By the Gods!

Enoch and the Watchers: Part One

Christian/Jewish scripture rarely maintains a consensus, and when it comes to angels, everything’s up in the air. When we talk about the Watchers, we’re delving deep into Christian and Jewish apocrypha— specifically, the Book of Enoch. The writings attributed to Enoch were seen as real scripture by many Christian authorities writing in the first and second centuries CE, and may have been similarly important to Jewish groups about this time. However, the Book of Enoch was removed from canon in the years to come, except for in the Ethiopian Christian Church, where it remained a fundamental part of scripture. 

Now, Enoch was the great-grandfather of Noah, and was elected by God as his all-around favourite guy, and was essentially named “greatest dude on the planet.” He was plucked from the mortal world, and raised to the level of Metatron: in some canon, he is seen as the voice of god, and was “promoted” to angelhood. He was also seen as the inventor of reading and writing, and was in charge of doing all of the big guy’s dirty work on Earth— like dealing with those pesky rebel Watchers.

The Watchers, y’see, were a group of angels who had been charged with watching over humanity. They just watched a little too closely, if you catch my meaning; they became deeply enamoured with the lives of men, and with the lovely wiggle ‘n shake of human women. They gave up their duties, descended down to Earth, and began to procreate with undoubtedly surprised people. The result of this interesting and as yet unseen union were the Nephilim— in the book of Genesis, they were described as “warriors of renown,” which you’d expect from Angelic stock. In the Book of Enoch, however, they were giants that would bring ruin on the world, and were the cause of everything bad.