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Enoch in Judaism

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Overview

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There is no evidence that the Enoch texts, or even excerpts of them, were transmitted by Jews in Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages. Rabbinic Judaism maintained a sort of ambivalent view of Enoch, preserving both traditions which praise Enoch and traditions which rebuke him.

The best way to make sense of the evidence is to explain the data diachronically. "We find traces of Tannaitic and Early Amoraic polemic against Enoch's elevation (Gen.Rab. 25:1; Tg.Onq. Gen 5:24), but the classical Rabbinic literature is characterized by a striking silence concerning this figure" (Reed 2005, 234). In earlier times, it seems that the rabbis were engaged in separating themselves from apocalyptic speculations on Enoch. "The Enochic myth of angelic descent was divorced from the interpretation of Gen 6:1-4... [and] the authority of Enochic literature was invalidated " (Reed 2005, 234). In Gen. R. v. 24 Enoch is held to have been inconsistent in his piety and therefore to have been removed by God before his time in order to forestall further lapses. The miraculous character of his translation is denied, his death being attributed to the plague.

When in later sources we see the reemergence of Enochic traditions, "these traditions exhibit no discernable connection with early Enochic pseudepigrapha: they appear to have arisen independently from the exegesis of Gen 5 and/or from the development of other traditions about Enoch" (Reed 2005, 234). According to Targ. Pseudo-Jonathan (Gen. v. 24) Enoch was a pious worshiper of the true God, and was removed from among the dwellers on earth to heaven, receiving the names (and offices) of Meṭaṭron and "Safra Rabba" (Great Scribe).

Enochic traditions play a very important role in the Hekaloth literature (3 Enoch) The editio princeps was published in Lemberg in 1864, see ספר היכלות מהתנא רבי ישמעאל כהן גדול (Sepher Hekhalot of R. Ishmael / 1864), book.

Reference to Enoch are found in Kabbalist literature--in Sefer ha-Zohar by Moses de Leon and in Perush 'al ha-Torah by Menahem Recanati (13th century). Even in this case, we cannot talk of a direct relations with the ancient writings attributed to Enoch. The Zokar speaks indeed of a "Book of Enoch" on several occasions, but it is a book "preserved in heaven, which no eye can see" (I 37b).

Menasseh Ben Israel, De Resurrectione Mortuorum written originally in Spanish but later translated into Latin, 1636

Bibliography (selected)

• Martha Himmelfarb. A Report on Enoch in Rabbinic Literature. In Society of Biblical Literature 1978 Seminar Papers (1978 Achtemeier), edited volume, 259-269.

• Luis Vegas Montaner. Tradiciones de Henoc en la literatura rabínica <Enoch Traditions in Rabbinic Literature>. In Miscelánea de Estudios Arabes y Hebraicos, Sección de hebreo, ISSN 0544-408X. - (2004) vol.53, p.509-533 (Spanish).