Texts in Conversation
In Genesis, Jacob encounters a camp of angels on his journey. In 3 Enoch, angels gather in camps around God's throne, placing the heavenly company he meets within an ordered world of angelic worship.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Genesis 32:1
Hebrew Bible
1 So Jacob went on his way and the angels of God met him. 2 When Jacob saw them, he exclaimed, “This is the camp of God!” So he named that place Mahanaim. 3 Jacob sent messengers on ahead to his brother Esau in the land of Seir, the region of Edom. 4 He commanded them, “This is what you must say to my lord Esau: ‘This is what your servant Jacob says: I have been staying with Laban until now. 5 I have oxen, donkeys, sheep, and male and female servants. I have sent this message to inform my lord, so that I may find favor in your sight.’”
3 Enoch 36:1
Hebrew Book of Enoch
Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses
R. Ishmael said: Metatron, the Angel, the Prince of the Presence, said to me: At the time when the ministering angels desire to say (the) Song, (then) Nehar di-Nur (the fiery stream) rises with many thousand thousands and myriads of myriads (of angels) of power and strength of fire and it runs and passes under the Throne of Glory, between the camps of the ministering angels and the troops of Araboth. And all the ministering angels first go down into Nehar di-Nur, and they dip themselves in the fire and dip their tongue and their mouth seven times; and after that they go up and put on the garment of 'Machaqe Samal' and cover themselves with cloaks of chashmal and stand in four rows over against the Throne of Glory, in all the heavens.
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Notes and References
“... But mah˙anaîm in the next line suggests that the primary link is with the
Genesis verse, which in turn links with Gen. 32: 3, where Jacob again
encounters angels of God: ‘This is God’s camp’, he says, and he calls the name
of the place Mahanaim. This word is widely thought on the one hand to be a
dual form meaning ‘two camps’, and on the other a dual form with singular
meaning.21 Against the latter are the occurrences of forms of mah˙aneh
meaning ‘camps’ in the Merkava texts. Philip Alexander, in his book on the
mystical texts of Qumran, writes:
The ordinary angels are designated ‘the camps of ‘Elohim’ . . . The language is suggest-
ive and once again hints at a parallelism between earth and heaven, between Israel and
the angels. Tradition linked the origin of the idea that the angels were marshalled in
camps with the name Mahanaim (‘Two Camps’), which Jacob gave to the place where
he met the ‘angels of God (’Elohim)’ in Gen. 32.2. Later Jewish mystical literature
often refers to the ‘camps’ of angels (3 Enoch 36.1; Heikhalot Rabbati 28.2, Synopse
§277; Sefer ha-Razim 1.5; 4.23; 6.30). But the term forges another link––with Israel in
the wilderness where the tribes were organized in camps around the tabernacle (see
Num. 2).22 ...”
Kingsmill, Edmée
The Song of Songs and the Eros of God: A Study in Biblical Intertextuality
(p. 132) Oxford University Press, 2009
* 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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