Andrei A. Orlov

http://www.andreiorlov.com

 Enoch as the Heavenly Priest

[an excerpt from A. Orlov, The Enoch-Metatron Tradition (TSAJ, 107; Tuebingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2005), pp. xii+383. ISBN 3-16-148544-0.]

…. Enmeduranki’s priestly office, which is only implicitly hinted at in the text from Nineveh, finds its possible Enochic counterpart in the priestly role of the seventh patriarch. In contrast to Enmeduranki’s appointments in the earthly sanctuary Ebabbara, the Enochic tradition shifts emphasis from the earthly to the celestial locale in depicting the seventh antediluvian hero, not in his terrestrial priestly role, but in the role associated with the heavenly temple. This role is attested with varying degrees of clarity by early Enochic traditions found in the Book of the Watchers, the Book of Dreams and the Book of Jubilees. Enoch’s affiliations with the priestly office in the aforementioned texts can be seen as the gradual evolution from the implicit hints of his heavenly priesthood in the early materials to a more overt recognition and description of his celestial sacerdotal function in the later ones. While later Enochic traditions attested in the Book of Jubilees unambiguously point to Enoch’s priestly role, referring to his incense sacrifice in the celestial sanctuary, the earlier associations of the patriarch with the heavenly Temple hinted at in the Book of the Watchers take the form of rather enigmatic depictions. A certain amount of exegetical work is therefore required to discern the proper meaning of these initial associations of the patriarch with the celestial sanctuary.

Martha Himmelfarb’s research helps us better understand Enoch’s possible connections with the celestial sanctuary in the Book of the Watchers, which depicts the ascension of the seventh antediluvian patriarch to the Throne of Glory as a visitation of the heavenly Temple.[1]  1 Enoch 14:9–18 reads:

And I proceeded until I came near to a wall (t[eqm) which was built of hailstones, and a tongue of fire surrounded it, and it began to make me afraid. And I went into the tongue of fire and came near to a large house (be4t (a3biy) which was built of hailstones, and the wall of that house (was) like a mosaic (made) of hailstones, and its floor (was) snow. Its roof (was) like the path of the stars and flashes of lightning, and among them (were) fiery Cherubim, and their heaven (was like) water. And (there was) a fire burning around its wall, and its door was ablaze with fire. And I went into that house, and (it was) hot as fire and cold as snow, and there was neither pleasure nor life in it. Fear covered me and trembling, I fell on my face. And I saw in the vision, and behold, another house, which was larger than the former, and all its doors (were) open before me, and (it was) built of a tongue of fire. And in everything it so excelled in glory and splendor and size that I am unable to describe to you its glory and its size. And its floor (was) fire, and above (were) lightning and the path of the stars, and its roof also (was) a burning fire. And I looked and I saw in it a high throne, and its appearance (was) like ice and its surrounds like the shining sun and the sound of Cherubim.[2]

Commenting on this passage, Himmelfarb draws the readers’ attention to the description of the celestial edifices which Enoch encounters in his approach to the Throne. She notes that the Ethiopic text reports that, in order to reach God’s Throne, the patriarch passes through three celestial constructions: a wall, an outer house, and an inner house. The Greek version of this narrative mentions a house instead of a wall. Himmelfarb observes that “more clearly in the Greek, but also in the Ethiopic this arrangement echoes the structure of the earthly temple with its vestibule (Mlw)), sanctuary (lkyh), and the Holy of Holies (rybd).”[3]

God’s throne is located in the innermost chamber of this heavenly structure and is represented by a throne of cherubim (14:18).  It can be seen as a heavenly counterpart to the cherubim found in the Holy of Holies in the Jerusalem temple. In drawing parallels between the descriptions of the heavenly Temple in the Book of the Watchers and the features of the earthly sanctuary, Himmelfarb observes that the fiery cherubim which Enoch sees on the ceiling of the first house (Ethiopic) or middle house (Greek) of the heavenly structure represent not the cherubim of the divine throne, but images that recall the figures on the hangings on the wall of the tabernacle mentioned in Exod 26:1, 31; 36:8, 35 or possibly the figures which, according to 1 Kings 6:29, 2 Chr 3:7 and Ezek 41:15–26, were engraved on the walls of the earthly temple.[4]

Several comments must be made about the early traditions and sources that may lie behind the descriptions of the upper sanctuary in 1 Enoch 14. Scholars observe that the idea of heaven as a temple was not invented by the author of the Book of the Watchers; the concept of the heavenly temple as a celestial counterpart of the earthly sanctuary was widespread in the ancient Near East[5] and appears in a number of biblical sources.[6] Students of Jewish priestly traditions have observed that the existence of such a conception of the heavenly sanctuary appears to become increasingly important in times of religious crises, when the earthly sanctuaries were either destroyed or defiled by improper rituals or priestly successions.[7]

Returning to the analysis of 1 Enoch 14, one must examine the motif of the servants of the heavenly sanctuary depicted in that text. Himmelfarb argues that the priests of the heavenly temple in the Book of the Watchers appear to be represented by angels,[8] since the author of the text depicts them as the ones who are “standing before God’s throne in the heavenly temple.”[9] In her opinion, such identification can also be implicitly supported by the motif of intercession, which represents “a central priestly task.” Himmelfarb also points to the possibility that in the Book of the Watchers the patriarch himself in the course of his ascent become a priest,[10] similarly to the angels.[11] In this perspective the angelic status of patriarch and his priestly role[12] are viewed as mutually interconnected. Himmelfarb stresses that “the author of the Book of the Watchers claims angelic status for Enoch through his service in the heavenly temple” since “the ascent shows him passing through the outer court of the temple and the sanctuary to the door of the Holy of Holies, where God addresses him with his own mouth.”[13]

George Nickelsburg’s earlier research on the temple symbolism in 1 Enoch 14 provides important additional details relevant to this discussion. Nickelsburg argues that Enoch’s active involvement in the vision of the Lord’s throne, when he passes through the chambers of the celestial sanctuary, might indicate that the author(s) of the Book of the Watchers perceived him as a servant associated with the activities in these chambers. Nickelsburg points to the fact that Enoch’s vision of the Throne in the Book of the Watchers is “qualitatively different from that described in the biblical throne visions” because of the new active role of its visionary.[14] This new, active participation of Enoch in the vision puts 1 Enoch 14 closer to later Merkabah accounts which are different from biblical visions. Nickelsburg stresses that in the biblical throne visions, the seer is passive or, at best, his participation is reactional. But in the Merkabah accounts, Enoch appears to be actively involved in his vision.[15] In Nickelsburg’s view, the verbal forms of the narrative (“I drew near the wall,” “I went into that house”) serve as further indications of the active participation of the seer in the visionary reality of the heavenly Throne/Temple.[16]

Biblical visions are not completely forgotten by Enochic authors and provide an important exegetical framework for 1 Enoch 14. Comparing the Enochic vision with Ezekiel’s account of the temple, Nickelsburg suggests that the Enochic narrative also represents a vision of the temple but, in this case, the heavenly one. He argues that “the similarities to Ezek 40–48, together with other evidence, indicate that Enoch is describing his ascent to the heavenly temple and his progress through its temenos to the door of the Holy of Holies, where the chariot throne of God is set.”[17] The possibility that the author of 1 Enoch 14 was trying to describe Enoch’s celestial trip as a tour through the heavenly temple can be supported, in Nickelsburg’s judgment, by three significant details:

a. the “house” (14:10) of the Deity is by definition a temple;

b. both 12:4 and 15:3 speak about the eternal sanctuary;

c. the language about the fallen Watchers and the angels approaching God indicates that some of the angels are understood to be priests. [18]

The traditions about the seventh patriarch’s heavenly priesthood are not confined solely to the materials found in the Book of the Watchers, since they are attested in other materials associated with the Ethiopic Enoch, including the Animal Apocalypse. If in the Book of the Watchers, Enoch’s associations with the heavenly temple are clothed in ambiguous imagery, his portrait in the Animal Apocalypse does not leave any serious doubts that some of the early Enochic traditions understood the patriarch to be intimately connected with the heavenly sanctuary.

Chapter 87, verses 3 and 4 of 1 Enoch portrays the patriarch taken by three angels from the earth and raised to a high tower, where he is expected to remain until he will see the judgment prepared for the Watchers and their earthly families:

And those three who came out last took hold of me by my hand, and raised me from the generations of the earth, and lifted me on to a high place, and showed me a tower (ma3xefada) high above the earth, and all the hills were lower. And one said to me: “Remain here until you have seen everything which is coming upon these elephants and camels and asses, and upon the stars, and upon all the bulls.”[19]

VanderKam notes a significant detail in this description, namely, Enoch’s association with a tower. He observes that this term[20] is reserved in the Animal Apocalypse for a temple.[21] The association of the patriarch with the tower is long-lasting, and apparently he must have spent a considerable amount of time there, since the text does not say anything about Enoch’s return to the earth again until the time of judgment, so the patriarch is depicted as present in the heavenly sanctuary for most of the Animal Apocalypse.[22]

Although the traditions about Enoch’s associations with the heavenly Temple in the Book of the Watchers and in the Animal Apocalypse do not refer openly to his performance of priestly duties, the account attested in the Book of Jubilees explicitly makes this reference. Jubilees 4:23 depicts Enoch as taken from human society and placed in Eden[23] “for (his) greatness and honor.”[24] Jubilees then defines the Garden as a sanctuary[25] and Enoch as one who is offering an incense sacrifice on the mountain of incense: “He burned the evening incense of the sanctuary which is acceptable before the Lord on the mountain of incense.”[26] James VanderKam suggests that here Enoch is depicted as one who “performs the rites of a priest in the temple.”[27]  He further observes that Enoch’s priestly duties[28] represent a new element[29] in “Enoch’s expanding portfolio.”[30]

Alexander stresses the significance of Enoch’s priestly role for the subsequent Jewish developments,[31] noting that  “Enoch in Jubilees in the second century B.C.E. is a high priest. Almost a thousand years later he retains this role in the Heikhaloth texts, though in a rather different setting.”[32] Indeed in the later rabbinic and Hekhalot sources, Metatron is often associated with the priestly office.[33]  One such source is a fragment from the Cairo Genizah in which he is directly named as the high priest:

I adjure you [Metatron], more beloved and dear than all heavenly beings, [Faithful servant] of the God of Israel, the High Priest, chief of [the priest]s, you who poss[ess seven]ty names; and whose name [is like your Master’s] … Great Prince, who is appointed over the great princes, who is the head of all the camps.[34]

In one further note, I must comment on particular details surrounding the depiction of Enoch’s priestly duties in early Enochic lore. The Book of the Watchers does not refer to any liturgical or sacrificial rituals of the patriarch; on the other hand, Jubilees depicts the patriarch offering incense to God. The absence of reference to any animal sacrificial or liturgical practice in Enoch’s sacerdotal duties might indicate that his office may have been understood by early Enochic traditions from the divinatory angle, that is as the office of oracle-priest, practiced also by the Mesopotamian diviners who, similarly to Enoch’s preoccupation with incense, widely used the ritual of libanomancy, or “smoke divination,” a “practice of throwing cedar shavings onto a censer in order to observe the patterns and direction of the smoke.”[35]