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2 Enoch

Secrets of Enoch

About this book
Chapter 30

1 And then I created all the heavens, and the third day was. Tuesday. On the third day I commanded the earth to grow great and fruitful trees, and hills, and seed to sow, and I planted Paradise, and enclosed it, and placed flaming angels as armed guardians, and thus I created renewal. 2 Then evening came, and morning came, the fourth day. Wednesday. On the fourth day I commanded that there should be great lights on the heavenly circles. 3 On the first uppermost circle I placed the stars, Kruno, and on the second Aphrodit, on the third Aris, on the fifth Zeus, on the sixth Ermis, on the seventh the lesser moon, 4 and adorned it with the lesser stars. 5 And on the lower I placed the sun for the illumination of day, and the moon and stars for the illumination of night. 6 The sun, so that it would go according to each animal, twelve, and I appointed the succession of the months and their names and lives, their thunderings, and their hour-markings, how they should succeed. 7 Then evening came and morning came the fifth day. Thursday. On the fifth day I commanded the sea, that it should produce fish, and feathered birds of many varieties, and all animals creeping over the earth, moving over the earth on four legs, and soaring in the air, male and female, and every soul breathing the spirit of life. 8 And evening came, and morning came, the sixth day. Friday. On the sixth day I commanded my wisdom to create man from seven substances:⁠ one, his flesh from the earth; two, his blood from the dew; three, his eyes from the sun; four, his bones from stone; five, his intelligence from the swiftness of the angels and from cloud; six, his veins and his hair from the grass of the earth; seven, his soul from my breath and from the wind. 9 And I gave him seven natures: to the flesh, hearing, the eyes for sight, to the soul, smell, the veins for touch, the blood for taste, the bones for endurance, to the intelligence, sweetness. 10 I devised a skillful saying to express this: I created man from invisible and from visible nature, from both come his death and life and image, he knows speech like some created thing, small in greatness and again great in smallness, 11 and I placed him on earth, a second angel, honorable, great and glorious, 12 and I appointed him as ruler to rule on earth and to have my wisdom, and there was none like him on earth among all my existing creatures. 13 And I appointed him a name, from the four component parts, from east, from west, from south, from north,⁠ 14 and I appointed for him four special stars, and I called his name Adam,⁠ 15 and showed him the two ways, the light and the darkness, and I told him:⁠ 'This is good, and that is bad,' so that I might learn whether he has love toward me, or hatred, so that it would be clear which of his race love me. 16 For I have seen his nature, but he has not seen his own nature, therefore through not seeing he will sin worse, and I said: 'After sin what is there but death?' 17 And I put sleep into him and he fell asleep. And I took from him a rib, and created him a wife, 18 so that death would come to him through his wife, and I took his last word and called her name mother, that is to say, Eva.

Texts in conversation

Compare 2 Enoch 30:13 and Sanhedrin 38a

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses · Rabbinic

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Summary

In 2 Enoch and Rabbinic tradition in tractate Sanhedrin, Adam is described as being formed from all parts of creation tied to the four cardinal directions. This portrays him as a "cosmic man" who reflects and represents all creation.

Passages

2 Enoch 30:13

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses · Secrets of Enoch
13 And I appointed him a name, from the four component parts, from east, from west, from south, from north, 14 and I appointed for him four special stars, and I called his name Adam,
1–100 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in 2 Enoch

Sanhedrin 38a

Rabbinic · Babylonian Talmud
It is taught in a baraita that Rabbi Meir would say: The dust that served to form Adam the first man was gathered from the entire world, as it is stated: “When I was made in secret and wrought in the lowest places of the earth, Your eyes did see my unshaped flesh” (Psalms 139:15–16), and it is written: “For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth” (II Chronicles 16:9), indicating that this figure was formed from the whole earth, the place within the view of the Lord’s eyes. Rav Oshaya says in the name of Rav: With regard to Adam the first man, his torso was fashioned from dust taken from Babylonia, and his head was fashioned from dust taken from Eretz Yisrael, the most important land, and his limbs were fashioned from dust taken from the rest of the lands in the world. With regard to his buttocks, Rav Aḥa says: They were fashioned from dust taken from Akra De’agma, on the outskirts of Babylonia.
450–550 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Sanhedrin

References

"... The testimonies from Midrash Rabbah, Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer and the Chronicles of Jerahmeel demonstrate that in the Jewish materials the anagram tradition was consistently interpreted as a reference to the cosmic body of the protoplast, created from one end of the universe to the other. In light of this tendency, it is possible that the tradition about the anagram found in 2 Enoch 30 also represents a reference to the cosmic body of the protoplast. This suggestion is made more plausible when one considers that the anagram tradition in 2 Enoch 30:13 follows immediately after the definition of the protoplast as a great celestial creature ... Another tradition found in chapter 30 about the creation of Adam from the seven components might also serve as an allusion to the cosmic body of the protoplast. The description found in 2 Enoch 30:8 relates that Adam’s flesh was created from earth; his blood from dew and from the sun; his eyes from the bottomless sea; his bones from stone; his reason from the mobility of angels and from clouds; his veins and hair from the grass of the earth; his spirit from the Lord’s spirit and from wind. It is possible that by such postulations the text intends to stress that the primordial Adam was the creature of macrocosmic dimensions since Adam’s creation from the seven elements refers to Adam as a microcosm, e.g. the anthropomorphic representation of the world ..."
Andrei A. Orlov, From Apocalypticism to Merkabah Mysticism: Studies in the Slavonic Pseudepigrapha, JSJSup 114 (Leiden: Brill, 2007), 161.

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

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2 Enoch 30:13 and Sanhedrin 38a

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