Fallen Angels and the Origins of Evil (47 page)

[64]
Bamberger, p. 79.

[65]
Ibid.

[66]
Theodoret,
Quaestiones in Gen. Interrogatio XLVII.

[67]
Jerome elsewhere mentions the Book of Enoch by name and is clearly referring to it here.

[68]
Saint Jerome,
Homily 45 on Psalm 132 (133),
trans. Marie Liguori Ewald, Fathers of the Church, 48(1964): 338–39.

[69]
Mani was well acquainted with the Book of Enoch and even refers to “Enoch, the apostle” in his
Book of Giants.
Mani’s book, though it has survived in very fragmentary form, can be found in the
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London,
11, pt. 1 (1943): 52–74.

[70]
Jean Chrysostom, “Homelies sur la Genèse,”
Saint Jean Chrysostome Oeuvres Complètes,
trans. M. Jeannin and ed. L. Guerin (Paris, 1865), 5:136–37.

[71]
Bamberger, p. 80.

[72]
Filastrius,
Liber de Haeresibus,
no. 108.

[73]
Augustine,
The City of God,
ed. and trans. Marcus Dods, 2 vols. (New York: Hafner, 1948), 2:92–93.

[74]
Ibid., 2:95–96.

[75]
Bamberger, p. 80.

[76]
A Catholic Dictionary of Theology,
s.v. “devil.”

[77]
New Catholic Encyclopedia,
s.v. “demon (theology of).”

[78]
Bamberger, pp. 204–5.

[79]
Synod of Laodicea, “Cannon XXXV,” Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 14:150. Josephus notes that one of the sacred rites of the Essenes was their swearing to preserve the names of the angels (
War of the Jews,
2:8).

[80]
Synod of Laodicea, “Cannon XXXV,” Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 14:150.

[81]
Ibid.

[82]
Philip S. Alexander, “The Targumim and Early Exegesis of ‘Sons of God’ in Genesis 6,”
Journal of Jewish Studies
23 (1972): 60–61.

[83]
Nicholas de Lange,
Apocrypha: Jewish Literature of the Hellenistic Age
(New York: Viking Press, 1978), pp. 9–10.

[84]
Ibid., p. 10.

[85]
J. T. Milik, ed. and trans.,
The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976).

[86]
Ibid., p. 31.

[87]
Ibid.

[88]
Julian Morgenstern, “The Mythological Background of Psalm 82,”
Hebrew
Union College
Annual
14 (1939): 106.

[89]
Ibid., pp. 106–7.

[90]
Morgenstern, p. 107.

[91]
Bk. Jub. 7:22; Milik, p. 178.

[92]
Morgenstern, pp. 84–85; 106, n. 135; Kurtz, p. 99.

[93]
Morgenstern, pp. 106–7, n. 135a.

[94]
Montague Rhodes James, trans. “The Gospel of Bartholomew,” in
The Apocryphal New Testament
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1924), p. 178.

[95]
James, trans. “The Book of John the Evangelist,” in
The Apocryphal New Testament,
p. 189.

[96]
Delitzsch, 1:225.

[97]
Kurtz, pp. 100–101.

[98]
Morgenstern, p. 82.

[99]
Tertullian, “The Apparel of Women,” p. 15.

[100]
Apoc. Ezra (4 Ezra) 14.

[101]
Paul D. Hanson, “Rebellion in Heaven, Azazel, and Euhemeristic Heroes in 1 Enoch 6–11,”
Journal of Biblical Literature
96, no. 2 (1977): 218.

[102]
The seed of the Wicked One, the conspiring enemies of Israel against whom David cries out to God repeatedly in his psalms. David refers to the Watchers as “the wicked.” Other biblical designations of the Watchers include “evildoers,” “evil men,” “wicked men,” “mighty men,” “pagans,” and “heathen.” See “Concealed References to the Watchers (and Nephilim) in Scripture,” p. 295.

[103]
Luke 11:47–51.

[104]
Ps. 94:3.

[105]
Rev. 6:10.

[106]
Quoted by Jude, vss. 14, 15.

[107]
An Aramaic text reads “Watchers” here (J. T. Milik,
Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4
[Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976], p. 167).

[108]
Mt. Armon, or Mt. Hermon, seems to derive its name from the Hebrew word
herem,
a curse (Charles, p. 63).

[109]
The Aramaic texts preserve an earlier list of names of these Watchers: Semîhazah; ’Ar‘t
^a
qoph; Ramt’el; Kôkab’el; Ra‘m’el; Danî’el; Zêqî’el; Baraq’el; ‘Asa’el; Hermonî; Matar’el; ‘Anan’el; S
^a
taw’el; Samsî’el; Sahrî’el; Tummî’el; Tûrî’el; Yomî’el; Y
^e
haddî’el (Milik, p. 151).

[110]
The Greek texts vary considerably from the Ethiopic text here. One Greek manuscript adds to this section, “And they [the women] bore to them [the Watchers] three races—first, the great giants. The giants brought forth [some say “slew”] the Naphelim, and the Naphelim brought forth [or “slew”] the Elioud. And they existed, increasing in power according to their greatness.” See the account in the Book of Jubilees in this volume.

[111]
Their flesh one after another.
Or, “one another’s flesh.” R. H. Charles notes that this phrase may refer to the destruction of one class of giants by another (Charles, p. 65).

[112]
Observers of the stars.
Astrologers (Charles, p. 67).

[113]
Arsayalalyur.
Here one Greek text reads “Uriel.”

[114]
Charles, p. 73; Michael A. Knibb, ed. and trans.,
The Ethiopic Book of Enoch
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978), p. 88.

[115]
Note the many implications of vss. 3–8 regarding the incarnation of the Watchers and the evil spirits in flesh bodies.

[116]
The Greek word for “clouds” here,
nephelas,
may disguise a more ancient reading, Napheleim (Nephilim). Laurence’s verb “shall be like” is only conjectural.

[117]
Shall not.
Nearly all manuscripts contain this negative, but Charles, Knibb, and others believe the “not” should be deleted so the phrase reads “shall rise up.”

[118]
Ha-satan
in Hebrew (“the adversary”) was originally the title of an office, not the name of an angel.

[119]
Cp. Ps. 114:4.

[120]
Cp. Gen. 9:13, “I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.”

[121]
He received it ... first of men.
Or, “my [great-] grandfather was taken up, the seventh from Adam” (Charles, p. 155). This implies that this section of the book was written by Noah, Enoch’s descendant, rather than Enoch. Scholars have speculated that this portion of the book may contain fragments of the lost Apocalypse of Noah.

[122]
Chapters 64, 65, 66 and the first verse of 67 evidently contain a vision of Noah and not of Enoch (Laurence, p. 78).

[123]
Son of man.
Laurence’s original translation renders this phrase “offspring of man.” Knibb (p. 166) and Charles (p. 185) indicate that it should be “Son of man,” consistent with the other occurrences of that term in the Book of Enoch. (See
discussion of this point
in “Forbidden Mysteries of Enoch.”)

[124]
See previous note.

[125]
That is, it is sixty days in the same gates, viz. thirty days twice every year (Laurence, p. 97).

[126]
It shines with ... from the moon.
Or, “Its light is seven times brighter than that of the moon” (Knibb, p. 171). The Aramaic texts more clearly describe how the moon’s light waxes and wanes by a half of a seventh part each day. Here in the Ethiopic version, the moon is thought of as two halves, each half being divided into seven parts. Hence, the “fourteen portions” of 72:9–10 (Knibb, p. 171).

[127]
This second vision of Enoch seems to portray in symbolic language the complete history of the world from the time of Adam down to the final judgment and the establishment of the Messianic Kingdom (Charles, p. 227).

[128]
Another heifer.
The sense seems to require that the passage should read, “two other heifers” (Laurence, p. 121).

[129]
Thirty-seven.
An apparent error for
thirty-five
(see verse 7). The kings of Judah and Israel (Laurence, p. 139)

[130]
The kings of Babylon, etc., during and after the captivity. The numbers thirty-
five
and twenty-three make fifty-eight; and not thirty-
seven,
as erroneously put in the first verse (Laurence, p. 139).

[131]
Holy angels.
A Qumran text reads, “Watchers and Holy Ones,” clearly denoting heavenly Watchers who did not fall along with the wicked ones (Milik, p. 264). See also Dan. 4:13, “a watcher and an holy one came down from heaven”; 4:17, “watchers, and ... holy ones.”

[132]
Despite Enoch’s mandate, his book was most certainly “changed” and “diminished” by later editors, though these fragments of it have survived.

[133]
After this verse, one Greek papyrus adds, “who are not like spiritual beings, but creatures of flesh” (Milik, p. 210).

[134]
Gibborim
are the “mighty men” mentioned in Gen. 6:4 as the progeny of the angels and the daughters of men. The Gibborim were equated with the “giants.”

[135]
Lilith:
in Semitic lore, a female evil spirit roaming in desolate places and attacking children; a demon (called a
succubus
) assuming female form to have sexual intercourse with men in their sleep. The succubus is the female counterpart of the male
incubus,
said to seduce women at night. In the plural form, these sex entities are called
succubi
or
succubae
and
incubi.

[136]
Brimstone
(sulphur) was the sign of a curse from God and of Sheol.

[137]
Hebrew scholar Julian Morgenstern points out that in Psalm 82, those whom Yahweh is judging and condemning are “not at all the corrupt, human judges ... [but] a certain, probably not overly large, group of the gods or angels themselves, who had committed some act of utmost sinful character, which aroused Yahweh’s indignation to the highest pitch and justified a punishment which should be both logical and appropriate in character and extreme in degree. Quite certainly what followed immediately ... in the original form of the [edited] Ps. was the arraignment by Yahweh of these sinning angels and the formal statement of the crime which they had committed.

“And what this may have been is now perfectly clear. They had been attracted by the physical beauty of the daughters of man and, in complete disregard of their divine, incorporeal, spiritual natures, had forsaken heaven, their natural abode, and descended to earth and consorted with these women in strictly human manner....

“Then, after the arraignment of these sinning angels and the formal declaration of their crime, vv. 6–7 continue with the final statement of Yahweh’s denunciation and the formal announcement of punishment. ‘I had thought that ye were gods, yea, sons of Elyon [the Most High] all of you.’ The sentence voices most graphically the surprise and painful shock which Yahweh had experienced when the shameful conduct of these divine beings had become known to Him. How could gods, sons of Elyon, comport themselves in this unworthy manner, reject their divine natures completely and indulge themselves with human women in the most physical of human appetites?...

“It is readily seen that the revision of the original poem, in order to adapt it for incorporation into the official liturgy of the Jerusalem Temple was simple and systematic. The statement of the horrifying and almost inconceivable crime of the angels was removed in its entirety and in its stead was substituted, what must have seemed to these editors far more appropriate and far more in accord with their theological principles and ethical standards, the denunciation of corrupt, earthly judges which we now find in vv. 2–5a.” (
Hebrew Union College Annual
14[1939]: 114–16, 122–23).

[138]
The Watchers lay their karma on the backs of the people; they do not bear their own karmic burden: Taxation, usury, and the manipulation of money are means of making the people pay their way.

[139]
A
phylactery
is a small, square leather box which contains strips of parchment inscribed with scriptural passages and is traditionally worn by Jewish men on the left arm and forehead during prayers. The Pharisees broadened the leather bands which held their phylacteries in place to attract attention to themselves.

[140]
Judgment of the Great Day.
Scofield interprets this to mean the judgment by Jehovah [‘the Mighty I AM Presence’] of Satan and other fallen angels with him (Scofield,
Scofield Reference Bible,
p. 1328, n. 2).

[141]
Cain.
Type of religious natural man, who believes in a God and in “religion,” but after his own will, and who rejects redemption by the blood of Christ, the incarnate Word (Scofield, pp. 1328–29, n. 3).