1 Enoch

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Chapter 27

1 Then I said: 'For what purpose is this blessed land, which is entirely filled with trees, and this cursed valley between them?' 2 Then Uriel, one of the holy angels who was with me, answered and said: 'This cursed valley is for those who are cursed forever:⁠ Here all the cursed shall be gathered who speak improper words against the Lord with their lips and speak harshly of His glory. Here they shall be gathered together, and this shall be their place of judgment.'⁠ 3 In the last days, there shall be the spectacle of righteous judgment in the presence of the righteous forever: here the merciful shall bless the Lord of glory, the Eternal King. 4 In the days of judgment over the former, they shall bless Him for the mercy by which He has assigned them their lot.' 5 Then I blessed the Lord of Glory and extolled His glory and praised Him gloriously.

Texts in conversation

Compare Isaiah 66:24 and 1 Enoch 27:2

Hebrew Bible · Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses

Summary

1 Enoch echoes Isaiah by pairing blessing for the righteous with a cursed valley for the unrighteous after judgment. It adapts imagery from Isaiah that depicts the aftermath of battle into an eschatological framework.

Passages

Isaiah 66:24

Hebrew Bible

22 “For just as the new heavens and the new earth I am about to make will remain standing before me,” says the Lord, “so your descendants and your name will remain. 23 From one month to the next and from one Sabbath to the next, all people will come to worship me,” says the Lord. 24 “They will go out and observe the corpses of those who rebelled against me, for the maggots that eat them will not die, and the fire that consumes them will not die out. All people will find the sight abhorrent.”

740–450 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Isaiah

1 Enoch 27:2

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses

1 Then I said: 'For what purpose is this blessed land, which is entirely filled with trees, and this cursed valley between them?' 2 Then Uriel, one of the holy angels who was with me, answered and said: 'This cursed valley is for those who are cursed forever: Here all the cursed shall be gathered who speak improper words against the Lord with their lips and speak harshly of His glory. Here they shall be gathered together, and this shall be their place of judgment.' 3 In the last days, there shall be the spectacle of righteous judgment in the presence of the righteous forever: here the merciful shall bless the Lord of glory, the Eternal King.

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

References

"... The vision is related to the previous one in two ways. Jerusalem, the blessed place with its holy mountain, is where the righteous will live the long life promised in the previous vision. The main purpose of the present vision, however, is to describe the cursed valley, where the wicked will be punished after the great judgment. The angelic poem in the previous vision drew on Isaiah 65 for some of its imagery; the present vision alludes to Isaiah 66:24. Taken together, this pair of visions refers to the twofold results of the great judgment, and thus brings to a climax this book’s discussion of the subject. Literary tensions within chap. 26 may indicate that an editor has superimposed a description of Jerusalem (verses 2–4) onto a description of paradise, “the blessed land” (verses 1, 5–6) ..."

George W. E. Nickelsburg, A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch Chapters 1-36, 81-108 (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2001), 318.

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 Isaiah 66:24 and 1 Enoch 27:2

Summary

Passages

Isaiah 66:24

1 Enoch 27:2

References

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