The Rebellion of the Watchers

Chapter 6

1 And when the population of humans had increased during those times, beautiful and attractive daughters were born to them.⁠ 2 And the angels, the children of heaven, saw them and desired them,⁠ and said to each other: 'Come, let us choose wives from among the humans and father children.'⁠ 3 And Semjâzâ, their leader, said to them: 'I fear that you will not actually agree to do this, and I alone will have to pay the penalty of a great sin.' 4 And they all replied to him and said: 'Let us all take an oath, and all bind ourselves with a solemn promise not to abandon this plan but to carry out this act.' 5 Then they all took an oath together and bound themselves with a solemn promise to do so. 6 And there were in total two hundred who descended on the summit of Mount Hermon⁠ in the days of Jared, and they named it Mount Hermon because they had taken an oath and bound themselves with solemn promises there. 7 And these are the names of their leaders:⁠ Samîazâz, their leader,⁠ Arâkîba, Râmêêl, Kôkabîêl, Tâmîêl, Râmîêl, Dânêl, Êzêqêêl, Barâqîjâl, Asâêl, Armârôs, Batârêl, Anânêl, Zaqîêl, Samsâpêêl, Satarêl, Tûrêl, Jômjâêl, Sariêl.⁠ 8 These are their chiefs of tens.

Texts in conversation

Fallen Angels Who Taught Women Makeup in 1 Enoch 6 and Tertullian

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses · Early Christian

Summary

The Christian theologian Tertullian draws on the story of the angels in 1 Enoch, presenting it as an authoritative source of history to explain the origins of cosmetics and emphasizing how the Watchers taught women practices associated with lust.

Passages

1 Enoch 6:2

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses

1 And when the population of humans had increased during those times, beautiful and attractive daughters were born to them. 2 And the angels, the children of heaven, saw them and desired them, and said to each other: 'Come, let us choose wives from among the humans and father children.' 3 And Semjâzâ, their leader, said to them: 'I fear that you will not actually agree to do this, and I alone will have to pay the penalty of a great sin.' 4 And they all replied to him and said: 'Let us all take an oath, and all bind ourselves with a solemn promise not to abandon this plan but to carry out this act.' 5 Then they all took an oath together and bound themselves with a solemn promise to do so.

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

Tertullian, On the Apparel of Women 1.3

Early Christian

I know that the scripture of Enoch, which has given this order to the angels, is not received by some, because it is not admitted into the Jewish canon either. They did not think, I suppose, that a book published before the flood could have survived safe after that disaster of the world, which abolished all things. If that is the reason, let them remember that Noah, who survived the flood, was the great-grandson of Enoch himself, and had surely heard and remembered, by family name and hereditary tradition, about his great-grandfather's grace with God and all his preaching, since Enoch charged his son Methuselah with nothing else than to hand on knowledge of these things to his descendants.

200 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Tertullian, On the Apparel of Women Book 1

References

"... Tertullian mentions 1 Enoch 15 in On the Apparel of Women 1.2; 1.3. In 1.2 Tertullian speaks at length of ornaments and makeup on women being traced back to the fallen angels' dealing with women in The Book of the Watchers. He mentions 'those angels, to wit, who rushed from heaven on the daughters of men.' and then says that they taught the women about metallurgy and eye makeup and jewelry (from the metallurgy). Because the angels were ill masters, they taught lustful things. He then interprets the Watchers story to his own means saying, 'women who possessed angels (as husbands) could desire nothing more;' but that they became worse for their lusts. Tertullian then said that men would judge angels because of the actions of the Watchers. There is a fair bit that could be said about Tertullian's feelings on makeup or his interpretive skills and methods, but what is important here for this thesis is that Tertullian used the Watcher story as an actual event to support his own thesis. In On the Apparel of Women 1.3 Tertullian defended the genuineness of the prophecy of Enoch ..."

Lawrence Henry Vanbeek, “The Letter of Jude's Use of 1 Enoch: The Book of the Watchers as Scripture” (ThD diss., University of South Africa, 1997), 151–153.

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

The Rebellion of the Watchers

1 Enoch108 chapters

Fallen Angels Who Taught Women Makeup in 1 Enoch 6 and Tertullian

Summary

Passages

1 Enoch 6:2

Tertullian, On the Apparel of Women 1.3

References

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