1 Enoch

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Chapter 22

1 And from there I went to another place, and he showed me in the west another great and high mountain of hard rock. 2 And there were four deep, wide, and very smooth hollow places⁠ in it. How smooth and deep and dark they are to look at. 3 Then Raphael, one of the holy angels who was with me, said to me: 'These hollow places have been created specifically for the spirits of the souls of the dead to gather, so that all the souls of the children of men should gather here. 4 They are meant to assemble here until the day of their judgment and until their appointed time, until the great judgment comes upon them.' 5 I saw the spirit of a dead man pleading, and his voice rose to heaven and made a plea. 6 And I asked Raphael the angel who was with me, and I said to him: 'This spirit that pleads, whose is it, whose voice rises and makes a plea to heaven?' 7 And he answered me saying: 'This is the spirit of Abel, whom his brother Cain killed, and he pleads against him until his seed is wiped from the face of the earth, and his descendants are destroyed among the seed of men.' 8 Then I asked about it, and about all the hollow places: 'Why is one separated from the other?' 9 And he answered me and said: 'These three have been made so that the spirits of the dead might be separated. And such a division has been made for the spirits of the righteous,⁠ which includes the bright spring of⁠ water.⁠ 10 And one has been made for sinners when they die and are buried in the earth and judgment has not been executed on them in their lifetime. 11 Here their spirits shall be kept in great pain until the great day of judgment and punishment and torment of those who are cursed forever, and retribution for their spirits.⁠ There they shall be bound forever. 12 And such a division has been made for the spirits of those who make their plea, who testify about their destruction, when they were killed in the days of the sinners. 13 Such has been made for the spirits of men who were not righteous but sinners, who were complete in transgression, and they shall be companions of the transgressors; but their spirits shall not be slain on the day of judgment nor shall they be raised from there.' 14 Then I blessed the Lord of glory and said: 'Blessed be my Lord, the Lord of righteousness, who rules forever.'

Texts in conversation

Compare Plato, Phaedo and 1 Enoch 22:9

Classical · Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses

Summary

1 Enoch describes the realm of the dead in divisions, echoing Greek traditions of the underworld such as Plato’s Phaedo. 1 Enoch uses these Greek traditions to organize concepts of judgment and afterlife in Jewish apocalyptic tradition.

Passages

Plato, Phaedo

Classical · The Last Hours Of Socrates

Now these rivers are many, and mighty, and diverse, and there are four principal ones, of which the greatest and outermost is that called Oceanus, which flows round the earth in a circle; and in the opposite direction flows Acheron, which passes under the earth through desert places into the Acherusian lake: this is the lake to the shores of which the souls of the many go when they are dead, and after waiting an appointed time, which is to some a longer and to some a shorter time, they are sent back to be born again as animals. The third river passes out between the two, and near the place of outlet pours into a vast region of fire, and forms a lake larger than the Mediterranean Sea, boiling with water and mud; and proceeding muddy and turbid, and winding about the earth, comes, among other places, to the extremities of the Acherusian Lake, but mingles not with the waters of the lake, and after making many coils about the earth plunges into Tartarus at a deeper level. This is that Pyriphlegethon, as the stream is called, which throws up jets of fire in different parts of the earth. The fourth river goes out on the opposite side, and falls first of all into a wild and savage region, which is all of a dark-blue colour, like lapis lazuli; and this is that river which is called the Stygian river, and falls into and forms the Lake Styx, and after falling into the lake and receiving strange powers in the waters, passes under the earth, winding round in the opposite direction, and comes near the Acherusian lake from the opposite side to Pyriphlegethon. And the water of this river too mingles with no other, but flows round in a circle and falls into Tartarus opposite Pyriphlegethon; and the name of the river, as the poets say, is Cocytus.

400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Plato, Phaedo

1 Enoch 22:9

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses

7 And he answered me saying: 'This is the spirit of Abel, whom his brother Cain killed, and he pleads against him until his seed is wiped from the face of the earth, and his descendants are destroyed among the seed of men.' 8 Then I asked about it, and about all the hollow places: 'Why is one separated from the other?' 9 And he answered me and said: 'These three have been made so that the spirits of the dead might be separated. And such a division has been made for the spirits of the righteous, which includes the bright spring of water. 10 And one has been made for sinners when they die and are buried in the earth and judgment has not been executed on them in their lifetime. 11 Here their spirits shall be kept in great pain until the great day of judgment and punishment and torment of those who are cursed forever, and retribution for their spirits. There they shall be bound forever.

300 BCE – 100 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in 1 Enoch

References

"... The general term “the spirits of the righteous” suggests that all such spirits are gathered in this compartment. In chaps. 17–19 the reference to the living waters in 17:4 may be the counterpart to this verse. Verse 2 explicitly contrasts the light that illuminates this compartment with the darkness of the other compartments. The light imagery suggests the divine presence. Such an idea contrasts with older Israelite ideas about Sheol (compare Isaiah 38:10–20; but contrast Psalm 139). The imagery of water connotes life, even if this is the place of the dead. The combined imagery of light and life-giving water appears in Israelite literature in Psalm 36:10 (“For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we shall see light”), and a Jewish reader might well think of this psalm with its contrast between the righteous and the wicked. But the specific idea that there is a vivifying, refreshing fountain of water in the underworld is attested in Greek, and especially Orphic, sources, and these may have directly or indirectly influenced the author of this text ..."

George W. E. Nickelsburg, A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch Chapters 1-36, 81-108 (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001), 307.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

1 Enoch108 chapters

Compare Plato, Phaedo and 1 Enoch 22:9

Summary

Passages

Plato, Phaedo

1 Enoch 22:9

References

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