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His mind was pure; his spirit rose above the turmoil of worldliness; he delighted in calm communion with God; once more the familiar intercourse between God and man, which had existed in the time of paradise, was restored; the path commenced by Seth was continued by Enoch; the former addressed God by the medium of the word; the latter approached Him by the still more spiritual medium of thought: the highest form of religious life was gained. But, unfortunately, Enoch alone "walked with God"; his contemporaries were sunk in iniquity and depravation; but the measure of their wickedness was not yet complete; three generations more were required to mature their destruction; and God, in order to rescue Enoch, took him to Himself, delivering him from the contamination of his time at a comparatively early period of his life. Was this early death a punishment? But the piety of Enoch is repeatedly stated. Was it a misfortune? It was this as little as the full length of Noah's life; both cases were analogous; in the one, the pious man left the wicked generation; in the other, he was by a catastrophe freed from it; and in both instances, the deliverance was miraculous and supernatural, by the immediate agency of God. If this is the clear internal meaning of Enoch's history, who can doubt that he was called away from the earth, not to cease his life abruptly, but to continue it in a better sphere, and in still more perfect virtue? We are convinced that the "taking away" of Enoch is one of the strongest proofs of the belief in a future state prevailing among the Hebrews; without this belief, the history of Enoch is a perfect mystery, a hieroglyph without a clue, a commencement without an end. If, then, pious men could hope to continue a brighter existence after their transitory sojourn upon earth, the books of the Old Testament are not enveloped in the gloomy clouds of despair; they radiate in the beams of hope; and, if a long life on earth was also gratefully accepted as a high, though not the highest, boon, this may have sprung from the just feeling, that man is born to enjoy and to work, to receive much and to give more; and that he does not deserve the blessing of eternal rest before he has toiled to extend the empire of truth and piety (comp. Genesis 4:7-10.) God "took" Enoch as He "took" Elijah (2 Kings 2:9), or "he was translated by faith, that he should not see death, and was not found, because God had translated him" (Hebrews 11:5). The notion seems to be, that Enoch passed from earth to heaven without the intermediate state of decrepitude and dissolution; he suffered no bodily infirmity; "his eye grew not dim, nor did his natural strength abate," as it is stated with regard to Moses, who also disappeared, so that no mortal knew his grave. For the pious Enoch, death lost its pang and its sting; though the descendant of a sinful race, he was delivered from the real punishment which sin inflicted upon the human family; his existence was uninterrupted; he was undying, as man was originally intended to be; for he passed from this life into a future state both without fear and without struggle. God took him as a loving father to His eternal home. The history of Enoch has ever been regarded as embodying profound truths; and, we think, there are few so strongly affecting the very root of religious life as those which we have just briefly indicated. And, as the virtuous are thus translated into heaven, the wicked are devoured alive in the gulf of the earth (Numbers 16). It is known that the classical writers also mention such translations into heaven; they assign this distinction among others to Hercules, to Ganymede, and to Romulus. But it was awarded to them either for their valour, or for mere physical beauty, which advantages, though valued among the Hebrews, were not considered by them as sublime or godlike; a pious and religious life alone deserved and obtained the crown of immortal glory. In no single feature can the Scriptures conceal their high spiritual character. However, the idea of a translation to heaven is not limited to the old world; it was familiar to the tribes of Central America; the chronicles of Guatemala record four progenitors of mankind who were suddenly raised to heaven; and the documents add that those first men came to Guatemala from the other side of the sea, from the east. This is, then, apparently, a rather remarkable connection of the primitive traditions of the most different nations.

(M. M. Kalisch, Ph. D.)

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

WEB: Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him.