FAQ:

What other evidences for Enoch's authenticity (as a sacred text) are there?

Why isn't it in the Bible today?

Jesus said that angels can't have sex, proving this book's falsehood...

The idea that Jesus said that angels cannot have sex is a very common objection to The Book of Enoch and the angelic understanding of Genesis 6 in general. However it is also a very common misinterpretation of what he actually said. Go Here to read what he said (Matt 22:30), and to study this topic. Beyond that misunderstanding, there is no doubt today that The Book of Enoch was one of the most widely accepted and revered books of Jewish culture and doctrine in the century leading up to Jesus' birth.

It is usually noted first that New Testament author Jude directly quotes from 1 Enoch - "Behold he comes with ten thousands of his saints to execute judgment ..." (1 Enoch 2, Jude 14-15). Additionally, "the citations of Enoch by the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs... show that at the close of the second century B.C., and during the first century B.C., this book was regarded in certain circles as inspired" (1).

Aside from Jude, Peter and Paul's affirmations of the angelic/hybrid interpretation, recognition of 1 Enoch "... is given amply in the Epistle of Barnabus, and in the third century by Clement and Irenaeus" (1). The Catholic Church's Origen - known as "the father of theology" - affirmed both the Book of Enoch and the fact that angels could and did co-habitate with the daughters of men. He even warned against possible angelic and/or Nephilim infiltration of the church itself. Oddly, while thousands of his writings are still considered by them as "sacred," this very issue got him labeled as a heretic when the faulty Sons of Seth "doctrine" was conceived! (2)

Additionally, the Coptic Orthodox Churches of Egypt (est'd appx 50-100 A.D.) still include Enoch as canonized text in the Ethiopic Old Testament (2). This fact alone should carry great weight for Western Christians when honestly studying the "case" for Enoch. Given their 1900+ year history, the fact that they were never "ruled" by Rome's theology, and that they currently number over 10 million - this is a VERY significant portion of The Body of Christ that has historically esteemed 1 Enoch as inspired doctrine.

Some today (who do not seem to believe in the inspiration of scripture) claim that most major themes of the New Testament were in fact "borrowed" from 1 Enoch. "It appears that Christianity later adopted some of its ideas and philosophies from this book, including the Final Judgment, the concept of demons, the Resurrection, and the coming of a Messiah and Messianic Kingdom" (3). No doubt, these themes are major parts of 1 Enoch, and appear there as complete theologies a full 200 years before any other NT writings.

Christian author Stephen Quayle writes, "Several centuries before and after the appearance of Jesus in Jerusalem, this book had become well known to the Jewish community, having a profound impact upon Jewish thought. The Book of Enoch gave the jewish people their solar calendar, and also appears to have instilled the idea that the coming Messiah would be someone who had pre-existed as God (4)." Translator RH Charles also stated that "the influence of 1 Enoch on the New Testament has been greater than all of the other apocryphal and pseudepigraphical books put together" (3). The conclusions are somewhat inescapable given Enoch's dating and wide acceptance between 200 B.C. and 200 A.D. - either Christian authors, and especially the Nicene Council, did plagiarize their theology directly from Enoch, or the original version of Enoch was also inspired.

James H Charlesworth, director of Dead Sea Studies at Yale University, says in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha & The New Testament (Trinity Press International),
"I have no doubt that the Enoch groups deemed the Book of Enoch as fully inspired as any biblical book. I am also convinced that the group of jewish people behind the Temple Scroll, which is surely pre-Qumranic, would have judged it to be quintessential Torah -- that is, equal to, and perhaps better than, Deuteronomy....Then we should perceive the Pseudepigrapha as they were apparently judged to be: God's revelation to humans(2 & 5)."

But perhaps the most telling argument for 1 Enoch's "inspiration" may well be that the Jewish understanding of the term "Son of Man" as a Messianic title comes - not truly from our Old Testament canon - but from the Book of Enoch! Ever wonder why Jesus refers to himself in the gospels as the "Son of Man" rather than the Son of God? (2) Of over 100 uses of the phrase "son of man" in the OT, it refers almost always to "normal" men (93 times specifically of Ezekiel, and certainly not as Messiah!), but is used only one time in the entire OT, in one of Daniel's heavenly visions, to refer to divinity. Despite the Old Testament's frequent lack of divine application of the phrase, 1 Enoch records several trips to heaven, using the title "Son of Man" unceasingly to refer to the pre-incarnate Christ. Of particular Messianic significance, Enoch describes the following scene (2):

The angels "glorify with all their power of praise; and He sustains them in all that act of thanksgiving while they laud, glorify and exalt the name of the Lord of Spirits forever and ever... Great was their joy. They blessed, glorified and exalted because the name of the Son of Man was revealed to them (1 Enoch 68:35-38)." Both His disciples, and especially the Sanhedrein knew what Jesus was claiming - 84 times in the gospels! - when referring to Himself as the "Son of Man." This claim was considered an obvious blasphemy to the Pharisees & Saducees, but it is eternal life to all who confess that Jesus of Nazareth was, and is, the Son of Man, The Messiah, God in the flesh, The Holy One of Israel, God's Christ - the Lord of All to whom every knee shall bow (Philippians 2:8-10).

Using "normal rules" of scriptural interpretation, we are never to draw firm doctrine from only one passage of scripture. Right? Daniel's single use of "Son of Man" (in a "night vision" at that - Dan 7:13), would not be sufficient to claim that the phrase is indeed Messianic, especially given the other 107 times it is not used in that way. 1 Enoch is the missing "second witness" needed (according to all other rules of interpretation) to understand the phrase's double meaning as an enduring Messianic title. It has been argued ever since Enoch's first English translation, that by using this title so familiar to the jewish people, Jesus was actually affirming the truth of this book, that the prophet was taken on many trips to heaven before his "final" translation, and that HE WAS THE ONE whom Enoch saw there - the pre-existent Son of Man, whom Enoch prophesied would judge the souls of all men.

Interestingly, Daniel is ALSO the only OT use of the term "watcher" to ever refer to angels (Daniel 4:13, 17, 23 KJV). Strong's Concordance defines a watcher as a "guardian angel" (Strong's 5894). "The distinguishing character of the Watcher (opposed to other angels in the canon) appears to be that it spends much time among men, overseeing what they are doing. It is also interesting to note that both times one of these angels appeared to Daniel, he took pains to note that it was "an holy one," suggesting that some Watchers are not aligned with God while others are (4)." Found nowhere else in the OT canon but the book of Daniel, "watcher" is patently Enoch's term for these angels. Likewise, Daniel alone used Enoch's term "Son of Man" to refer to the pre-incarnate Christ, adding further intrigue to the case for 1 Enoch's inspiration, and an overall understanding of it's doctrinal acceptance among both Old and New Testament writers.

What we lose out on today by not examining 1 Enoch - even if only for its historical significance - is that it is actually more splendid than ANY OTHER book in our canon in its exultation of Christ as King! It also gives clear, stern and oft-repeated warnings to the unsaved of swift destruction at the Coming of The Lord, but is also full of amazing promises of future glory for the elect! We are of course wise to stay clear of dangerous heresy, but... ask yourself if the below sounds like false doctrine? Keep in mind, this was written at least 200 years before Christ walked the earth, and perhaps before Noah's birth:

Then shall the kings, the princes, and all who possess the earth, glorify Him who has dominion over all things, Him who was concealed; for from eternity the Son of Man was concealed, whom the Most High preserved in the presence of
His power and revealed to the elect.

He shall sow the congregation of the saints, and of the elect; and all the elect shall stand before Him in that day.
All the kings, the princes, the exalted, and those who rule
over the earth shall fall down on their faces before Him,
and shall worship Him. They shall fix their hopes on this Son of Man...

Then the sword of the Lord of Spirits shall be drunk from them (the lost); but the saints and the elect shall be safe in that day; nor the face of the sinners and the ungodly shall they thence-forth behold. The Lord of Spirits shall remain over them; And with this Son of Man shall they dwell, eat, lie down, and rise up for ever and ever...

Enoch 61:10-13

Literally Translated from the Ethiopic by Richard Laurence LL.D.
Archbishop of Cashel
Late Professor of Hebrew in the University of Oxford