1 Enoch 84
Study resource: not ScriptureR. H. Charles translation (1917) · public domain
1And I lifted up my hands in righteousness and blessed the Holy and Great One, and spake with the breath of my mouth, and with the tongue of flesh, which God has made for the children of the flesh of men, that they should speak therewith, and He gave them breath and a tongue and a mouth that they should speak therewith:
2‘Blessed be Thou, O Lord, King, Great and mighty in Thy greatness, Lord of the whole creation of the heaven, King of kings and God of the whole world. And Thy power and kingship and greatness abide for ever and ever, And throughout all generations Thy dominion; And all the heavens are Thy throne for ever, And the whole earth Thy footstool for ever and ever.
3For Thou hast made and Thou rulest all things, And nothing is too hard for Thee, Wisdom departs not from the place of Thy throne, Nor turns away from Thy presence. And Thou knowest and seest and hearest everything, And there is nothing hidden from Thee [for Thou seest everything].
4And now the angels of Thy heavens are guilty of trespass, And upon the flesh of men abideth Thy wrath until the great day of judgement.
5And now, O God and Lord and Great King, I implore and beseech Thee to fulfil my prayer, To leave me a posterity on earth, And not destroy all the flesh of man, And make the earth without inhabitant, So that there should be an eternal destruction.
6And now, my Lord, destroy from the earth the flesh which has aroused Thy wrath, But the flesh of righteousness and uprightness establish as a plant of the eternal seed, And hide not Thy face from the prayer of Thy servant, O Lord.’
The chapter, studied
The Angels of Thy Heavens Are Guilty
Enoch answers his terrifying vision with a doxology, blessing God as King over all creation, whose throne is the heavens and whose footstool is the earth. In the middle of his praise he states plainly that "the angels of Thy heavens are guilty of trespass" and that God's wrath rests on mankind's flesh, until the day of judgment, because of it. He begs God to spare a righteous remnant rather than destroy every living thing.
Chapter 84 is Enoch's prayer proper, following straight out of the collapsing-heaven vision of chapter 83, and it names the actual cause of the coming judgment out loud: "the angels of Thy heavens are guilty of trespass." Set inside a Book of Dream Visions that opened with cosmic destruction, this line makes the angelic sin, not human sin alone, the trigger for divine wrath resting "upon the flesh of men."
The prayer's petition: spare a posterity, do not "destroy all the flesh of man," preserve "the flesh of righteousness and uprightness… as a plant of the eternal seed" — reads as the book's own version of Noah's preservation, prayed forward before the flood narrative arrives in chapter 89's animal imagery. "Eternal seed" recalls the promised line running through Genesis, the seed guarded from every threat against it since Eden.
The doxology framing, throne, footstool, kingship forever, is worth noticing on its own: it borrows language scripture itself uses of God's own dwelling, showing how deeply Second Temple prayer language and biblical prayer language overlapped even outside the canon.
The Genesis 6 narrative is not told in this chapter, but its consequence is stated in the plainest terms the book offers: "the angels of Thy heavens are guilty of trespass" — matching the site's Watchers reading of Genesis 6:1-4 and the New Testament's witness that God "spared not the angels that sinned" and reserved them "in everlasting chains" for the judgment of the great day.
Doors into the 66
- Isaiah 66:1 — "The heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool" is the exact biblical language this chapter's doxology borrows for God's kingship.
- Genesis 3:15 — The prayer's plea to preserve an "eternal seed" of righteousness echoes the promised seed set against the serpent from the garden onward.
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.
1And I lifted up my hands in righteousness and blessed the Holy and Great One, and spake with the breath of my mouth, and with the tongue of flesh, which God has made for the children of the flesh of men, that they should speak therewith, and He gave them breath and a tongue and a mouth that they should speak therewith:
2‘Blessed be Thou, O Lord, King, Great and mighty in Thy greatness, Lord of the whole creation of the heaven, King of kings and God of the whole world. And Thy power and kingship and greatness abide for ever and ever, And throughout all generations Thy dominion; And all the heavens are Thy throne for ever, And the whole earth Thy footstool for ever and ever.
3For Thou hast made and Thou rulest all things, And nothing is too hard for Thee, Wisdom departs not from the place of Thy throne, Nor turns away from Thy presence. And Thou knowest and seest and hearest everything, And there is nothing hidden from Thee [for Thou seest everything].
4And now the angels of Thy heavens are guilty of trespass, And upon the flesh of men abideth Thy wrath until the great day of judgement.
5And now, O God and Lord and Great King, I implore and beseech Thee to fulfil my prayer, To leave me a posterity on earth, And not destroy all the flesh of man, And make the earth without inhabitant, So that there should be an eternal destruction.
6And now, my Lord, destroy from the earth the flesh which has aroused Thy wrath, But the flesh of righteousness and uprightness establish as a plant of the eternal seed, And hide not Thy face from the prayer of Thy servant, O Lord.’
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.