Category:Enoch in Judaism (subject)

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Enoch in Judaism

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Rabbinic Judaism maintained a sort of ambivalent view of Enoch, preserving both traditions which praise Enoch and traditions which rebuke him. 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). In other texts (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.

Enochic traditions (3 Enoch) were also known from the Sefer Hekaloth of R. Ishmael (ed. princeps 1864, and 1873).

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).

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