Genesis 5:24

And Enoch walked with God,.... Which is repeated both for the confirmation of it, and for the singularity of it in that corrupt age; and to cause attention to it, and stir up others to imitate him in

And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him. And he was not; for God took him.

i.e. He appeared not any longer upon earth, or amongst mortal men. The same phrase is in . For God took him out of this sinful and miserable world unto himself, and to his heavenly habitation: see . And he took either his soul, of which alone this phrase is used, ; or rather both soul and body, as he took Elias, , because he so took him that he did not see death, .

Genesis 5:24 And Enoch walked with God: and he [was] not; for God took him.Ver. 24. And Enoch walked with God.] And so “ condemned the world” : first, by his life; secondly, at his death. By his life, in that he kept a constant counter-motion to the corrupt courses of the times; not only not swimming down the stream with the wicked, but pronouncing God’ s severe judgment against them, even to the extreme curse of Anathema Maranatha, as St Jude tells us Secondly, by his death he condemned them: in that so strange a testimony of God’ s grace and glory, in his wonderful translation, did not affect and move them to amend their evil manners. The heathens had heard somewhat afar off, concerning this candidate of immortality, as the ancients call him, and thence grounded their apotheoses. Eupolemon saith that their Atlas was Enoch, as their Janus was Noah. And how fitly are the Papists called heathens by St John. Since, besides their Atlas of Rome, on whose shoulders the whole Church, that new heaven, must rest, there was at Ruremund, in Gilderland, a play acted by the Jesuits, anno 1622, under the title of the “ Apotheosis of St Ignatius.” Alsted, Chron., p. 85. Gentes sunt Antichristus cum suis asseclis . - Paraeus. Jac. Revil., Hist. Pontif. Rom., p. 309. Sil. Ital.

(24) Enoch walked with God.—This is translated in the LXX., “Enoch pleased God,” whence comes the “testimony” quoted in Hebrews 11:5. Really it gives the cause of which the Greek phrase is the effect; for it denotes a steady continuance in well-doing, and a life spent in the immediate presence of and in constant communion with God. (See Note on Genesis 4:18.) God took him.—Instead of the mournful refrain and he died, coming like a surprise at the end of each of these protracted lives, we have here an early removal into another world, suggesting already that long life was not the highest form of blessing; and this removal is without pain, decay, or death into the immediate presence of God. Thus one of Adam’s posterity after the fall succeeded in doing, though, doubtless, not without special help and blessing from the Almighty, that wherein Adam in Paradise had failed. We learn, too, from Jude 1:14-15, that Enoch’s was a removal from prevailing evil to happiness secured. Already, probably, the intermarriages between the Cainites and Sethites had begun and with it the corruption of mankind. Philippson, while regarding the phrase “God took him” as a euphemism for an early death, yet finds in it an indication of there being another life besides this upon earth. We may further add that Enoch’s translation took place about the middle of the antediluvian period, and that his age was 365, the number of the days of the year. As, however, the Hebrew year consisted of only 354 days, and the Chaldean of 360, the conclusion that Enoch was a solar deity has no solid foundation to rest upon. But see Note on Genesis 8:14.

24. and he was not] For this expression used to denote an unaccountable disappearance, cf. Genesis 42:13; Genesis 42:36; 1 Kings 20:40. In order to make it quite clear that the words did not imply death, LXX renders οὐχεὑρίσκετο; Vulg. “non apparuit.” The shortness of his life as compared with the other patriarchs might have been regarded as a proof of Divine displeasure, if the next sentence had not been added to explain the circumstance. for God took him] “Took,” or “received,” him, i.e. into His own abode, without death: cf. “he shall receive me” (Psalms 49:15). Sam. “the Angel took him”; LXX μετέθηκε = “translated”; Lat. tulit; Targ. Onkelos, “for the Lord had made him to die.” Our word “translated” has passed into general use from this passage and from the allusion to it in Hebrews 11:5, “By faith Enoch was translated (Lat. translatus est) that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God translated him.” For the only other instance in the O.T. of a Saint’s “translation,” see the story of Elijah (2 Kings 2). In the early Babylonian traditions, Xisuthros, the hero of the Babylonian Deluge story, is “translated” after the Deluge, that he may dwell among the gods. Late Jewish tradition was very busy with the story of Enoch. Enoch was supposed to have received Divine revelation concerning “all mysteries,” and to have recorded them in writing in apocalyptic books. This current belief concerning Enoch, as the repository and the recorder of the mysteries of the universe, gave rise to the writing of the extant apocalyptic work, “The Book of Enoch,” composed in the second century b.c. The devout Israelite was able to believe that they who walked with God would somehow be taken by God; cf. Psalms 73:24, “Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and afterward take me to glory.” In an age which had no conception of a general resurrection there was faith in God’s power and a trust in fellowship with Him.

24. The testimony to the exalted piety of Enoch is emphatically repeated; and where we might expect to read again the solemn phrase, “and he died,” we find instead the mysterious words and he was not; for God took him.