Extracted from Dr Philip Harland blog, Rebellious Fallen Angels and the Flood, 1 Enoch
The figure of Satan, as chief angel among the angels who rebel against God emerges some time around 200BC in 1 Enoch, an apocalypse text, generally divided into five books, with book one (chapters 1-36) being among the earliest.
1 Enoch is an exegesis of Genesis 6:1-8, where the “sons of God” (angelic figures) mate with human women, events which bring about the Flood. Notable here is that the emphasis in the literature is on Genesis 6, and nor the Fall as recounted in Genesis 3.
Enoch says that evil came into the world by way of fallen angels, and questions regarding the degree to which human of fallen s or divine beings (angels), on the other, were responsible for the introduction and continuation of evil and sin among humanity would continue to occupy those who told and re-told the story of Satan in subsequent centuries. Some would configure things differently than Enoch.
In explaining the origins of evil, Enoch possibly weaves two separate traditions concerning a conspiracy among the angels, perhaps drawing on a lost work called the “Book of Noah”, mentioned in Jubilees 10, for one of these traditions. In 1 Enoch there are inconsistencies with regard to who led the rebel angels. At times the author speaks of Semyaz (Semihazah), but at others of Azazel (Asa’el). Not only that, but the author seems to have preserved the different emphases of each tradition (as we can see in the two traditions informing Genesis 1 and Genesis 2). The Semyaz material portrays the conspiracy against God as centred on sexual union with humans, while the Azazel tradition focusses on how the fallen angels subsequently reveal skills that lead to war and seduction, to the general chaos that brings about the flood.
For Enoch, the offspring of angels and humans are giants whose spirits after death are demons that continue to mislead humanity (15:8-12).
The Lord instructs Raphael: "'Bind Azazel hand and foot and throw him into the darkness!’ And he (Raphael) made a hole in the desert. . . he threw on top of him (Azazel) rugged and sharp rocks. And he covered his face in order that he may not see light; and in order that he may be sent into the fire on the great day of judgment." (1 Enoch 10:1-7)
This fate is echoed in the Apocalypse of John: "And I saw an angel descending from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the abyss and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is a Slanderer and the Accuser, and bound him for a thousand years, and cast him into the abyss, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he should no longer lead the gentiles astray until the thousand years are finished... " (20:1-4)
As in other apocalyptic writings, the flood of long ago becomes a precursor or foreshadow of God’s final intervention in the end times, the “great day of judgment”, when the angels who rebelled, along with the humans who sided with them by doing evil, will meet their end. The righteous ones, on the other hand, will go on to live in a new world cleansed “from all sin and from all iniquity” (cf 10:17-22).
The name “Satan” does not appear at all, but the fallen angels story was soon to be linked up with passages involving the angelic 'adversary' (“satan”) in the Hebrew Scriptures. The idea of 'fallen angels' would inevitably be read by Christian authors to include the Babylonian king as cosmic rebel in Isaiah 14, who speaks of the “Day Star, Son of Dawn” who falls from heaven (where he imagines himself to belong). It was Jerome who translated the Hebrew "shinning one, son of dawn" into Latin (410AD) as "lucifer qui mane oriebaris" ('light-bearer who rose in the morning').
The figure of Satan, as chief angel among the angels who rebel against God emerges some time around 200BC in 1 Enoch, an apocalypse text, generally divided into five books, with book one (chapters 1-36) being among the earliest.
1 Enoch is an exegesis of Genesis 6:1-8, where the “sons of God” (angelic figures) mate with human women, events which bring about the Flood. Notable here is that the emphasis in the literature is on Genesis 6, and nor the Fall as recounted in Genesis 3.
Enoch says that evil came into the world by way of fallen angels, and questions regarding the degree to which human of fallen s or divine beings (angels), on the other, were responsible for the introduction and continuation of evil and sin among humanity would continue to occupy those who told and re-told the story of Satan in subsequent centuries. Some would configure things differently than Enoch.
In explaining the origins of evil, Enoch possibly weaves two separate traditions concerning a conspiracy among the angels, perhaps drawing on a lost work called the “Book of Noah”, mentioned in Jubilees 10, for one of these traditions. In 1 Enoch there are inconsistencies with regard to who led the rebel angels. At times the author speaks of Semyaz (Semihazah), but at others of Azazel (Asa’el). Not only that, but the author seems to have preserved the different emphases of each tradition (as we can see in the two traditions informing Genesis 1 and Genesis 2). The Semyaz material portrays the conspiracy against God as centred on sexual union with humans, while the Azazel tradition focusses on how the fallen angels subsequently reveal skills that lead to war and seduction, to the general chaos that brings about the flood.
For Enoch, the offspring of angels and humans are giants whose spirits after death are demons that continue to mislead humanity (15:8-12).
The Lord instructs Raphael: "'Bind Azazel hand and foot and throw him into the darkness!’ And he (Raphael) made a hole in the desert. . . he threw on top of him (Azazel) rugged and sharp rocks. And he covered his face in order that he may not see light; and in order that he may be sent into the fire on the great day of judgment." (1 Enoch 10:1-7)
This fate is echoed in the Apocalypse of John: "And I saw an angel descending from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the abyss and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, the ancient serpent, who is a Slanderer and the Accuser, and bound him for a thousand years, and cast him into the abyss, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he should no longer lead the gentiles astray until the thousand years are finished... " (20:1-4)
As in other apocalyptic writings, the flood of long ago becomes a precursor or foreshadow of God’s final intervention in the end times, the “great day of judgment”, when the angels who rebelled, along with the humans who sided with them by doing evil, will meet their end. The righteous ones, on the other hand, will go on to live in a new world cleansed “from all sin and from all iniquity” (cf 10:17-22).
The name “Satan” does not appear at all, but the fallen angels story was soon to be linked up with passages involving the angelic 'adversary' (“satan”) in the Hebrew Scriptures. The idea of 'fallen angels' would inevitably be read by Christian authors to include the Babylonian king as cosmic rebel in Isaiah 14, who speaks of the “Day Star, Son of Dawn” who falls from heaven (where he imagines himself to belong). It was Jerome who translated the Hebrew "shinning one, son of dawn" into Latin (410AD) as "lucifer qui mane oriebaris" ('light-bearer who rose in the morning').
