruption, an intrusion, or "Christian interpolations" in the Enoch text,³³ they now recognize, as Jellinek did from the first, that "the Enoch- and the Noah-books belonged together"; ³⁴ after all, they were contemporaries and had the same mission. The Joseph Smith text shows how easily Noah and Enoch can trade places, a phenomenon so marked that some scholars now go so far as to maintain that "Enoch is really Noah."³⁵ Parallel passages show how the two are consciously related:

Moses 7:41. . . . wherefore Enoch knew, and looked upon their wickedness, and their misery, and wept and stretched forth his arms . . . and his bowels yearned . . . and all eternity shook. 44. And as Enoch saw this he had bitterness of soul, and wept . . . and said unto the heavens: I will refuse to be comforted; but the Lord said . . . look.

1 Enoch 65:1. [When] Noah saw the earth . . . that its destruction was nigh, 2. . . . He arose . . . and went to the ends of the earth, and cried aloud to his grandfather Enoch; and Noah said three times in an embittered voice: "Hear me, hear me, hear me!" . . . And thereupon there was a commotion on the earth. . . . And Enoch my grandfather came and stood by me, and said to me: Why hast thou cried unto me with a bitter cry and weeping?

When Enoch "refused to be comforted" in view of the impending flood, God showed him Noah and he was comforted (Moses 7:44—45), a reminder of the closing line of the Chester Beatty Papyrus (107:3): "And his name was called Noah, comforting the earth after destruction." He also showed him the ark and "that the Lord smiled upon it and held it in his own hand" (Moses 7:43), even as in 1 Enoch 67:2 he sees the mysterious structure built by the angels, which on later evidence turns out to be the ark, with the promise, "I will place my hand upon it [the ark] and preserve it." In the Joseph Smith text the Earth says to Enoch, "When shall I rest, and be cleansed from all the filthiness which is gone forth out of me? . . . that I may rest and righteousness for a season abide upon my face?" (Moses 7:48.) In the Greek Enoch, on the other hand, it is Enoch who says, "Noah shall be the remnant in whom you will rest for a season and his sons from all the impurities and the filthiness, sins and wickedness . . . of the earth"³⁶ It is the same story with a shift of characters. Again, in the Joseph Smith Enoch when Satan's rule "veiled the whole face of the earth with darkness . . . Enoch beheld angels descending out of heaven . . . and [many] were caught up by the powers of heaven into Zion." (Moses 7:26—27.) In the recently discovered Apocryphon of John, on the other hand, when "darkness was poured out over every place upon the entire earth, He [God] took counsel with his angels, and their angels were sent down to the children of men"; but it was not Enoch's people but Noah and those with him who were carried away to heaven in a cloud of light.³⁷

The first five columns of the Genesis Apocryphon, an old Aramaic text belonging with the Dead Sea Scrolls, "deal with the birth of Noah," according to Professor Avigad, in terms not found in "the brief Biblical account in Genesis [5:28—29], but [which] resembles Enoch [106] in most essential points."³⁸ When first discovered, it was thought to be a Book of Noah "embedded in Enoch, properly derived from the Book of Lamech,"³⁹ but the story turns up elsewhere, for example, in the Greek Enoch text in exactly the same context. It tells of a marvelous child, Noah, who had been born to Lamech, who could not believe it to be his own, but charged his wife (Bit-Enosh, "Daughter of Man") with having consorted with "one of the angels" (sons of God). Only when Lamech's father, Methusaleh, goes to a far place to inquire of his father, Enoch, does he receive assurance that the child is legitimate.⁴⁰ Even this interesting twist does not escape the Joseph Smith version.

Moses 8:2. Methusaleh, the son of Enoch was not taken . . . for he [God] truly covenanted with Enoch that Noah should be the fruit of his loins. Moses 8:3. And . . . Methusaleh prophesied that from his loins should spring all the kingdoms of the earth [through Noah], and he took glory unto himself. 4. And there came forth a great famine into the land . . .

C. Beatty, 107:2. Enoch: Now run child [Methusaleh was already a grandfather] and signify to Lamech thy son that the child [Noah] born to him is truly his and not in falsehood. Beatty, 106:16. It is to Methusaleh that Enoch foretells that the issue of Noah will populate the whole earth through his three sons. Slavonic Enoch 22. But I will preserve Noah, the firstborn of Lamech, and I will cause to rise from his seed another world, and his seed will endure through the ages. And Methusaleh awoke from his sleep and was sorely distressed because of the dream.

Here we are told not only that Noah was legitimate after all and that Methusaleh was promised that his grandson Noah would be the parent of the race, but also, surprisingly, that the news caused Methusaleh distress.⁴¹ Of this there is nothing in the Bible.

But what leads to a natural confusion of Enoch with Noah is that both receive the same promise. Again, the Joseph Smith version is right on target:

Moses 7:45. . . . from Noah, he beheld all the families of the earth; and he cried unto the Lord, saying: When shall the day of the Lord come . . .	1 Enoch 65:6. To Enoch: A command hath gone forth from the presence of the Lord. . . .
7:49. And . . . Enoch . . .? cried unto the Lord, saying: O Lord, wilt thou not have compassion upon the earth? Wilt thou not bless the children of Noah?	12. And He hath destined thy name to be among the holy . . . And has destined thy righteous seed both for kingship and great honors, and from thy seed shall proceed a fountain of the righteous and holy without number forever.
50. . . . I ask thee . . . that thou wilt have mercy upon Noah and his seed. . . . 51. And the Lord . . . covenanted with Enoch . . . that he would call upon the children of Noah. . . . 52. . . . That a remnant of his seed should always be found among all nations, while the earth should stand;	67:2. . . . And there shall come forth from it [the Ark] the. . . seed of life. . . . And I will make fast thy [Enoch's] seed before me forever and ever, and I will spread abroad those who dwell with thee. . . . It shall be blessed and multiplied on the earth in the name of the Lord.
53. And the Lord said: Blessed is he through whose seed Messiah shall come; for he saith—I am Messiah, the King of Zion, the Rock of heaven. . . .	1 Enoch 84:5. Enoch: And now, O Lord and Great King, I implore thee and beseech thee to fulfill my prayer, and to leave me [Enoch] a posterity on earth, and not destroy all the flesh of man.
Moses 7:42. And Enoch also saw Noah . . . that the posterity of all the sons of Noah should be saved with a temporal salvation. 43. Wherefore Enoch saw that Noah built an Ark. . . . 45. And . . . Enoch looked; and from Noah he beheld all the families of the earth. . . .	Secrets of Enoch 23:82. And I know that this race will be destroyed entirely, and Noah my brother will be saved for the procreation of offspring, and that a numerous race will arise from his seed, and Melchizedek will become the head of the priests.

Thus the covenant of Noah is made also with Enoch: "And the Lord said unto Enoch: As I live, even so will I come in the last days . . . to fulfill the oath which I have made unto you concerning the children of Noah." (Moses 7:60.)

The general principle on which one great patriarch can be identified with another is set forth in the Zohar:

     Noah [cf. Enoch] walked with God, meaning that he never separated himself from Him, and acted so as to be a true copy of the supernal ideal, a "Zaddik [righteous one], the foundation of the world", and embodiment of the world's covenant of peace. 59b. Righteousness and Justice are the foundation of thy throne [cf. Moses 7:32]. . . . It is the Zaddik who produces offspring in the world, . . . the souls of the righteous, these being the fruit of the handiwork of the Holy One. (Zohar, Bereshit 59b—60a.)

As the one who conveys the promise concerning Noah from Enoch to Lamech, Methusaleh also shares in the knowledge and the promise. Indeed in 1 Enoch 83:8ff., it is Methusaleh rather than Enoch who is told to "make petition . . . that a remnant may remain on the earth, and that he may not destroy the whole earth. . . . And . . . I . . . wrote down my prayer for the generations of the world." Now according to Moses 8:2, Methusaleh was spared specifically to ensure the carrying out of the covenant God made with Enoch "that Noah should be the fruit of his loins," which agrees perfectly with the other sources. The same adding of links to the chain is repeated in the story of Nir, the son of Methusaleh who, when his wife Sophonim brought forth another "Wunderkind" like Noah, accused her as Lamech did his wife, of unfaithfulness, ⁴² while he and Noah (his nephew) looked upon the newborn child in wonder and fear.⁴³ Nir doubles also for Enoch in a passage that reveals the borrowing:

     From the day that Nir, the son of Methusaleh, became High Priest, there was peace and order on all the earth for 202 years but after that the people apostatized . . . envying each other, and people rose against people and nation against nation, and there was a great trouble, and Nir the priest . . . was greatly afflicted and said in his heart: The time is approaching of which the Lord spoke to Methusaleh, the father of my father . . . and he stretched forth his arms to the heavens and as he prayed his spirit departed.⁴⁴

In the same account Methusaleh, like his father Enoch, doubts his worthiness: "And Methusaleh stretched forth his arms to the heavens and called upon the Lord saying: 'Alas O Lord, who am I to be at the head of thine altar and thy people?'"⁴⁵ And then, exactly like his son Nir, "While Methusaleh was speaking to the people his spirit was troubled, and bending his knees he stretched forth his arms toward the heaven, praying to the Lord; and as he prayed his spirit departed."⁴⁶ One begins to wonder what difference it makes who is in the stellar role. "Methusaleh became king under his fathers," as the Hebrew source puts it, "and did according to all that his father Enoch showed him . . . and he did not turn from the Good Way to the right or to the left."⁴⁷ Guided by "another book [that] Enoch wrote for his son Methusaleh,"⁴⁸ keeping strictly in the same path, one great leader resembles another, which is not surprising where each repeats the words and actions of his father by the father's specific instructions:

Moses 7:50. Enoch: I ask thee, O Lord . . . that the earth might never more be covered by the floods.	1 Enoch 83:8. And now my son [Methusaleh] arise and make petition [as Enoch himself had] . . . that a remnant may remain on the
51. And the Lord could not withhold; and he covenanted with Enoch . . . that he would call upon the children of Noah;	earth, and that He may not destroy the whole earth; 10. And I [Methusaleh] wrote down my prayer for the generations of the world.
52. And he sent forth an unalterable decree, that a remnant of his seed should always be found.

After doubling for Enoch, Methusaleh, and Noah, Nir proceeds to have a son, who, following the pattern, is another wonder-child, Melchizedek:

     Noah and Nir feared greatly, for the child was completely grown and spoke with his mouth and blessed the Lord. And Noah and Nir examined the child and declared: This is from the Lord, my brother! Behold the seal of the priesthood on his breast! Noah said to Nir: Brother, behold the Lord has restored the dwelling of his sanctification among us. And they washed the child and clothed him in the robes of the high Priest and he ate the bread of benediction, and they called him Melchizedek. And Noah said to Nir: Guard the child, for the people have become wicked on all the earth and will try to kill him. Nir, praying to God, was told in a vision of the night: "A great destruction is coming. . . . As to the child [Melchizedek], I will send my archangel Michael and he will take the child and place him in the Paradise of Eden . . . and he will be my priest of Priests forever, Melchizedek. And Nir . . . said I know that this race will be destroyed entirely, and Noah my brother will be saved for the procreations, and that a numerous race will arise from his seed and Melchizedek will become the head of Priests."⁴⁹

Thus the apparent confusion of Enoch and Noah is progressively confounded down the line of succession. But there is the same line from beginning to end: "Now this same Priesthood, which was in the beginning, shall be in the end of the world also." (Moses 6:7.) It centers in the Messiah of the seed of Enoch and Noah as "the King of Zion, the Rock of Heaven, which is as broad as eternity." (Moses 7:53.) In the Secrets of Enoch we are told that Melchizedek will be priest and king in a place at the center of the earth when the Lord will bring him forth as "another Melchizedek of the lineage of the first Melchizedek."⁵⁰ Here is identity indeed—Melchizedek succeeding himself! In the Pistis Sophia, Jesus says that "the higher mysteries" tell how all "are to be saved in the time and in the number of Melchizedek the Great Mediator of the Light, the agent of all who is at the center of the world."⁵¹

"All the prophets," said Joseph Smith, "had the Melchizedek Priesthood and were ordained by God himself."⁵² And in an Enoch text a voice comes from Adam's coffin and blesses Melchizedek as "the only Priest among the people consecrated by God's own hand. Then the Lord told Melchizedek to take twelve stones and make an altar and put the bread and wine of Shem on it . . . in similitude of the sacrifice of the Lord." ⁵³ When in a like demonstration Methusaleh prayed at the altar and asked God to let the people know by a sign "that it is thou who hast ordained the Priest for thy people. . . . While he was praying the altar was shaken, and the knife of its own accord turned away from the altar and flew out of the hand of Melchizedek in the presence of all the people. And all the people were seized with trembling and glorified the Lord."⁵⁴ To assure us that this is not an unconscious plagiarism, we are told that Melchizedek was with Abraham at the time, having met him on Mount Nabus near Jerusalem, where he embraced and blessed him, Abraham and Melchizedek receiving from the people exactly the same acclamation that was once given Methusaleh and Enoch.⁵⁵

Abraham is our model (D&C 132:29ff.) and is as notable as Enoch for a peculiar combination of intelligence, independence, and humanity:

Abraham 1:2. Desiring also to be one who possessed knowledge, and to be a greater follower of righteousness, and to possess a greater knowledge, and to be a father of many nations. . .	BHM 4:129. The soul of great Enoch clung to the discipline of God and to knowledge and intelligence; and he knew the ways of God, and he was set apart in himself from the children of men.
1:1. . . . it was needful for me to obtain another place of residence.	Then all the people gathered together from the children of men. And Enoch taught the children of men.
	Midrash, Lekh Lekha: All the princes and people came to Abraham to be taught.

The two heroes both have the same singular view of the role of intelligence in the eternal plan:

Abraham 3:18. . . . if there be two spirits, and one shall be more intelligent than the other, yet these two spirits, notwithstanding one is more intelligent than the other, have no beginning; . . . they are gnolaum, or eternal. 19. There shall be another more intelligent than they; I am the Lord thy God, I am more intelligent than they all . . . 18. . . . they are gnolaum, or eternal.

Secrets of Enoch 23:46. One man is more honorable (schestie) than another for his riches, another for his wisdom, another for his intelligence. . . . But the greatest of all is the one who fears the Lord. They who fear the Lord will have glory forever.

As both men are zealous champions of suffering humanity, we find them both, in Jewish tradition, present at the judgment to see that people get a fair break: while Abraham pleads for the unredeemed souls, Enoch stands at the side of the Righteous Judge, keeping an eye on the records.⁵⁶ One could replace the name of Abraham with that of Enoch in every episode of the Apocalypse of Abraham (in which that patriarch's genealogy begins with Enoch) without changing the basic story.⁵⁷

Since each of the patriarchs in his time was "a man righteous and perfect" in whom was reproduced the supernal pattern,⁵⁸ it is no more surprising that they should all follow a single type than that each one should have two eyes and ten fingers; and the archetype of all was, of course, Adam. "He [God] set the ordinances to be the same forever and ever," says Joseph Smith, "and set Adam to watch over them, or to reveal them from heaven to man, or to send angels to reveal them. . . . These angels are under the direction of Michael or Adam, who acts under the directions of the Lord."⁵⁹ "He had dominion given to him over every living creature. . . . Then to Noah, who is Gabriel; he stands next in authority to Adam in the Priesthood." ⁶⁰ None may depart from the pattern set by Adam: "The ordinances must be kept in the very way God has appointed; otherwise their priesthood will prove a cursing instead of a blessing."⁶¹ Enoch, Seth, and Methusaleh were all "ordained under the hand of Adam" (D&C 107:48) while Seth ordained Lamech (107:51), and Noah was ordained not by his father but by his grandfather, Methusaleh (107:52). Then Adam called them all together, "Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahaleel, Jared, Enoch, and Methusaleh, who were all High Priests . . . into Adam-Ondi-Ahman" (107:53), where to climax and fix everything, "the Lord appeared . . . and blessed Adam, and called him Michael, the Prince (107:54) . . . to be at the head" (107:55), all of which "things were written in the Book of Enoch" (107:57).⁶² A. Caquot points out that Abraham, Isaac, Levi, Moses, Elijah, Baruch, and Esdras all have the same type of mission and receive the same revelations as Enoch himself,⁶³ yet nothing detracts from the primacy of Adam, the "Man Adam," who is also Enoch.⁶⁴ As Van Andel puts it, the great line including Enoch, Abraham, Noah, Moses, and Elijah "all crystalizes around Enoch," fulfilling the promise to him by "a logical process from Adam to the Messianic kingdom" at the end of the world.⁶⁵

The placing of Adam at the head of the priesthood formally designated as that of Melchizedek explains the insistence of early Jewish writers on identifying Michael with Melchizedek, though this naturally puzzles modern scholars.⁶⁶ In the great victory scene of the harrowing of hell, Christ turns the liberated Adam over to Michael, and they all enter the gate of heaven, where Enoch and Elijah receive them.⁶⁷ In the Metatron, as Käsemann observes, "both Michael and Metatron-Enoch belong in the series of Moses and Elijah as heavenly high priests."⁶⁸ And so, by an easy transition, to Elijah, more often paired with Enoch than any other figure: "The angel containing the name Yahweh referred to in Exodus 23:20—21 is . . . 'Metatron Prince of the Face,' and is identified with the prophet Elijah."⁶⁹ As the Lord approaches the gates of hell in the drama just referred to, Beliar asks Hades, "Look carefully who is coming, it looks like Elijah or Enoch or one of the prophets to me!" Yet it is Jesus—so much are the three alike.⁷⁰ In a related source, after Christ leads the procession up out of hell and the righteous dead are redeemed with the help of Enoch and Elijah, those who live on "until the end of the world, at which time they will be sent down to earth by God during the rule of the Antichrist to be put to death by him and rise after three days to be caught up into the clouds and meet the Lord."⁷¹ Other sources report the same tradition but include the Lord in the holy trio who are slain and ascend to heaven in their respective times.⁷² John the Baptist, too, was identified with Elijah—"this was Elijah to come if ye can receive it."⁷³ Just as the sectaries of the desert believed John the Baptist, "the Wild Man," to be the returned Enoch,⁷⁴ so the Manichaeans in the third century identified their own founder, Mani, with Enoch.⁷⁵

So we have a society of intimates, all sharing and doing the same things: "Abraham received the priesthood from Melchizedek, who received it through the lineage of his fathers, even till Noah. And from Noah till Enoch . . . and from Enoch to Abel." (D&C 84:14—15.) "Enoch was 25 years old when he was ordained under the hand of Adam, [who also] blessed him. And he saw the Lord, and he walked with him, and was before his face continually." (D&C 107:48—49.) That intimate, personal, face-to-face contact is emphasized throughout—it is all one family living by the same rules and looking forward to one single great event—the coming of the heavenly Zion to join with the earthly ones. That intimate touch is important—it puts all the leaders of the dispensations, including our own, on the same footing: "Let my servant Ahashdah and my servant Gazelem or Enoch [Joseph Smith, Jr.], and my servant Pelagoram, sit in council with the Saints which are in Zion." (D&C 78:9.)

Joseph Smith has been charged with gross ignorance in depicting Elijah and Elias as two different persons, yet they very well could have been. The Gospel of Philip says that the Lord had one name, Jesus, which was the same for all people and all languages, while his Greek name of Christ was not used by the Syrians, who said "Messiah" instead; the name of Nazarene was a secret one whose real meaning was known only to his immediate followers.⁷⁶ Conversely, one name could designate different prophets while taking a slightly different form to avoid confusing them.⁷⁷ Thus Caesar was a man, but scores of men have borne the same name; to make distinction among them the name may be rendered, for example, Czar, Kaiser, Kezar. Elijah is identified repeatedly in ancient sources with both Enoch and John the Baptist. Who is to say at this distance in time whether or not Elias is a doublet of this illusive figure? Sir Frederick Kenyon has explained how the Son of Man is "the Lord, whose life was in many respects prefigured by many of the patriarchs and prophets. . . . This is he who in Abel was slain, in Isaac was bound, who in Jacob dwelt in a strange land, in Joseph was sold, in Moses was cast out, in the Lamb was sacrificed, in David was hunted, in the prophets was dishonored." ⁷⁸

The repeated emergence of "Enoch figures" in the course of sacred history should cause no perplexity to Latter-day Saints, who have already seen three "Joseph Smiths" as prophet, seer, and revelator.⁷⁹ What arguments that could stir up among scholars three thousand years from now! As the mantle of Elijah fell on Elisha (note the suspicious resemblance of names), and that of Moses on Joshua in a more than figurative sense, so many of the Saints testified as eyewitnesses that for a moment in the bowery at Nauvoo Brigham Young was Joseph Smith.

There is one parallel that has exercised the experts more than all the others put together, and that is the puzzling relationship between Enoch and the Son of Man. No question has been more diligently discussed in the journals than the identity of the son of Man; few scholars can resist the temptation of pointing out with magisterial ease just who he is, but with little or no agreement among themselves. Aside from Jesus, it is Enoch who of all the candidates lays by far the most convincing and challenging claim to the Son of Man title "as teacher, wise one, advocate, prophet, ideal man, bringer of salvation, revealer of hidden mysteries, etc."⁸⁰ The key to the identification as R. Otto sees it is that Christ "lived and preached in the role and in the name of the Son of Man, just as Enoch also in his preaching was a functionary of the Son of Man and his Righteousness."⁸¹ In 1 Enoch 37:71, "Enoch has become the eschatological Saviour himself, the ideal of the pious community," officially designated as the "Son of Man."⁸² Though earlier scholars were disturbed by the outright identity of the two (R. H. Charles deliberately alters the ancient text to avoid it),⁸³ their identity was fully recognized by ancient theologians; indeed, the Christian "tendency to identify Adam in all his characteristics with Jesus, who similarly is represented as 'The Perfect Man,'"⁸⁴ matches the practice of identifying Enoch also with Adam. Eusebius states the case thus: "The Son of Man and the Son of Adam are the same thing, so that Adam and Enosh are the same; carnal (sarkikon) through Adam, rational (logikon) through Enosh."⁸⁵ He also makes it perfectly clear that by Enosh he means Enoch: "The Hebrews say that Enosh not Adam was the first true man. . . . He 'was not found' [said only of Enoch] means that truly wise men are hard to find. He withdrew from the world of affairs and thereby became the Friend of God [cf. Abraham]. The Hebrews call him 'The Friend,' signifying thereby the favor (charin) of God."⁸⁶ For the Mandaeans, the Son of Man is necessarily the Son of God, "for he is Enosh, the first man created," in the direct image of God.⁸⁷

In the intertestamental period, "the Son of Man tradition [was] in a fluid state and could be adapted to any Messianic Figure."⁸⁸ The individual is unique, but the type can be shared. Thus in the Dead Sea Scrolls Michael is the Son of Man, but for that matter so is Melchizedek.⁸⁹ "The fact that the prophets spoke in the person of God or Christ was a common observation," as Rendell Harris pointed out. "It [was] inevitable that this impersonation should cause difficulties of interpretation."⁹⁰ Impersonation? Was it not enough to be the agent without actual impersonation? Time and again when we think we have discovered an overlooked "Enoch figure," it turns out that the ancient author was quite aware of the parallel. Thus Zerubbabel or Paul or Rabbi Ishmael or Isaiah in their heavenly journeys all meet with Enoch before the story is over.⁹¹ Are these men guilty of impersonation? The question concerns C. P. Van Andel, who acquits them all: A man who performs the function of Enoch has, he concludes, a perfect right to assume the name of Enoch.⁹²

Today emphasis is being placed on the society of the faithful itself as the actual embodiment of the Son of Man: "Enoch has become the eschatological Saviour himself, the ideal of the 'pious community'"⁹³ officially designated as the "Son of Man." Such "Enoch circles" naturally identified whoever was their leader with Enoch.⁹⁴ Matthew Black, seeing the Metatron title "Man as the Measure," equates "the elect community" with the "Head of the Community, the immortalized patriarch, the elect one, the Son of Man."⁹⁵ The communities that followed John the Baptist regarded him as both Enoch and Elijah. "How could John [the Baptist also] be Elijah?" L. E. Keck asks. This was one of the great mysteries to which various sects claimed to have the key, secretly passed down from the Lord to the Apostles.⁹⁶ The passing down thus took place during the forty-day ministry of the Lord, at which time he appears exactly in the manner of Enoch as one whose comings and goings are as thrilling and mysterious as are the great secrets of knowledge he imparts.⁹⁷

In the Old Testament, the expression "Son of Man" is found only in four poetic passages, in which it is hardly more than an expression for an ordinary human.⁹⁸ In the New Testament, it is not, as anyone would naturally expect, the unassuming title of one who would depict himself humbly as a common mortal "delicately and modestly,"⁹⁹ or even in "self-depreciation." ¹⁰⁰ For in all the occurrences of the title in the New Testament, it refers to the Lord in his capacity as the exalted one from on high whose real nature and glory are hidden from men.¹⁰¹ Aside from these occurrences, the title "Son of Man" "is never used as a title in the intertestamental literature except in the Similitudes of Enoch."¹⁰² Here is a very neat test for Joseph Smith: the "Son of Man" title does not occur once in the Book of Mormon, either, and in the Pearl of Great Price it is confined to one brief section of the Book of Enoch where it is used no fewer than seven times—again the prophet is right on target. Several verses are cited below to explain how the titles Sons of God and Sons of Man in the plural related to the singular Son of God and Son of Man (all emphasis supplied):

Moses 6:68. Behold thou [Enoch] art one in me . . . and thus may all become my sons.	Ethiop. Bk. of Mysts., in Patriologiae Orientaliae VI, 430. Next after Adam comes Enoch, the 7th, the Righteous One, who saw all that was to
7:18. And the Lord called his people Zion, because they were of one heart and one mind. . . . people walked with God, and	come and saw a vision of the cosmos. In such a way all the prophets are symbols of the Son. The Lord the Father wrote with
7:69. And Enoch and all his he dwelt in the midst of Zion; and . . . God received it up into his own bosom.	his own fingers the 10 words indicating the various dispensations—all centering in "the subject of the Son." 431. In the 2nd Week [Disp.] Enoch saw "that the Man was saved," "the Man" being Noah, who was also a type of the Savior since he saved the race. . . . Even so in
7:24. Enoch was . . . even in the bosom of the Father and the Son of Man. 7:63. And the Lord said unto Enoch: . . . thou and all thy city. . . . We will receive them into our bosom . . . and we will fall upon their necks and they shall fall upon our necks.	the 3rd Week, the Lord chose Abraham. 432. In the 4th Week he chose Moses; in the 5th Week he chose the Prophets, in the6th the Apostles, in the 7th [a dispensation coming after the Apostles] he chose the Saints those who believe on the coming of the Lord. 434. Thus "Noah" was the symbol of the Son, as the Flood was of Baptism; 436. Abraham was the symbol of Jesus in 10 things, including baptism and Enoch was the exemplar of all 10 [signs and dispensations; cf Clementine Recognitions I]. Van Andel, Structuur, p. 23 on the 10 dispensations. 1 Enoch 1:1. Enoch directs his writings to "the Elect and righteous who will be living in that day of tribulation . . . 2. . . . but not for this generation, but for a remote one which is to come."

Recalling that Enoch is the initiate, it is suggested that it was by initiation that Enoch became "in a way identified with the Son of Man."¹⁰³ Here Van Andel notes that we are skating on thin ice, that "the concept is a dangerous one in our ignorance," since the whole thing was treated by the ancients themselves as a carefully guarded secret.¹⁰⁴ Through anointing, a Catholic writer suggests, Enoch is "next to God, but not God," ¹⁰⁵ recalling those wonderful words of Enoch, "thou art God, and I know thee . . . that I should ask in the name of thine Only Begotten; thou hast made me and given me a right to thy throne." (Moses 7:59.) Also a right to become his son: "Behold I am a Son of God in the similitude of his Only Begotten; and where is thy [Satan's] glory that I should worship thee?" (Moses 1:12—13; emphasis supplied) for God said, "I have a work for thee, Moses, my son; and thou art in the similitude of Mine Only Begotten [who] . . . is and shall be the Savior." (Moses 1:6; emphasis supplied.) That "is and shall be" is important, showing the Son of Man's recurrent missions; even more important is "similitude" as the key to identity between one of God's sons and another. "The Man Adam" is "many," and yet there is but one great archetype; there are saviors on Mount Zion, but there is only one Savior; lords many, but only one Lord; there are prophets and the Prophet; there is a Daniel and the Daniel; an Elijah and the Elijah, anointed ones and the Anointed One, devils and the devil. We need not be disturbed when the Odes of Solomon report that Enoch is "raised up to become the Son of God,"¹⁰⁶ or when an Ethiopian text teaches that only the prophets by ascending a high mountain to a high place "can hear the fearful name of God," pending which God is known only by epithets, the first of the list being Enoch.¹⁰⁷ Enoch here is only an epithet, not the true and essential name.

The fullest explanation of the divinity of Enoch is given by the Prophet Joseph:

     They are they who are priests and kings, who have received of his fulness, and of his glory. And are priests of the Most High, after the order of Melchizedek, which was after the order of Enoch, which was after the order of the Only Begotten Son. Wherefore, as it is written, they are gods, even the sons of God. (D&C 76:56—58; emphasis supplied.)

     Our Father Adam, Michael, he will call his children together and hold a council with them to prepare them for the coming of the Son of Man. . . . The Son of Man stands before him, and there is given him glory and dominion. Adam delivers up his stewardship to Christ . . . as holding the keys of the universe, but retains his standing as head of the human family; I saw Adam in the valley of Adam-Ondi-Ahman. . . . The Lord appeared in their midst and he [Adam] blessed them all. (Teachings, pp. 157—58.)

Those who share the same exalted order have a claim to the same honorific titles. Such were not limited to the ancient prophets, "for pious theists claim for themselves the attribute of Enoch," and the words of Psalms 73:49 "seem not unworthy of the poet who identified himself with Enoch." ¹⁰⁸ The initiate has become a scribe, a sage, and an interpreter himself, an initiator—a veritable Enoch. This is confirmed by the Prophet Joseph: "I say in the name of the Lord that the kingdom of God was set up on the earth from the days of Adam to the present time, whenever there has been a righteous man . . . unto whom God revealed his word."¹⁰⁹

The Enoch Tradition in the Ancient Near East

The Dead Sea Scrolls have expanded the sphere of Enoch studies, which until now have been confined to the world of the intertestamental writers taking their cue from apocalyptic Daniel (about 165 B.C.), with occasional brief looks at the classical and Indo-Iranian elements vaguely designated as belonging to the Gnostics or the Mysteries. But the Enoch tradition takes an immense leap backward as soon as we begin to examine the oldest records of the race, in which the most eminent authorities have detected not only the figure but even the name of Enoch repeatedly, and which also contain full and vivid descriptions of the world of Enoch as described in our later sources.

At least as early as the second century B.C., learned men were making a "fusion of the Bible with Berossus and Hesiod," the former being a highly trustworthy historian who was "entirely dependent on Babylonian traditions," ¹¹⁰ while the latter rivals Homer as the earliest and most venerated of Greek writers. The common meeting ground of the hoariest legends and histories of many peoples was the Flood story, and down through the centuries the figure of Enoch "was widely equated with the Oannes of Berossus," he being the seventh mythical king of Babylon (as Enoch was the seventh patriarch), the bringer of heavenly wisdom to men, builder of the holy city, and God of the Flood, whose name also suggests that of Enoch.¹¹¹ W. Hallo notes that Oannes may be the Greek form of the Sumerian name Ur-an, equated "in late texts . . . playfully . . . with Akkad, ummanu, sage, teacher, while Hnwk [Enoch] is derived from a root meaning to train, educate."¹¹² Another seventh king, the Sumerian En-men-dur-an-ki(na), Caquot equates with Enoch, he being the founder of the Mesopotamian priesthood, "the king of Sippar in whose hands the Gods place the secret of Anu, Bel, and Ea, the tablet of the Gods, the seal of the oracle of the heaven and earth."¹¹³ His Sumerian name means "Lord of the Decree, of Totality of heaven and earth." ¹¹⁴ The name Enoch also suggests that of Enki-Ea, "the King of Wisdom who created intelligence. He knows everything that has a name," like the Egyptian Thoth, and like Thoth he is also the great guide to the rites of initiation into the mysteries.¹¹⁵

As "recent studies emphasize the significance of the Flood story for the understanding of pre-patriarchal history,"¹¹⁶ Enoch assumes a central position. It will be recalled that in the Genesis Apocryphon and other Lamech texts, Methusaleh goes to Enoch at the ends of the earth to inquire about the birth of Noah. Now in the long familiar Babylonian epic of Gilgamesh, that hero in dire perplexity goes to consult Utnapishtim, also at the ends of the earth, and Utnapishtim is none other than Noah, who tells the hero the Flood story even as Enoch predicts the Flood to Methusaleh.¹¹⁷ It is held today that "Enoch is a kind of demi-god corresponding to (and inspired by) the Redeemer-god or Wisdom-God of the Babylonian Flood-legend . . . Ea-Oannes; Enoch is the Jewish Redeemer from the Flood," the real hero of the Flood story, "a highly privileged mediator between God and man, enjoying the distinction of being human yet immortal."¹¹⁸

Indeed J. G. Davies goes so far as to maintain that the Utnapishtim story "is the immediate source of the Enoch legend."¹¹⁹ In the Sumerian version of the epic, Utnapishtim also goes by the name of Atrahasis, "the exceedingly Wise One," "the Super-clever One."¹²⁰ As Kraeling describes it, the Atrahasis story is even closer to Enoch's than is the Old Babylonian version.¹²¹ In the latter not only Utnapishtim but Gilgamish himself is an Enoch figure: "He saw the secret things and revealed hidden things; he brought intelligence of the days before the Flood; he went on a long journey . . . . He engraved on a tablet of stone all the travail; he builded the wall of Uruk, the Holy City" (cf. Enoch's City).¹²²

Moving west into Canaan, the Ugaritic writings of the fourteenth century B.C. contain lines and situations that seem to come right out of Enoch. There is a great assembly of fallen Gods on Mount Hmry—the Mount Hermon on which the heavenly Watchers held their convention in the Enoch story.¹²³ There is the upheaval of nature in "violent rains and storms," the colossal roaring of the elements that marks the end of an old age and the beginning of a new.¹²⁴ We find a ritual drama in which "we may visualize such a scene as the classic encounter between Elijah and the Prophets of Baal," ¹²⁵ thus bringing Enoch's double onto the scene. There is a haunting familiarity in some lines: "Who is Kret that he should weep? Or shed tears, the Good one, the Lad of El?"¹²⁶ These texts share common elements and names with the Minoan-Mycenaean, Babylonian, and Egyptian holy books, showing their common archaic ritual background.

A very early Egyptian ritual text, Papyrus Salt 825, has recently been reexamined. It gives a vivid picture of world upheaval amidst universal weeping:

     O make lamentation, Gods and Goddesses. . . . The earth is desolate, the Sun does not come forth, the moon is reversed in her course; Nun [the watery firmament] trembles, the earth is overturned, all mortals shall weep and mourn, the gods and goddesses also, all mankind, the Akhw, the dead, the beast of the field, the herds . . . with a sore weeping.¹²⁷ [cf. Moses 7:28, . Hor has wept, the water descending from his eye to the earth. . . . Then Shw and Tefnut set to weeping with a great weeping [this pair represent the heavens above and the earth beneath; cf. "The whole heavens shall weep over them. . . . Wherefore should not the heavens weep? (Moses 7:37; see also verses 28—34, 40)]. Then Re wept anew, and the water that came down to earth from his eye became a bee ('fy).¹²⁸

E. Hornung points out that the common Egyptian root rem, meaning both "tears" and "mankind," shows the "deep association," the mood (Stimmigkeit) of the world as reflected in language. "It hits us like lightning when the Creator says: 'I must weep because of the raging against me! Men are blind.'"¹²⁹ How well our Joseph Smith Book of Enoch captures the spirit of the thing!

     And it came to pass that the God of heaven looked . . . and he wept; and Enoch bore record saying: how is it that the heavens weep, and shed forth their tears as rain upon the mountains? (Moses 7:28.)

Here the weeping sky is equated with the weeping Creator and the rain to its tears and to his tears. Or again:

Moses 7:34. The fire of mine indignation is kindled against them; and in my hot displeasure will I send Floods upon them, for my fierce anger is kindled.

Salt 825. III, I. Re spat or vomited in this indisposition [bdsh] bitumin [mrhw] . . . 2. he was indisposed again and the liquid that came from his mouth grew up and became Papyrus [twfn, a cleansing substance].

If rain can be divine, cleansing tears, lava can be divine, purifying wrath!

An important class of writings contained in the "oldest book in the world," the Pyramid Texts of Egypt, is what Faulkner labels "Ascension Texts."¹³⁰ They describe the ascension to heaven of the hero snatched up in the whirlwind amidst vast thunderings and lightnings and upheavals of nature. The imagery is impressive, but where does it come from? "The king is Osiris in a [whirlwind] . . . bound for the sky on the wind, on the wind!" (PT 258.) "The king travels the air and traverses the earth. . . . There is brought to him a way of ascent to the sky, and it is he who performs the errand of the storm. The Sun Folk have testified concerning me; the hail storm of the sky has taken me and they raised me up to Re." (PT 261—62.) "The sky is overcast, the stars are darkened, the celestial expanses quiver, the bones of the earth-gods tremble. . . . Commend me to the four blustering winds which are about you . . . who contend . . . with those whom they would destroy. May they not oppose me when I . . . come to tell you the report of the great Flood which is coming forth from the great one." (PT 273—74, 311.) So Enoch might have spoken. It is interesting to read that in the king's entourage are the "Great Ones" and the "Watchers" (so rendered by Faulkner), suggesting personnel of very ancient traditions: "The Great Ones care for you, the Watchers wait upon you." (PT 373.) We read of the opposing hand of the Great Fetterer or Chainer in PT 384, and think of Satan clutching his great chain in Moses 7:26. The departure to heaven is a triumphant one though it leaves mortals stunned: "Geb laughs, Nut shouts for joy before me when I ascend to the sky. The sky thunders for me, the earth quakes for me, the hail storm has burst apart for me, and I roar as does Seth. Those who are in charge of the parts of the sky open the celestial doors for me, and I stand on air, the stars are darkened for me with the aid of the gods' water jars [the virga of falling rain]. . . . I will leave a record of myself among men and the love of me among the Gods." (PT 511.) This reads like some "primitive" version of the scores of "testaments" left behind by prophets, patriarchs, and apostles who at a later time tell of their journeys to heaven, following the archetypal Enoch; what can be the connection?¹³¹ After the Pyramid Texts, the Coffin Texts continue the story in which "the voyages to heaven assume an infinity of astronomical allusions, the greater part of which are incomprehensible," according to L. Speleers, who concludes that "the original texts and contexts have plainly been lost."¹³² The 178th chapter of the Book of the Dead contains a Flood story text that the ancient scribes profess themselves at a loss to explain, lost as it is in the mists of the remote past. "What is this?" writes one of them; and the answer: "This storm was the raging of Re. Thoth removed the thundercloud—and restored the eye. Others say, however, that the thunder cloud is caused by sickness in the eye of Re which weeps."¹³³ The title of this chapter is "The Rite for Not Dying a Second Time," reminding us that Gilgamesh visited the Babylonian Noah expressly to learn the secret of not dying again.

     What has become of the human race? They make war, stir up all manner of iniquity and violence, and commit every kind of crime. They contrive rebellion, conspiracy and terror; killing has become a way of life; they plot and carry out murders, for the strong takes advantage of the weak in all their doings [Budge]. Thou [Thoth speaking for God] canst not look upon evil, thou wilt not be patient. Make short their years! Cut short the times of their months; because they do crime in secret in everything they have done unto thee. I have [am] thy writing-tablet O Thoth, thy inkpot has been brought to me. I am not among those who return to their secret deeds of iniquity. (2—9.)

Here the scribe specifies: "Words to be spoken by Ani [the Candidate or Initiate]":

     O Atum, what land is this toward which I wander? For it has no water, it has air; it is very md [deep, like a valley, cf. Moses 7:5—8]. It is black as night [Moses 7:26, etc.] and ever vainly seeking is he who lives in it; none of the sweet things of life are in it. . . . So said Atum, speaking with me face to face, saying, I cannot look upon thy iniquities [or afflictions, difficult times, lit. "straits"]. Spoken by Atum . . . I have ordained that my likeness shall be seen in him; my face shall look upon the face of the Lord Atum. . . . I have permitted him to send the Great Ones [cf. angels] and now all my works shall be for destruction. This earth is destined to return to the water of Nun, into primeval chaos [hwhw] as in the beginning. (10—18.)

The god next promises Ani the continuation of his line, his son being, as he is, the heir upon the throne (line 20, cf. Moses 7:45, 49.) In the lines that follow, the hero survives in the great "ship of millions" [cf. facsimile no. 2, fig. 41], which supports the life of the race. Then (lines 23—26) comes a renewing of the covenant: "Thou doest for me what thy father did for thee, Re has placed me upon the earth that I might prepare my throne that my heir . . . and my garden might thrive . . . to place mine enemies . . . in bonds in the embraces of Sekhet. I am thy son, O my father Re, thou hast made me for this. . . . Thou causest me to come, to rise up, to advance to a glorified state."

To escape from the Flood every god takes his place in the "ship of millions"—what better name for the Ark?¹³⁴ The same story is told in other texts: Heliopolis joins in weeping, as the earth returns to its watery chaos, and Osiris departs in the Great Ship to go to the great God in the midst of the sky.¹³⁵ The funerary nature of the event in no way conflicts with historical contexts, since the final leave-taking of the hero, his Petirah, is necessarily his last farewell—to all intents his funeral—to those left behind on earth. A hieratic papyrus in the British Museum has the righteous escaping from the diluvial punishment of the wicked in two ways—one in a great boat, the other by taking off into the sky; and, as we have seen, the Slavonic texts supply both escape routes for Enoch's people.¹³⁶

The recorder of all these events is the Egyptian Thoth, Hermes, who bore God's message to a depraved humanity in the time of the Watchers and, as he warned them, recorded all that happened in "the Book of Remembrance of All Things."¹³⁷ "He saw all things as a whole, and having beheld he comprehended . . . he had the power to reveal unto others, and . . . the things which he learned he engraved and having engraved them he hid them," so that succeeding generations would have to seek diligently for such knowledge in order to find it (cf. Moses 1:41).¹³⁸ The Egyptian equivalent of Watchers were those who conspired under Typhon and took terrible oaths in which Aso, the queen of Ethiopia, took the lead, reminding us of Lamech's wife. The evil aspirations of this woman were checked by the mysterious prophet Si-Osiris whose wondrous birth matches that of Noah and others.¹³⁹ Guided by his father, this Wunderkind journeyed to the celestial court and, like Enoch and others, "entered the seventh hall and saw Osiris upon a golden throne." ¹⁴⁰ Fifteen hundred years later, this prophet returns again, appearing as a superboy and superscribe in the royal court, where he overcomes the evil woman and her son and sends them packing to Nubia in an airship of his own invention. Like the Messiah, Si-Osiris returns in every "time of wickedness and vengeance."¹⁴¹ A Thoth figure, he is personified as Sia, "who bears the gods' book, he who is in charge of wisdom being great even Sia who is at the right hand of Re." "Sia," Faulkner notes, "is the personification of intelligence and understanding."¹⁴² He is also the Arabic Idris, who is Enoch.¹⁴³ Thoth, like Enoch, is in charge of the rites of initiation, as "Lord of the Divine Words, Keeper of the Secret Knowledge that is in heaven and earth, the great God of the beginning . . . who established speech and writing, causing the temples to flourish." ¹⁴⁴ "This way was taught by Hermes (Thoth) and was interpreted by the prophet Bitus to Ammon the king when he found it written in Hieroglyphs. . . . He transmitted the name of God and it spread throughout the entire earth." ¹⁴⁵

The stock Egyptian picture of the king mounting up to heaven in the vast updrafts of a cumulo-nimbus thunderhead is recognized today as referring to real natural phenomena that must have made an enormous impression.¹⁴⁶ The mysterious cords or ropes often referred to by which one is carried up into the sky are interpreted by Wainright as meteoric trails, and he compares the ascensions of Moses and Elijah "in a thunderstorm," the latter with a "chariot of fire and horses of fire" to "the entry into heaven made by some of the early Pharaohs."¹⁴⁷

Indo-Aryan tradition fairly swarms with Enoch-figures, and the early Christians resented the competition with their own. "Stupid men regarded Zoroaster as a martyr," said Clement of Rome, "worshipped at his tomb, and said he had been carried up to heaven as the Friend of God in a heavenly chariot, they dared to worship him and cherish him as the Living Star."¹⁴⁸ To go into Book of Mormon (1 Nephi 1:8—11) and other analogies would take us too far afield (though G. de Santillana finds very significant ties between Enoch and Quetzalcoatl),¹⁴⁹ as would the frequent parallels with Enoch of various heroes of Classical literature, noted by scholars of the Renaissance and Reformation.¹⁵⁰

Pindar, in his ninth Olympian Ode, tells of the rebellion of men against God and the horrid convulsions of nature that followed, of Deucalion and the ark and of his son Japetus (Japheth), the ancestor of the Greeks. If ever there was a perfect description of a half-heavenly, half-earthly society, it is Pindar's picture of the Hyperboreans dwelling in a state of bliss atop "the inaccessible unattainable mountain."¹⁵¹ B. Z. Wacholder saw in Atlas, standing amidst the thunder between heaven and earth, "but a Greek adaption of Enoch" through Phoenician ties.¹⁵²

Greek mythology is an endless procession of familiarly recurring themes—the abominations of the ancients, the deeds of inspired holy men, upheavals of nature, fearful punishments and glorious ascensions, and so on, as Greek imagination and speculation suggest ever more combinations and embellishments of the motifs. Take, for example, the case of Aeacus. At a time when gods were mating with the daughters of men, Zeus, blasting the earth with fires from heaven, took the maiden Aegina to an uninhabited island and there begot Aeacus, causing the island to be peopled by turning its ants into humans and surrounding it with reefs so that no one could approach it.¹⁵³ Others say that Aeacus himself led the people up onto the land where the prehistoric rites of all the Greeks were held atop a high mountain.¹⁵⁴ He was the most pious man who ever lived, and was "held in such honor that men longed to keep their eyes on him . . . and join his holy company on the island of Aegina." When mankind became treacherous and murderous the earth was smitten with a great drought, and the oracle said that only the prayers of Aeacus, who, incidentally, was married to a water-nymph, the daughter of Nereus [cf. Nir, brother of Noah in the Enoch-legends], could save the race. So he ascended the highest mountain, where "his prayers were answered by a loud thunderclap, clouds obscured the mountain summit that has ever since been an unfailing portent of rain." ¹⁵⁵ To this day the Athenians call it the cloud of St. Elijah, sure sign of a downpour. Aeacus, greatest of kings and leaders, also built the holy city of Dia (some say Troy), and many sources describe him (as others do Enoch) as one of the three judges of the dead (the other two being Michael and Elijah). His name, according to Worner, means "divine," and he is to be identified originally with Zeus.¹⁵⁶ Thus we may see that Greeks have all the original building blocks, but they have admittedly lost the blueprints and never tire of trying to put the parts back together again in the proper order. I. E. S. Edwards says much the same thing about the Egyptians.¹⁵⁷

Hesiod's Theogony, the Greek Genesis, begins with rain upon the mountains with the chorus of Muses singing in the darkness "veiled in thick clouds" (lines 1—11). We are told of the revolt in heaven; of horrible conspiracies on earth with a race of giants rebelling against Kronos, who had earlier revolted against his own father, Uranus; of a land that emerged from the sea and how people went up on the new land and there celebrated the lascivious rites that produced the race of Titans by those who had been the children of heaven. (207ff.) Then comes a long genealogy of horrors and troubles that still afflict the earth (211—336), interrupted only by the righteous Nereus (the Nir of the Slavonic Enoch), from whom sprang a host of daughters who are most fair to look upon, and a generation of proud and cruel descendants. (240—69.) The next rebel is Zeus, who takes over the earth with his faithful companions, force and violence. Zeus has an ambivalent character. He is responsible for the afflictions of mankind on earth and yet he is still the god of heaven. The Greeks have more than a sneaking suspicion that their ancestors at an early time got off on the wrong track in their worship. All is not sweetness and light: "We can lie like truth," the holy Muses tell Hesiod, "but we can tell the truth when we want to." (27—28.) The idea that something went seriously wrong early in the human story is not out of place in religious people; one is reminded that the initiates of Qumran began their discipline with a solemn recitation of how their fathers had taken the wrong way, as indeed does the story of Abraham. (Abraham 1:5—7.)

Zeus calls a great council on Olympus (cf. the Watchers on Mount Hermon) to plan his war against the Titans. (389—403.) The first to join him was Styx, the lady of the oath, who gave him his power (397—403); but it is Hecate, the dark lady of the oaths, whom men and gods honor above all others, for it is she whose methods promise success to all—power and gain, authority and riches (411—52). Zeus and Hades were born together, and the birth pangs of their mother Rhea are the major upheavals of earth and heaven respectively. (453—506.) Kronos ate his children to prevent any of them seizing his power, but Zeus was saved by Earth's wise tricks and got the upper hand. The whole epic is a tale of horrendous crimes, conspiracies, oaths, and betrayals. Next we hear of a new race, the line of Japetus (Japheth), who, with the daughter of Oceanus, begot Atlas, Meoetius, Prometheus, and Epimetheus. Meoetius was blasted for his pride and ambition; Epimetheus was the first immortal to marry among the daughters of men and got what he deserved, his wife being Pandora (cf. Lamech). Atlas and Prometheus suffered the same afflictions between heaven and earth for showing too much affection toward the human race. Hesiod tells of the Flood (775ff.) as well as the great burning at the end of the world (845ff.), and of the city of perfect peace and harmony that exists somewhere suspended between heaven and earth where Charis and Himeros (all that is lovely and desirable respectively) have their dwelling (63—64).

The leader and hero-ancestor of the Greeks, according to Hesiod, is Prometheus, the son of Japheth. (526.) Some Jewish doctors associate him with Adam and indirectly with Enoch,¹⁵⁸ and the recently discovered Apocryphon of John, No. 3, says that the fall of the first Archon was revealed to Noah by Pronoia and Epinoia, "Foreknowledge" and "Reflection," whose names perfectly match those of Prometheus (Fore-thought) and his brother Epi-metheus (Hind-sight), who taught the people at a time when "darkness was poured out over all that was on earth."¹⁵⁹ Note that the time of wickedness was not the first such period, even as we read in Moses 5:13—16 of the great time of evil even before the days of Cain.

The Prometheus of Aeschylus takes place at the ends of the earth (line 1): no wholly human character appears in the play. Prometheus is being crucified ¹⁶⁰ for the crime of showing too much affection (philanthropia) for the human race and betraying the secrets of heaven to mortals. (Lines 28—38, 104ff.) The once heavenly Zeus has in his ambition become cruel and tyrannical; only Prometheus has the courage to resist him and champion suffering mankind. The chorus enters in a spaceship—an aerial chariot—weeping and shedding their tears upon the mountains. (190ff.) We learn from them that Zeus, for all his ferocity, is still the president of the Blessed Ones, and Prometheus prophesies that he and Zeus will one day become loving friends again. (277—283.)

Prometheus tells of the war in heaven and how he changed sides and brought men a hope of salvation that frees them from fear, compared with which gift the accompanying gift of fire was merely a bonus. (291ff.) He himself appears as one who must suffer and be raised up on high in order to redeem the race. (269.) The leader of the chorus, Oceanus, arrives on a winged horse, which he calls a "swift-winged bird." (279ff.) Why the ocean here in the tops of the mountains? It is because his presence presages the Flood. His opening speech is quoted by Paul: "Do not kick against the pricks!" (325.) Oceanus says he is bringing the solution to the whole problem, as indeed the Flood was. (390ff.) Hearing him, the chorus sheds rain-tears while all Asia weeps (399ff.), the seas are in turmoil, the waters are troubled (431ff.), and the sky and the earth's volcanoes throw fiery bolts at each other. (360ff.)

Prometheus is depicted as the great teacher, the bringer of knowledge and intelligence to the human race, and again he supplies a line to the scriptures when he says of mankind, "Having eyes they saw not, having ears, they heard not." (447—48.) He tells how he has taught them astronomy, mathematics, medicines, technology, divination (456ff.), and like Enoch announces that he has been promised the right to God's throne (510). But the human race lies in darkness as the maiden Io enters describing the drought and desolation of the seas. (561.) The girl wheedles the Great Secret out of Prometheus (just as Pandora did of his brother Epimetheus). Prometheus reports to Io his universal vision of all the earth (707ff.); he knows what happens from beginning to end and prophesies the overthrow of Zeus by his own folly for seeking to marry a mortal woman (760ff.). He tells Io that her wanderings will end in Egypt, where she will beget a king from whom fifty maidens, five generations removed, will flee from their fifty Egyptian cousins and murder all but one, who will beget Heracles the Deliverer. The chorus prays not to be wedded "to any bridegroom who descends from heaven!" and declares mixed marriages to be the great source of misery and disaster. (890ff.)

Prometheus remarks that just such a marriage will overthrow Zeus, and then he describes the great upheavals of nature with the waters of the Flood out of control. (907—35.) Hermes the oath-maker comes to persuade Prometheus to listen to reason and come back to the court of Zeus, but Prometheus refuses, saying he has already seen two tyrants fall and knows that Zeus is the next in line. Hermes tells Prometheus that he can hope for no relief unless some God of his own free will offers to suffer for him and descend below all things. (1026ff.) Prometheus declares himself willing to abide his deliverance rather than yield to the enticing offer held forth by Hermes as the personal representative of Zeus. Hermes, warning against the coming destruction, says that Prometheus and the Chorus can blame only themselves for what is about to happen to them; and as he departs, the whole universe is thrown into confusion as "the sky mingles with the sea," and all that remain are the basic elements of earth, sky, water, and fire.

There are other versions of these sad events in the myths and legends of many people, but by now it should hardly be necessary to multiply examples or to point out parallels to the reader. Of comparative studies there is no end, but where do they lead us? What can we say for sure about Enoch? For one thing, that the Enoch story is not just another myth. More than two thousand years ago, able scholars were trying to account for the common Flood story and the Enoch figure found throughout the ancient world; with the progress of modern research, Enoch, instead of dissolving as so many figures have done in the light of science, has become progressively more real, and the old familiar claims to his hoary antiquity do not vanish at the touch of modern research but do just the opposite. "Curiously," writes B. Z. Wacholder, "it is now generally agreed that the link between the Babylonian traditions and Genesis was much more profound than conceived either by Pseudo-Eumolpus or Alexander Polyhistor," two sound and competent scholars of the second or third century B.C.¹⁶¹

As Enoch's base is spread ever broader on the map and deeper into the past, its importance for Jews, Christians, and Moslems becomes more evident and more baffling: "The relationship between Luke and the Enoch tractate becomes more and more of a puzzle to me the more I think of it," writes one eminent scholar. "Was the relationship in question more than a literary one? Was Luke personally acquainted with the man who translated 1 Enoch? Or was he perhaps himself this man?"¹⁶² Luke himself as one of the transmitters of the old Enoch text! Bold speculation indeed, but for such surprises the student must now be prepared.

In 1835, the Latter-day Saints were told that all things contained in the Book of Enoch were "to be testified of in due time." (D&C 107:57.) Meantime, they had been given a preview in chapters 6 and 7 of the book of Moses. The Pearl of Great Price might well be called the Book of Six Testaments, namely: (1) the Book of Moses, including the Visions of Moses and the Writings of Moses, designated in the ancient manner as "the words of God which he spake unto Moses" (Moses 1:1); (2) A Revelation of the Gospel unto Our Father Adam, excerpted from his Book of Rememberance and quoted in (3) the Prophecies of Enoch;¹⁶³ (4) the Book of Abraham Written by His Own Hand upon Papyrus [this is the title of the book after the ancient fashion, not merely the colophon of one particular manuscript only];¹⁶⁴ (5) an Extract from the New Testament, "being the 24th Chapter of Matthew," also called "the Little Apocalypse" and with equal propriety "the Little Enoch"; (6) Extracts from the History of Joseph Smith, the Prophet.

Without exception these are all parts of larger writings—extracts and fragments. The same holds true for the Book of Mormon, containing "an abridgment of the record of the people of Nephi, and also of the Lamanites" with "an abridgment taken from the Book of Ether also." (Title page, Book of Mormon.) The abbreviated and fragmentary nature of all these writings should be emphasized; every one of them is only a sampling, but in each case a large enough sampling to permit extensive comparison with ancient writings claiming the same authorship and thus establishing their right to serious attention. The repetition of the same themes in all of them is a mark of authenticity, for not only does all authentic apocalyptic writing tell the same story,¹⁶⁵ but even secular history follows patterns to such a degree that throughout the ages the ever-recurring events of sowing and harvest, coronation and conquest, marriage and burial, war and peace, and so on, have been endlessly rehearsed in set ritual cycles all over the world. The many parallel passages we have cited from sources far removed from each other in time and place may once have raised eyebrows; yet any thought of plagiarism by Joseph Smith is out of the question, and if there is one thing that recent manuscript discoveries have made clear for the first time, it is that ancient texts of the greatest importance have been preserved throughout thousands of years of copying with almost uncanny accuracy. Even more impressive is the dawning realization of the immense age and historical plausibility of those legends found throughout the world to which Enoch holds the key.¹⁶⁶

NOTES

*   "The Enoch Figure" was originally prepared for inclusion in "A Strange Thing in the Land: The Return of the Book of Enoch," which appeared in the Ensign from October 1975 to August 1977.

1.   Aside from brief genealogical notes, all that the Bible tells us about Enoch is that "he walked with God, and was not" (Genesis 5:25), and that he prophesied the coming of the Lord to execute judgment (Jude 1:14).

2.   Quoted from G. W. Anderson, in Encyclopedia Britannica (Chicago: Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc., 1973) 8:605.

3.   R. Eisler, Iesous Basileus ou Basileusas, 2 volumes (Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1930) 2:32, 46—52, 102—3; M. J. bin Gorion, Die Sagen der Juden, 5 volumes (Frankfurt am Main: Rutten u. Loening, 1926) 2:285.

4.   A Caquot, "Pour une étude de l'initiation dans l'ancien Israel," in C. Bleeker, ed., Initiation (Leiden: Brill, 1965), p. 121.

5.   B. Davies, A Compendious and Complete Hebrew & Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament (Andover: W. F. Draper, 1882), p. 220.

6.   C. von Orelli, "Enoch," in S. M. Jackson, ed., The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, 15 volumes (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1977) 4:148.

7.   Caquot, "Pour une étude," p. 121.

8.   Ibid., p. 121; von Orelli, "Enoch," p. 148.

9.   Caquot, "Pour une étude," p. 121.

10.   A. van der Born, "Henoch," in H. Haag, ed., Bibel-Lexikon (Zurich: Benziger Verlag, 1968), p. 711.

11.   Ibid.

12.   Journal of Discourses 18:303.

13.   Ludwid Blau, "Metatron," in Jewish Encyclopedia, 12 volumes (N.Y.: Funk and Wagnalls Co., 1904) 8:519.

14.   G. H. Box, "The Hebrew Book of Enoch," in Jewish Quarterly Review (hereinafter JQR) 7(1895): 592.

15.   Ibid.

16.   Ibid., p. 583.

17.   L. Blau, "Metatron," p. 519.

18.   K. Kohler, "The Pre-Talmudic Aggada. II. C. The Apocalypse of Abraham and his Kindred," JQR 7 (1895): 592.

19.   A Jellinek, Bet ha-Midrash (hereinafter BHM), 6 volumes, (Jerusalem: Wahrmann Books, 1967) 5:171.

20.   M. Black, "Eschatology of the Similitudes of Enoch," Journal of Theological Studies, NS 3 (1952): 6—8.

21.   Cf. Lehi. Such elect societies are typified as "Rekhabite." Eisler, Iesous Basileus 2:68, 171, 242ff., etc.; U. Mauser, Christ in the Wilderness (London: SCM Press, 1963), ch. 2.

22.   Moses 6:21ff., 36; Van Andel, De Structuur van de Henochtraditie en het Nieuwe Testament (Utrecht: V. H. Kemink, 1955), p. 61.

23.   Moses 7:44.

24.   Moses 7:41, 44, 49—50.

25.   D&C 107:48.

26.   Moses 6:34.

27.   Moses 7:13, 19.

28.   Van Andel, Structuur, p. 119. As Noah preaches the first end, so Enoch Redivivus preaches the second end of the world (25); both take a special position between heaven and earth (29); Noah as Preacher of Righteousness was identified by the early Christians with Enoch (83), etc.

29.   Ibid., p. 117.

30.   Ibid., pp. 41—42.

31.   R. H. Charles, The Book of Enoch (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1912), xlvii.

32.   F. G. Kenyon, The Chester Beatty Papyri (London: Emery Walker Ltd., 1941) fasc. VIII, Enoch and Melito 8.

33.   So A. Dillmann, cited in G. B., "Enoch," in J. -P. Migne, Dictionnaire des Apocryphes, 2 vols. (Paris: J. -P. Migne, 1856) 1:395; thus Lagrange, cited by J. B. Frey, "Apocryphes de l'Ancien Testament," in L. Pirot, Dictionnaire de la Bible (Paris: Letouzey et Ane, 1928) 1:368.

34.   A. Jellinek, BHM 3:32—33; frg. XIV, 155—60; 2:83—108, 114ff.

35.   R. Graves and R. Patai, Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis (New York: McGraw Hill, 1964), p. 119.

36.   M. Black, ed., Apocalypsis Henochi Graecae (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976), x:20; 106:18.

37.   Apocryphon of John, No. 1, 73:7.

38.   N. Avigad, Genesis Apocryphon (Jerusalem: Magnes Press), 1956), p. 19.

39.   J. C. Trevor, "Identification of the Aramaic Fourth Scroll from 'Ain Feshkha,'" Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 115 (October 1949): 9—10, n.4.

40.   The story is told in the Greek Enoch (Black, Apocalypsis, pp. 10, 12—13, 18, and Kenyon, Chester Beatty 106:1—107:2), and in the Genesis Apocryphon.

41.   Secrets of Enoch, 22ff., in Andre Vaillant, ed., Le livre des secrets d'Hènoch (Paris: Institut d'études Slaves, 1952), pp. 72, 77. The story is repeated a generation later in the Apocalypse of Adam, where it is Noah who doubts the legitimacy of his child, swearing with an oath, "This race was not begotten of me!" for which God rebuked him. (Apocalypse of Adam 71:116ff.)

42.   Secrets of Enoch, 22ff., in Vaillant, ed., Le livre des secrets, p. 72.

43.   Ibid.

44.   Ibid.

45.   Secrets of Enoch 21 in Vaillant, ed., Le Livre des secrets, p. 66.

46.   Secrets of Enoch 22 in Vaillant, ed., Le livre des secrets, p. 72.

47.   BHM 4:132. When "Methusaleh served as High Priest, he explored all the earth, and searched out all those who believed in the Lord, and those who had changed, and he corrected them and converted them," as indeed did his father Enoch and his grandson Nir. (Secrets of Enoch 22.)

48.   Book of Noah 108:1, in R. H. Charles, ed., Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963—64) 2:280.

49.   Secrets of Enoch 23, in Vaillant, Le livre des secrets, pp. 80, 82.

50.   Secrets of Enoch, Ms. R 23, in ibid., pp. 114ff.

51.   Pistis Sophia, p. 24 (34). In the Book of Adam (G. B., "Le livre du combat d'Adam," in Migne, Dictionnaire des Apocryphes, 1:357—59), Melchizedek remains with the body of Adam "celebrating the ordinances forever" at the place in the center of the earth, where salvation will be accomplished (1:367); that spot is the site of Enoch's New Jerusalem (1:377), to which the kings of the earth come and bow down to Melchizedek, begging him to dwell with them.

52.   Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1976), p. 181.

53.   G. B., "Le livre du combat," pp. 375—76.

54.   Secrets of Enoch 21, in Vaillant, Le livre des secrets, p. 66. Now this is exactly the sign that convinced the people of divine favor over Abraham on the altar, after which all the princes and the people came and bowed down to him. Discussed at length in Hugh W. Nibley, "The Unknown Abraham," Improvement Era, 72 (March 1969): 3, 76, 79—80, 82, 84; Midrash, Lekh Lekha.

55.   G. B., "Le livre du combat," pp. 375—76.

56.   K. Kohler, "The Pre-Talmudic Aggada," p. 588, where he also compares Abraham with Enoch and other patriarchs, pp. 592—94.

57.   Thus, in Apocalypse of Abraham 1:1, Abraham's genealogy begins with Enoch; he, like Enoch, is shown the universal vision (9:61); spends forty days on a high mountain and is shown the fate of the human race (9:8); is caught up and taken on a cosmic journey (9:14); is overcome and has to be reassured in the presence of God (10:14); moved amidst vast meteorological and geological disturbances (11:1—6); is caught up as on wings to a high mountain and hence to heaven, where he beholds all things (12:1—9); has a bout with Satan in the manner of Moses (Moses 1); learns the story of Satan's fall and the sins of the Watchers (13:14); describes the throne of God where "naught but peace" is found (13:18), etc., ending with the vision of the return of the temple, the priesthood, and the celestial Zion (13:26ff.).

58.   Zohar, Noah 65b.

59.   Joseph Smith, Teachings, pp. 157, 168, 169.

60.   Ibid.

61.   Ibid.

62.   An important part of the book of Enoch is the "Book of Weeks," each "week" being a dispensation represented by an inspired central figure: Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, the temple, Elijah, and the Chosen Ones of the seventh period. (Van Andel, Structuur, p. 25.) Since Enoch is the seventh figure of the first period, he is particularly involved in the seventh dispensation, that of the end; hence, Van Andel, ibid., p. 26, suggests that down through apocalyptic history, the "Enoch Church or Society, is a constant factor, with the figure of Enoch dominating throughout."

63.   "Pour une étude," p. 121.

64.   Above, note 3. The Primal Man who comes down to earth at the beginning and returns at the end is both Adam and Enoch in early Christian lore. (R. Bultmann, "Die Bedeutung der neuerschlossenen mandäischen und manichälischen Quellen fur das Verstandnis des Johannesevangeliums," Zeitschrift fur die Neutestamentliche Wissenschaft 24 [1924—25]: 104.) Adam and Enoch have the same pattern of years, marking their functional identity. (George Syncellus, Chronolog. 13; Book of Jubilees 3:32; Jellinek, BHM 5:172.)

65.   Van Andel, Structuur, p. 126.

66.   The Metatron in his capacity as Great High Priest is both Enoch and Michael. (E. Käsemann, The Wandering People of God, tr. Roy A. Harrisville and Irving L. Sandberg [Minneapolis: Augsburg Publishing House, 1984], p. 215.) "It is not clear how he [Melchizedek] is to be distinguished from Michael," writes J. T. Milik, in "Milki-ṣedeq et Milki-reša dans les anciens écrits juifs et chr≥tiens," Journal of Jewish Studies 23 (1972): 95—144.

67.   Gospel of Nicodemus 9:25.

68.   The Wandering People, pp. 213—15.

69.   P. Mordell, "The Origin of Letters and Numerals according to the Sefer Yeṣirah," JQR 2 (1912): 580—81. On the widespread identification of Enoch with Elijah, see J. S. Soggin, "Enoc ed Elia come profeti escatologici nel folklore romanesco," Studi e Materiali, 30 (1959): 119ff. For many points of comparison, see H. P. Houghton, "The Coptic Apocalypse of Elias," Aegyptus 39 (1959): 179—210.

70.   A. Wilmart and E. Tisserand, "Fragments grecs et latins," Révue Biblique 22 (1913): 186—87, being Evang. Barthol. 1:16—17 (GK. frg.).

71.   Gospel of Nicodemus 9:25.

72.   Geo. Cedrenus, "Historiarum Compendium," in J.-P. Migne, ed., Patrologiae Graecae (hereinafter PG) (Paris: Freres Garnier, 1894) 121:476, says they will lie three days unburied on the very spot where the Lord was crucified; F. Tempestini, "Livre d' Adam," in Migne, Dictionnaire des Apocryphes 1:167; J. G. Davies, He Ascended to Heaven (New York: Association Press, 1958), p. 16.

73.   Mark 9:11—13; Matthew 17:10—13. The identity of Enoch-Enosh and John the Baptist is treated at length by Eisler, Iesous Basileus 2:101, 439, 445, 736.

74.   Ibid. 2:18ff.

75.   Copric Manichaean Manuscripts (Berlin, 1960), I, 47.

76.   Gospel of Philip 104:3, 110:9ff.

77.   Cf. "Jesus" and "Joshua."

78.   F. G. Kenyon, Chester Beatty Papyri, fasc. VIII, 9—10.

79.   Joseph Smith, Jr., Joseph F. Smith, and Joseph Fielding Smith.

80.   Van Andel, Structuur, pp. 35—36, citing Rudolf Otto.

81.   Ibid., pp. 36—37.

82.   Ibid., p. 118.

83.   Noted by B. Lindars, "Re-Enter the Apocalyptic Son of Man," New Testament Studies 22 (1976): 58. While the great Catholic scholar C. Lapide found it "daring and improper" to speculate on Christ's activities after the Crucifixion, he conceded that "probably as some believe he was with Elijah and Enoch in paradise." (Commentaria in Sacram Scripturam, 21 volumes [Paris: Ludovicus Nives, 1858], 17:490.)

84.   Leo Jung, "Fallen Angels," JQR 16 (1925—26): 312—13.

85.   Eusebius, Praeparatio XI, 6, in PG 21:856—58.

86.   Ibid., VII, 8, in PG 21:521.

87.   G. Widengren, The Gnostic Attitude (Santa Barbara: Institute of Religious Studies, University of California at Santa Barbara, 1973), pp. 29—30.

88.   L. Jansen, cited by Van Andel, Structuur, p. 75. What we have in the Old Testament, according to Van Andel, is a line of prophets who are also teachers and leaders of the people out of dire straits: Saviors of the people. The line runs from Adam to the Messiah through Abraham, Noah, Moses, and Elijah, each bringing through a "remnant" and each planting the seed for a later dispensation, all in fulfillment of the promise to Enoch, who remains the figure around whom the whole process crystalizes. (Van Andel, Structuur, pp. 25—27.)

89.   B. Lindars, "Re-Enter," pp. 56, 57, 60.

90.   R. Harris, The Odes and Psalms of Solomon (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1909), p. 103.

91.   Book of Zerubbabel, in BHM 2:54; Apocalypse of Paul (Syriac) in G. Ricciotti, "Apocalypsis Pauli syriace," in Orientalia 2 (1933): 2ff.; Ishmael in BHM 5:xliii.

92.   Van Andel, Structuur, pp. 17, 115: "He does not conceal himself behind the name, but he bears the name and the name bears him."

93.   Ibid., p. 118.

94.   Ibid.

95.   M. Black, "Eschatology," p.7, cites Manson: "May it not be that we are here [En. 71] by the 'oscillation' between the individual and the corporate?" in which "Enoch . . . is regarded as the first human individual to embody the Son of Man idea, the nucleus of the group of the elect and righteous ones." Cf. ibid., p.6: "Enoch is not only translated and transfigured; he is declared to be the Son of Man, the Man par excellence, 'born unto righteousness,' in union with whom the righteous 'shall have peace and an upright way.'"

96.   L. E. Keck, "John the Baptist in Christianized Gnosticism," in C. Bleeker, ed., Initiation (Leiden: Brill, 1965), pp. 185—87.

97.   See H. Nibley, "The Forty-day Mission of Christ—the Forgotten Heritage," Vigiliae Christianae 20(1966): 1—24, reprinted in When the Lights Went Out (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1974), pp. 33—54.

98.   Job 16:21; Ps. 12:8, 89:45; Eccles. 3:21, though all are subject to a wide variety of interpretation, of course.

99.   So Vermes and Lievestad, both cited by Lindars, "Re-Enter," p. 53.

100.   Ibid.

101.   Ibid., pp. 65—67. W. Bauer, Das Johannesevangelium (Tubingen: Mohr, 1933), p. 40.

102.   Ibid., p. 53, with italics added.

103.   Van Andel, Structuur, p. 37. Upon reaching heaven, Enoch is exalted to the level of the Son of Man (1 Enoch 70—71); while as a reward, all the righteous may receive "the secrets of the Son of Man, who is still a mystery now" (1 Enoch 118). The standard mounting up to the seventh heaven, for example, of R. Ishmael, is an initiation, reflected in the Hechalot concept.

104.   Ibid., p. 15.

105.   E. de San Marco, "Henoch," in Enciclopedia Cattolica, 12 volumes (Citta del Vaticano: Ente per l'Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro cattolico, 1951) 6:1407—8.

106.   Odes of Solomon 36.

107.   In S. Euringer, "Die Binde der Rechtfertigung (Lefafa Sedek)," Orientalia 9 (1940): 248, the name is Honake.

108.   T. K. Cheyne, Jewish Religious Life After the Exile (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1908), pp. 238—39.

109.   Joseph Smith, Teachings, pp. 59—60: "For our own part, we cannot believe that the Ancients in all ages were so ignorant of the system of heaven as many suppose. Because the Ancients offered sacrifice it did not hinder their hearing the Gospel."

110.   B. Wacholder, "Pseudo-Eupolemus: Two Greek Fragments on Abraham," Hebrew Union College Annual 34 (1963): 92.

111.   Ibid., p.97, n. 86; K. Koch, "Die Hebräer," Vetus Testamentum 19 (1969): 58; Van Andel, Structuur, p. 117.

112.   W. W. Hallo, "Antediluvian Cities," Journal of Cuneiform Studies 23 (1971): 64.

113.   A. Caquot, "Pour une étude," p. 121. C. von Orelli, "Enoch," p. 148, notes that Enmeduranki has Enoch's solar affinities—calendar, holy city, and so forth.

114.   S. Mayassis, Mystères et Initiations (Athens: B.A.O.A., 1961). p. 154.

115.   Ibid., p. 181; cf. p. 175 on Hammurabi as such an Enkifigure.

116.   W. M. Clark, "The Righteousness of Noah," Vetus Testamentum 21( 1971): 261, giving references.

117.   C. von Orelli, "Enoch," p. 148, notes that there has been the usual confusion of Noah and Enoch in the Babylonian version, in which the Babylonian Noah is translated to heaven like Enoch while "by analogy [with Noah] it was assumed that Enoch instead of Noah was meant."

118.   M. Black, "Eschatology," p. 5, citing L. Jansen and R. Otto.

119.   J. G. Davies, He Ascended to Heaven (New York: Association Press, 1958), p. 17.

120.   L. Matous, "Die Urgeschichte der Menschheit im Atraḫasīs-Epos in der Genesis," Archiv Orientální 37 (1969): 5. Kraeling finds the two versions reflected in the P and J texts of Genesis: "In P's Enoch we seemingly have the whole biography of the Babylonian Flood here in nuce," whereas the hero of the other version is Terah, whose "name could be an abridgement of Atraḫasīs or Atarḫasīs." (E. G. Kraeling, "The Earliest Hebrew Flood Story," Journal of Biblical Literature 66 (1947): 292.)

121.   Kraeling, "The Significance and Origin of Genesis 6:1—4," Journal of Near Eastern Studies 6 (1947): 193—94, discussing Phoenician and Greek ties especially with regard to the Giants.

122.   Gilgamesh Epic, I.i, 5—9.

123.   "The Story of Baal and Anat," 67:11:10ff, in C. Gordon, Ugaritic Literature (Rome: Pontificium Institutum Biblicum, 1949), p. 36.

124.   J. Gray, The Legacy of Canaan (Leiden: Brill, 1957), pp. 47—52ff., with "perpetual tension between fertility and drought," p. 56.

125.   Gray, The Legacy, p. 148.

126.   C. H. Gordon, Before the Bible (N.Y.: Harper & Row, 1962), p. 135. As in the Adam-Enoch literature, we see the hero lying helpless on the ground at the mercy of Satan-Mot, while his wife tries to revive him (Gray, The Legacy, pp. 6ff.); again he is smitten when the adversary comes to "challenge him to a final combat" (pp. 73—74) and must suffer in expiation for his brother's blood—making him also a Cain-figure (pp. 75—76).

127.   Pyr. Text No. 309; 250: "I have come to my throne, which is for the spirit, I unite hearts, O you who are in charge of wisdom, being great, I become Sia, who bears the God's book, who is on the right hand of Re. . . "—a typical Enoch passage. (R. Faulkner, Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969), pp. 61, 96.)

128.   Ph. Derchain, Le Papyrus Salt 825 (Brussels: Academic, 1965) 1:137; 2:1, with much more to the same effect.

129.   E. Hornung, Der Eine und die Vielen (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchsgesellschaft, 1973) p. 142; Adriaan de Buck, The Egyptian Coffin Texts, 7 vols. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956) 6:344.

130.   Faulkner, 58ff., from which our quotations are taken.

131.   Some are discussed by K. Kohler, "The Pre-Talmudic Aggada," p. 592ff.

132.   L. Speleers, Les Textes des Cerceuils du Moyen Empire Egyptien (Brussels: n.p., 1946), p. xxvi.

133.   E. A. W. Budge, Book of the Dead: Papyrus of Ani (New York: G. W. Putnam's, 1912), p. 3, plate 29; 2:562ff.

134.   Texts are full of navigational terms suggestive of the Flood, for example, 1336: "The sky weeps for you, the earth quakes at you. . . and you ascend to the sky as a star."

135.   J. Zandee, "Sargtexte, Spruch 75," Zeitschrift fur Aegyptische Sprache 99 (1975):52—54. de Buck, Coffin Texts 4: 180d;6:32k;7:187b.

136.   A. H. Gardiner, Hieratic Papyri in the British Museum (London: Trustees of the British Museum, 1910), col. V(pt.ii): 11,5—22. So also PT 521.

137.   T. Hopfner, Fontes Historiae Religions Aegypticae (Bonn: A. Marci u. E. Weberi, 1922—25) p. 391:38.

138.   Ibid.

139.   F. L. Griffith, Stories of the High Priest of Memphis (Oxford: Clarendon, 1900), pp. 145—47; Plutarch, de Iside 13.

140.   Ibid., p. 153, with Thoth (Enoch) standing at the right side of the throne keeping the record while Anubis on the other side brings up the dead for judgment.

141.   Ibid., pp. 205—6, 201.

142.   Pt 309; 250: "I have come to my throne, which is for the spirit, I unite hearts, O you who are in charge of wisdom, being great, I become Sia, who bears the God's book, who is on the right hand of Re."—a typical Enoch passage. (R. Faulkner, Pyr. Texts, pp. 61, 96.)

143.   In G. Vajda, "Idris," in Encyclopedia of Islam (Leiden: Brill, 1971) 3:1030, Idris is identified "most frequently with Hanokh, more rarely with Elijah (llyas)," and by the Shi'i with Elisha as well; also he is Hermes. The Enoch quotation known to the Middle Ages was attributed to Enochus philosophus qui lingua Arabica cognominatur Edris, cit. in "Enoch," in Migne, Dictionnaire des Apocryphes 1:397.

144.   Prayer of Kheriuf, in G. Roder, Urkunden zur religion des Alten Aegypten (Jena: E. Diedrichs, 1915), p. xxv.

145.   Iamblichus, de Mysteriis 8:5. Like Setme's Book of All Knowledge and Power (Griffith, Stories, p. 20), hidden in the depths of the sea, even so Adam's Book of Razael (the Divine Secret) was thrown into the sea by envious angels and recovered by Rahab "the Celestial Prince of Egypt" in a later dispensation. (L. Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 7 volumes [Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1909] 1:156.) Neferhotep, a pharaoh of the XIII dynasty (1785 B.C.), reports in an inscription how he said to his courtiers, "My heart yearns to see the records of the primal time of Atum (Adam), unfold them for me for a thorough investigation; help me to know what God is in his true form." M. Pieper, Die Grosse Inschrift des Konigs Neferhotep (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1929), p. 73, Text Roman I lines 3—5.

146.   J. Spiegel, "Das Auferstehungsritual der Unaspyramide," Annales du Service des Antiquités de L'Egypte 53 (1956): 379; G. de Santillana, Hamlet's Mill (Boston: Gambit, 1969), pp. 77—78.

147.   E. A. Wainwright, "Letopolis," Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 18 (1932): 168—69; cf. 2 Kings 2:11.

148.   Clementine Recognitions, P. G. 1:1327. R. Otto has investigated the Indo-Aryan ties with Enoch. (Van Andel, Structuur, p.71.)

149.   De Santillana, Hamlet's Mill, pp. 77—78, 360.

150.   For example, the key expression "and he was not" may be detected in Livy, I, 16: "nec deinde in terris Romulus fuit"; in Diodorus, History 2:20: "Semiramis sese subduxerit tanquam migratura ad does"; Lysias, Orations 31:494: "Herakles ex anthropōn ephaisthē"; Homer, Odyssey Odyssey, 4:561: "For God took him." Other references are given in E. Rosemüller, Scholia in Vetus Testamentum (Leipzig: J. A. Barth, 1810), 1:147—50. Josephus del., Antiquities 1:3:4, is disturbed, in fact at not finding the report of Enoch's passing in the official records.

151.   O. Schroeder, "Hyperborer," Archiv fur Religionswissenschaft 8 (1905): 76, 80—84; quotation from p. 83.

152.   B. Wacholder, "Pseudo," pp. 96—97.

153.   E. Wörner, "Aiakos," in W. H. Roscher, Ausführliches Lexikon der Griechischen und Römischen Mythologie, 7 volumes (Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1965) 1:109—10.

154.   Ibid.

155.   R. Graves, The Greek Myths, 2 volumes (Harmondsworth, N.Y.: Penguin Books, 1960) 1:214.

156.   Wörner, "Aeacus," pp. 113—14.

157.   I. E. S. Edwards, The Pyramids of Egypt (Baltimore: Pelican Books, 1961), pp. 27—28.

158.   BHM 5:xlviiif.

159.   Apocryphon of John, no. 3, 37.

160.   His punishment differs from typical Roman crucifixion only in being on stone instead of wood. He is "raised up on high" (1.277), "nailed" (21, 56) sleepless in a standing position (32), and pierced with a spear-head. (64).

161.   Wacholder, "Pseudo," p. 93.

162.   Aalen, "St. Luke's Gospel and the Last Chapters of I Enoch," NTS 13 (1967), 13.

163.   These titles are found in the English Pearl of Great Price, published by F. D. Richards, Liverpool, 1851, p. 1.

164.   "Written by his own hand" is typical of colophons to Egyptian books, as is the mention of the writing material, as in the Memphite "Shabaka" text, which we are told was written upon leather. This does not mean that the copies of Egyptian texts and drawings in the possession of the Church today are the actual first-hand manuscripts coming directly from Abraham to us. See H. Nibley, "As Things Stand at the Moment," BYU Studies 9:1 (Autumn 1968): 74—79.

165.   K. Koch, Ratlos vor der Apokalyptik (Gerd Mohn: Gutersloher Verlag., 1970), pp. 20—24.

166.   De Santillana, Hamlet's Mill, pp. 77—78, and G. de Santillana, The Origins of Scientific Thought (New York: Mentor Books, 1961), p. 20.