Enoch

Also known as: Metatron · Role: servant of God · First appears: The Ascension Of Enoch

Enoch announced the doom against Azazel and the other fallen angels. When they asked him to petition God for them, he agreed; God then instructed him to tell the watchers, “You have no peace!” Later, an angel summoned him from seclusion to rule and teach men. Enoch gathered people around him and instructed them in conduct pleasing to God. During the two hundred and forty-three years of his influence, kings and princes submitted to his guidance and peace reigned over the world. In the year Adam died, Enoch joined Seth, Enosh, and Methuselah in burying him with great honors.

At the end of that period, Enoch resolved to leave human society again and devote himself wholly to God’s service. An angel told him that God would install him as king over the angels, and on the seventh day he was carried to heaven in a fiery chariot. In another account, two men sent by God told him, “to-day thou shalt ascend with us into heaven.” Before ascending, he instructed his sons to remain faithful to God and keep His judgment. Michael removed his earthly robe, anointed him, and clothed him so that he looked like one of God’s glorious ones. After an archangel instructed him for thirty days and thirty nights, Enoch wrote books about heaven and earth, angels and men.

Enoch returned to earth for thirty days to instruct his sons and give them his books. The angels placed him on his bed beside his son Methuselah, who had been waiting for him; after the thirty days, they carried him back to the highest heaven, where the Lord received him. Methuselah and Enoch’s other sons built an altar at Achuzan, the place from which he had been taken up. In a further account, when the generation of the deluge turned away from God, Enoch was carried from earth to heaven. There, God appointed him Metatron, prince and chief over the princes in His realm, set a crown on his head, and called him “the little Lord.” Enoch’s body was transformed into celestial fire. As God’s servant, Metatron was appointed to his heavenly office; God declared, “I have appointed My servant Metatron as prince and chief over all the princes in My realm.”