It matters whether or not we serve the Lord. A day is coming when we will have to answer for how we have lived our lives. Jude has been talking about the ungodly, warning them that just as Old Testament wicked people met their doom, they will meet theirs if they do not repent. Today he's going to remind his readers that the Lord is coming and that wickedness is going to meet its just reward. He's also going to talk about a man named Enoch who warned the world that the Lord was coming to judge wickedness. We're going to discuss the real Enoch versus the one depicted in a a false book by the same name, and while we're at it we're going to talk about why the Book of Enoch is not included in most versions of the Holy Bible.
When we concluded our study on Saturday, Jude was saying of the ungodly, "They are wild waves of the sea, foaming up their shame; wandering stars, for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever." (Jude 1:13) Today he picks up there by saying, "Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about them: 'See, the Lord is coming with thousands upon thousands of His holy ones to judge everyone, and to convict them of all the ungodly acts they have committed in their ungodliness, and of all the defiant words ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.' These people are grumblers and faultfinders; they follow their own evil desires; they boast about themselves and flatter others for their own advantage." (Jude 1:14-16)
First we are going to look at who Enoch was and why Jude feels his words are worth quoting. There were four Enochs in the Bible, but it is assumed by most scholars that Jude is referring to the Enoch of Genesis 5:18-24. He is the most famous of the four men named Enoch, for he was the great-grandfather of Noah and he was a man who did not die but who was taken up to heaven by God. Only one other man in the Bible was taken up to heaven without dying, and that was Elijah the prophet. (See 2 Kings 2:1-11) Was Enoch also a prophet? Well, we know that he made at least one prophecy, the prophecy Jude quotes in our portion of Scripture today. I think it's quite likely that he was a prophet. He lived during the centuries that led up to the flood, and just as God sent prophets to the nations of Israel and Judah for a long time before He sent them into captivity, I believe God would have sent prophets to the citizens of the world for a long time before He sent the flood.
The Bible tells us very little about the historical figure Enoch. We know that he was sixty-five years old when he fathered his son Methuselah. This made him somewhat of a young father for the long-living men of Genesis, who tended to be closer to 100 (or more) before fathering a child. And we know that, "After he became the father of Methuselah, Enoch walked faithfully with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters. Altogether, Enoch lived a total of 365 years." (Genesis 5:22-23)
Then, mysteriously, we are simply told, "Enoch walked faithfully with God; then he was no more, because God took him away." (Genesis 5:24) I'm a curious person and I want to know why God took him away and how God took him away. The taking away of Enoch appears to be connected with his faithfulness, since the author of Genesis is careful to keep reminding us of the faithfulness of Enoch. But the circumstances of this "taking away" are not revealed to us. The only other thing we are told about Enoch in the Bible is when the Apostle Paul says in his letter to the Hebrews, "By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: 'He could not be found, because he had been taken away.' For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God." (Hebrews 11:5) Paul paraphrases Genesis 5:24 in Hebrews 11:5. So we see that when the author of Genesis (believed to have been Moses) says God took Enoch away, he isn't using a euphemism for death but is literally saying that God removed the living Enoch from the earth and took him to heaven.
The question is: Is Jude quoting from the Book of Enoch (not considered to be inspired Scripture) or is he quoting a prophecy the actual Enoch is known to have made? The answer is: We do not know. The Book of Enoch has a verse which says, "Behold, He comes with ten thousand of His saints, to execute judgment upon them, and destroy the wicked, and reprove all the carnal for everything which the sinful and ungodly have done, and committed against Him." This information is nothing new to anyone who has studied the Bible. We know God is going to judge the ungodly. The fact that whoever wrote the Book of Enoch tells us judgment is coming doesn't make the book inspired Scripture, for all of us who believe in God know that God is going to judge the ungodly.
Jude would have been aware of the Book of Enoch which surfaced around the 2nd century BC, but this may or may not mean he is quoting from the book itself. The book is part of a body of writings known as the "pseudoepigraphia". This is a collection of writings that claim to have been written by people who did not write them. The term "pseudoepigraphia" comes from the Greek "pseudo" which means "false" and the Greek "epigraphein" which means "to inscribe". In other words, they are "false writings". They are fakes. The apocryphal Book of Enoch which existed in Jude's day was not written by the historical Enoch who lived many centuries before the flood. There were a large number of pseudoepigraphical books in existence in the late centuries BC and the early centuries AD. The authors were attempting to create a following for their writings by falsely attributing them to real characters of the Bible. Most Christian denominations do not consider these works to be inspired Scripture and do not include them in their copies of the Holy Bible.
The Book of Enoch was long ago rejected from the Biblical canon for the same reason the other pseudoepigraphical books were rejected. First of all, these books tell a lie right off the bat by claiming to have been written by persons who did not write them. Secondly, they suddenly appear on the scene far loo late in history to have been written by whom they claim to have been written. (Where were they during all the centuries between the time the person actually lived and the time they became "discovered"? Why were these books never mentioned by anyone in between the time the person lived and the time the books surfaced?) Thirdly, they contain historical errors, such as the date given for the fall of Jerusalem to Babylon in the book called "The Apocalypse Of Baruch". (Baruch was the scribe of Jeremiah, so the person who wrote the false book by Baruch's name was attempting to lend authority to his book by attributing it to Baruch. The real Baruch, who lived during the time Babylon conquered Judah, would not have made a mistake about the year it happened or about who was king of Judah at the time.) Lastly, they contain Scriptural errors---sometimes outright heresy. There are too many of these examples for me to reference here, but if you have free time you can Google why the pseudoepigraphical books were rejected as the word of God.
I have a book which contains the pseudoepigraphical Book of Enoch, and in places it appears to be legitimate because it throws in just enough actual Scripture and words that sound like they could be Scripture to lend an air of authority to it. It sounds enough like the Bible that it might fool someone who doesn't know the Bible. By and large though, what it reminds me of most is what someone might write down after having been on a psychedelic drug trip. If someone had taken acid for example, and had experienced hallucinations, and later on had attempted to write down an account of the things he experienced while under the influence, it might well read a lot like the account contained in the Book of Enoch. You will find the Book of Enoch quoted quite often on popular TV shows and in popular books having to do with the "ancient astronaut theory", but these TV shows and books also take true Scripture and twist it to suit their own needs (Ezekiel's account of seeing the Lord, for example, and the account of Elijah being taken up to heaven in 2 Kings 2). I've watched these shows and read these books for myself, and in them I always note Scriptural errors and the use of apocryphal and pseudoepigraphical books. They are using these fake Scriptures in order to deceive people into thinking the word of God says things it does not say. Those who don't know the Bible can be easily deceived because, in not being familiar with the inspired word of God, they are not going to be able to recognize fake Scripture when it's presented to them.
So is Jude quoting from the Book of Enoch or had the words of the real historical Enoch been passed down through the generations? We can't say for certain. If Jude is quoting from the Book of Enoch, is he giving it the status of inspired Scripture? Well, the Apostle Paul sometimes quotes the words of playwrights and poets in his letters, but Paul isn't saying that these men were given inspired Scripture by the Holy Spirit. Sometimes the truth is simply the truth, and even a fake Scripture writer or an unbelieving playwright makes a true statement from time to time. Is God going to judge the world? We know He is. The real Enoch who lived before the flood knew it. Those who lived between the flood and the coming of Jesus Christ knew it. Those of us who have lived since the first advent of Christ know it. The person who wrote the fake Book of Enoch knew it. The truth is the truth, and the truth is that God---who is righteous and holy---must judge unrighteousness and ungodliness. If He did not judge wickedness, then He would not be holy. I couldn't serve a God who isn't holy. Just think about the horror stories we see on the news sometimes. Would we serve a God who isn't going to hand down punishment for the cruelty and abuse some human beings have perpetrated on their fellow humans or on the animals? I don't think we would, because a God who won't judge unrighteousness wouldn't be righteous Himself.
Judgment is coming. And when it does, we want to be among the redeemed of the Lord, not among those who must stand before a holy God with no Defender. At one time we were all lost. We may have wallowed gleefully in sin, or we may have been cruel and deceitful to others, or we may just have refused to allow God to be Lord of our lives. But we were all lost and we all needed a Redeemer and Defender. We needed Christ to make us new and whole. Judgment is coming and we don't want to face it alone with the stain of our sins still on us. We want to face it as the regenerated people of the Lord, whose sins have been cleansed by the blood of Christ, who have been saved by faith in Christ. We want to be those whom Paul is talking about when he says, "Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now He has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to present you holy in His sight, without blemish and free from accusation." (Colossians 1:21-22)
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