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In most versions of the Hebrew Bible you're likely to encounter, the patriarch Enoch only appears once, mentioned in passing in the Book of Genesis as the father of Methuselah. Enoch is said to have been born 1034 years before the Great Deluge of his great grandson Noah, so roughly 3275 BCE. He fathered Methuselah at age 65, and then went on to live to age 365 (2910 BCE). He didn't actually "die" though. Genesis is quoted specifically that he "walked with God, then he was no more; because God took him." If you're wondering what the hell that's supposed to mean, you're not alone. If you know anything about rabbis today, this is exactly the kind of minute detail that biblical scholars can and have devoted their lives to dissecting and expanding upon for millennia. This one Bible verse spun off an entire genre of apocalyptic texts loosely compiled anywhere between the 4th century BCE to the 6th century CE, taking their collective name from this seemingly innocuous figure: the Books of Enoch. While today there are usually three Books of Enoch cited, it is clear that all of these are compilations of older individual texts. Usually people mean 1 Enoch when they just say "Book of Enoch", a text which dates back to the 4th century BCE but only preserved in Ethiopian manuscripts dating back to the 15th century CE. Similarly, there is also 2 Enoch, a 1st century text only preserved in medieval Slavonic manuscripts, and 3 Enoch which was still preserved by Rabbinic tradition. Different manuscripts can vary dramatically in their content, but they account for a shocking majority of surviving ancient biblical specimens that we have, even being found in the Dead Sea Scrolls This was clearly a very popular narrative, diving deep into the apocalyptic genre that was popular at the time.

While we often use "apocalypse" today to just mean the end of the world, its original and literal meaning was… well "revelation" for lack of a better word. It was a genre that caught on after the cultural nightmare that was the destruction of Jerusalem's Temple by the Babylonians in 587 BCE, and all the woes that followed. The Jewish people had to grapple with the existential crisis that not only had their God seemingly abandoned them, but didn't even bother to completely eradicate them like their ancient scrolls foretold. The solution was to come to believe in a narrative that somehow, some way, this was all actually part of God's 4D chess plan and that soon He would bring about the end times to rescue His people from their earthly suffering. It was a rather tragic desperation born out of a very real fear that the world was collapsing in on them. Because… well… look at literally all of written history or turn on the news. The world, sadly, is always closing in on the Jews. This genre, interestingly enough, is also what produced the first Christian authors. It's obvious that the New Testament is an extremely apocalyptic text rooted deeply in the cultural context of 1st century Judea. It even directly cites the Book of Enoch, with the Book of Jude almost directly quoting a passage from Enoch word for word.

So that's the historical context, but what exactly is in this strangely forgotten piece of apocrypha? Well, it narrates that the titular Enoch does not in fact die when he "walks with God and is no more because God took him". Instead, he is given the full tour of God's palace in heaven, and transformed into the angel Metatron. He is made God's scribe and is sent back to Earth to tell everyone what he had learned directly from the source: that a Great Flood will be sent to cleanse the Earth of sin. In the regular Hebrew Bible, the Flood isn't really given much other explanation beyond that. In Enoch, though, it is elaborated that this "sin", is the lingering consequences of a group of fallen angels called the "Watchers" who were cast out of heaven in the great rebellion at the start of creation. These Watchers then mated with humans and taught them all the dirty dirty secrets of civilization like metalworking and witchcraft, and then spawned a mysterious race of giant hybrids called the Nephilim. Interestingly, Genesis also alludes to this, but does not expand, in place of "Watchers" using the phrase "bne elohim", which literally means "children of the gods", alluding to Judaism's more polytheistic antiquity. Genesis claims these Canaanite demigods were the heroes of old, like the mighty Gilgamesh, likely related to the broader term Rephaim found in Ugaritic sources. The Book of Enoch, however, describes the Nephilim as voracious monsters who had to be stopped from destroying the Earth. Thus, Deluge.

Enoch was taken by God to explain the situation to his descendants and lay the groundwork for Noah to build his ark. Over time, this role turned Enoch the iconic archetype for divine revelation and mystical angelology. This is probably why later Christian and Muslim scholars equated him to the legendary sage Hermes Trismegistus, who fulfilled a similar role in their lore. Medieval Islamic scholars believed that Idris (the prophet equivalent to Enoch in genealogy and narrative) was dubbed "Thrice Great" as Trismegistus literally means, because of his history as Enoch, Thoth, and Hermes throughout history. In the Drake Hero universe, I've leaned heavily on this interpretation for my lore. Enoch was great, then made great again as the angel Metatron, then once more finally during his reincarnation as Hermes when he chose to fuse with Thoth to at last become the penultimate sage. I really wanted to explore a character who broke under the stress of the apocalyptic genre and lost all faith in his god who would neither save his people or eradicate them. He blames himself for telling his family they could accept their fate and die in the Deluge, and blames his god for making a promise He couldn't keep. But in the D&D game I ran, he ultimately is forced to realize that entropy is a power outside of the control of even the gods, and instead devotes his existence as Hermes Trismegistus to studying the turn of the universe and passing on his knowledge to sages like Pythagoras and Apollonius of Tyana for when humanity will need it the most…

Design notes, tch. Man. Every depiction of Bible characters really does seem to look the same huh? Old dudes with long gray beards in togas or potato sacks. I mean okay yeah I understand why but come on ancient artists, give me something unique to work with XD Ah well, I did thankfully find something: a 14th century fresco attributed by Wikipedia to Theophanes the Greek, though try as I did, I couldn't find the specific mural it belonged to. It seems to be from the Church of the Transfiguration on Ilyina Street in Novgorod, though, so there's that at least. I extrapolated a little bit extra than what I believe the artist intended with the clothing details and layers, but I think the end result is pretty snazzy. The sword isn't really based on anything, it's meant to just be a simplified metal version of the one his villain form Dismegistus carried in my D&D game. I did try to make it look plausibly like something that could be found in the Bronze Age, at least in terms of blade shape, but I gotta come clean: I let the rule of cool override my historical accuracy just a little bit on that one. I know, may the gods have mercy on my tortured soul.

Description
In most versions of the Hebrew Bible you're likely to encounter, the patriarch Enoch only appears once, mentioned in passing in the Book of Genesis as the father of Methuselah. Enoch is said to have been born 1034 years before the Great Deluge of his great grandson Noah, so roughly 3275 BCE. He fathered Methuselah at age 65, and then went on to live to age 365 (2910 BCE). He didn't actually "die" though. Genesis is quoted specifically that he "walked with God, then he was no more; because God took him." If you're wondering what the hell that's supposed to mean, you're not alone. If you know anything about rabbis today, this is exactly the kind of minute detail that biblical scholars can and have devoted their lives to dissecting and expanding upon for millennia. This one Bible verse spun off an entire genre of apocalyptic texts loosely compiled anywhere between the 4th century BCE to the 6th century CE, taking their collective name from this seemingly innocuous figure: the Books of Enoch. While today there are usually three Books of Enoch cited, it is clear that all of these are compilations of older individual texts. Usually people mean 1 Enoch when they just say "Book of Enoch", a text which dates back to the 4th century BCE but only preserved in Ethiopian manuscripts dating back to the 15th century CE. Similarly, there is also 2 Enoch, a 1st century text only preserved in medieval Slavonic manuscripts, and 3 Enoch which was still preserved by Rabbinic tradition. Different manuscripts can vary dramatically in their content, but they account for a shocking majority of surviving ancient biblical specimens that we have, even being found in the Dead Sea Scrolls This was clearly a very popular narrative, diving deep into the apocalyptic genre that was popular at the time.

While we often use "apocalypse" today to just mean the end of the world, its original and literal meaning was… well "revelation" for lack of a better word. It was a genre that caught on after the cultural nightmare that was the destruction of Jerusalem's Temple by the Babylonians in 587 BCE, and all the woes that followed. The Jewish people had to grapple with the existential crisis that not only had their God seemingly abandoned them, but didn't even bother to completely eradicate them like their ancient scrolls foretold. The solution was to come to believe in a narrative that somehow, some way, this was all actually part of God's 4D chess plan and that soon He would bring about the end times to rescue His people from their earthly suffering. It was a rather tragic desperation born out of a very real fear that the world was collapsing in on them. Because… well… look at literally all of written history or turn on the news. The world, sadly, is always closing in on the Jews. This genre, interestingly enough, is also what produced the first Christian authors. It's obvious that the New Testament is an extremely apocalyptic text rooted deeply in the cultural context of 1st century Judea. It even directly cites the Book of Enoch, with the Book of Jude almost directly quoting a passage from Enoch word for word.

So that's the historical context, but what exactly is in this strangely forgotten piece of apocrypha? Well, it narrates that the titular Enoch does not in fact die when he "walks with God and is no more because God took him". Instead, he is given the full tour of God's palace in heaven, and transformed into the angel Metatron. He is made God's scribe and is sent back to Earth to tell everyone what he had learned directly from the source: that a Great Flood will be sent to cleanse the Earth of sin. In the regular Hebrew Bible, the Flood isn't really given much other explanation beyond that. In Enoch, though, it is elaborated that this "sin", is the lingering consequences of a group of fallen angels called the "Watchers" who were cast out of heaven in the great rebellion at the start of creation. These Watchers then mated with humans and taught them all the dirty dirty secrets of civilization like metalworking and witchcraft, and then spawned a mysterious race of giant hybrids called the Nephilim. Interestingly, Genesis also alludes to this, but does not expand, in place of "Watchers" using the phrase "bne elohim", which literally means "children of the gods", alluding to Judaism's more polytheistic antiquity. Genesis claims these Canaanite demigods were the heroes of old, like the mighty Gilgamesh, likely related to the broader term Rephaim found in Ugaritic sources. The Book of Enoch, however, describes the Nephilim as voracious monsters who had to be stopped from destroying the Earth. Thus, Deluge.

Enoch was taken by God to explain the situation to his descendants and lay the groundwork for Noah to build his ark. Over time, this role turned Enoch the iconic archetype for divine revelation and mystical angelology. This is probably why later Christian and Muslim scholars equated him to the legendary sage Hermes Trismegistus, who fulfilled a similar role in their lore. Medieval Islamic scholars believed that Idris (the prophet equivalent to Enoch in genealogy and narrative) was dubbed "Thrice Great" as Trismegistus literally means, because of his history as Enoch, Thoth, and Hermes throughout history. In the Drake Hero universe, I've leaned heavily on this interpretation for my lore. Enoch was great, then made great again as the angel Metatron, then once more finally during his reincarnation as Hermes when he chose to fuse with Thoth to at last become the penultimate sage. I really wanted to explore a character who broke under the stress of the apocalyptic genre and lost all faith in his god who would neither save his people or eradicate them. He blames himself for telling his family they could accept their fate and die in the Deluge, and blames his god for making a promise He couldn't keep. But in the D&D game I ran, he ultimately is forced to realize that entropy is a power outside of the control of even the gods, and instead devotes his existence as Hermes Trismegistus to studying the turn of the universe and passing on his knowledge to sages like Pythagoras and Apollonius of Tyana for when humanity will need it the most…

Design notes, tch. Man. Every depiction of Bible characters really does seem to look the same huh? Old dudes with long gray beards in togas or potato sacks. I mean okay yeah I understand why but come on ancient artists, give me something unique to work with XD Ah well, I did thankfully find something: a 14th century fresco attributed by Wikipedia to Theophanes the Greek, though try as I did, I couldn't find the specific mural it belonged to. It seems to be from the Church of the Transfiguration on Ilyina Street in Novgorod, though, so there's that at least. I extrapolated a little bit extra than what I believe the artist intended with the clothing details and layers, but I think the end result is pretty snazzy. The sword isn't really based on anything, it's meant to just be a simplified metal version of the one his villain form Dismegistus carried in my D&D game. I did try to make it look plausibly like something that could be found in the Bronze Age, at least in terms of blade shape, but I gotta come clean: I let the rule of cool override my historical accuracy just a little bit on that one. I know, may the gods have mercy on my tortured soul.