Texts in Conversation
1 Enoch and Jubilees both interpret Genesis to say that God took Enoch not just to heaven, but to the Garden of Eden. Jubilees leaves him there permanently as a scribe of judgment, while 1 Enoch makes the garden one stop on his journey.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
1 Enoch 70:3
Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses
1 After that, his name was exalted to the Son of Man and to the Lord of Spirits among those who live on the earth during his lifetime. 2 He was lifted up on the chariots of the spirit, and his name disappeared among them. 3 From that day, I was no longer counted among them; he placed me between the North and the West winds, where the angels measured a place for the chosen and the righteous. 4 There, I saw the earliest ancestors and the righteous who have lived in that place since the beginning.
Jubilees 4:23
Pseudepigrapha, Hebrew Bible Expansions
22 And he testified to the Watchers, who had sinned with the daughters of men; for these had begun to unite themselves, so as to be defiled, with the daughters of men, and Enoch testified against (them) all. 23 And he was taken from among the children of men, and we conducted him into the Garden of Eden in majesty and honour, and behold there he writes down the condemnation and judgment of the world, and all the wickedness of the children of men. 24 And on account of it (God) brought the waters of the flood upon all the land of Eden; for there he was set as a sign and that he should testify against all the children of men, that he should recount all the deeds of the generations until the day of condemnation.
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Notes and References
“... The tradition that the garden became the habitat of the ascended Enoch is an old one attested already in Jubilees 4:23, a text from the first half of the second century B.C.E. And he was taken from among the children of men, and we conducted him into the garden of Eden for majesty and honor. And, look, there he writes down the condemnation and judgment of the world and all the wickedness of the children of men. Additionally, it is probably also the place at “the ends of the earth” to which Methuselah travels to seek advice from Enoch, “whose dwelling is with the angels” (1 Enoch 106:7-8; compare the Genesis Apocryphon ii.21-23; compare 1 Enoch 65:2, of Noah). The same tradition appears in 1 Enoch 12:1-2: Enoch has been “taken” (compare Genesis 5:24) and spends his time with the holy watchers. ...”
Nickelsburg, George W. E., and James C. VanderKam
1 Enoch 2: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch, Chapters 37-82
(p. 322) Fortress Press, 2012
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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