1 Enoch 7
Study resource: not ScriptureR. H. Charles translation (1917) · public domain
1And all the others together with them took unto themselves wives, and each chose for himself one, and they began to go in unto them and to defile themselves with them, and they taught them charms and enchantments, and the cutting of roots, and made them acquainted with plants.
2And they became pregnant, and they bare great giants, whose height was three thousand ells:
3Who consumed all the acquisitions of men.
4And when men could no longer sustain them, the giants turned against them and devoured mankind.
5And they began to sin against birds, and beasts, and reptiles, and fish, and to devour one another's flesh, and drink the blood.
6Then the earth laid accusation against the lawless ones.
The chapter, studied
The Giants Who Ate the Earth Empty
The two hundred Watchers take human wives and teach them "charms and enchantments, and the cutting of roots." The women bear giant offspring so large they consume everything humanity produces, then turn to devouring people themselves, and finally begin sinning against animals and each other, eating flesh and drinking blood.
The escalation in this chapter is deliberate and fast: intermarriage (v. 1) leads to forbidden knowledge taught to the women, which leads to monstrous offspring (v. 2, their height given as "three thousand ells"), which leads to consumption of "all the acquisitions of men," which leads to cannibalism of humanity itself, which leads finally to violence against "birds, and beasts, and reptiles, and fish" and the drinking of blood. Each step widens the circle of what is destroyed, ending with creation's whole order under assault.
The chapter's last line is its verdict: "the earth laid accusation against the lawless ones" — the ground itself is personified as a witness bringing a legal complaint, the same figure Genesis uses when Abel's blood "crieth unto me from the ground." The chapters that follow (8-11) will answer that complaint with a hearing in heaven and a sentence.
The giants of this chapter are the offspring the site's Watchers reading identifies with the Nephilim of Genesis 6:4: a genuine, monstrous corruption of the created order, not legend for legend's sake. Their violence is the direct cause the flood narrative (Genesis 6:11-13) later names as the earth being "filled with violence."
Doors into the 66
- Genesis 6:4 — "There were giants in the earth in those days... mighty men which were of old, men of renown" — the single verse this chapter expands into a full account of the giants' violence.
- Genesis 4:10 — The earth's accusation in verse 6 echoes the same personified cry of the ground carrying a victim's blood before God, as with Abel.
Teachers on this ground
R. H. Charles
The Book of Enoch (1917)
The public-domain translation this shelf reads, with the critical introduction the field still builds on.
Johnny Enlow
The Book of Enoch: Paraphrase and Commentary (2025)
A living teacher's paraphrase of the whole book with his own running commentary, from the prophetic stream.
Michael S. Heiser
A Companion to the Book of Enoch: A Reader's Commentary, Vol. I — The Book of the Watchers (2019)
A verse-by-verse reader's commentary on chapters 1–36: the closest thing in print to a study Bible for this section.
Michael S. Heiser
Reversing Hermon: Enoch, the Watchers, and the Forgotten Mission of Jesus Christ (2017)
How the Watchers story of these chapters stands behind New Testament theology.
Gary Wayne
The Genesis 6 Conspiracy (2014)
A topical case for the Watchers reading these chapters narrate: giants, bloodlines, and the seed war.
Timothy Alberino
Birthright: The Coming Posthuman Apocalypse and the Usurpation of Adam's Dominion on Planet Earth (2020)
Reads the Watchers rebellion of these chapters into the Bible's larger dominion story.
1And all the others together with them took unto themselves wives, and each chose for himself one, and they began to go in unto them and to defile themselves with them, and they taught them charms and enchantments, and the cutting of roots, and made them acquainted with plants.
2And they became pregnant, and they bare great giants, whose height was three thousand ells:
3Who consumed all the acquisitions of men.
4And when men could no longer sustain them, the giants turned against them and devoured mankind.
5And they began to sin against birds, and beasts, and reptiles, and fish, and to devour one another's flesh, and drink the blood.
6Then the earth laid accusation against the lawless ones.
The language it was written in
Aramaic (the Qumran fragments' language); parts possibly Hebrew. The Parables (chs. 37–71) have no Qumran witness and their original language is debated.
What survives, and where
Aramaic: Dead Sea Scrolls
Eleven fragmentary manuscripts from Qumran Cave 4 covering every section except the Parables (3rd c. BC – 1st c. AD).
Greek
Substantial portions: chs. 1–32 (Codex Panopolitanus), quotations in Syncellus, and the Chester Beatty papyrus of the Epistle.
Ge’ez (Ethiopic)
The only complete text, preserved by the Ethiopian church, whose canon receives the book; the base of every full translation.
What you are reading here
R. H. Charles's 1917 English translation, made from the Ge’ez against the Greek and Aramaic evidence then known — public domain, quotable in full.
No tagged word floor exists for the Aramaic or Ge’ez text; word-by-word study on this shelf awaits a future ingest. What stands here is the manuscript story itself.