THE MYSTERY OF ENOCH. Excerpt:
1 Enoch in particular was enormously influential in its time. Generations of New Testament scholars have been intrigued by the book’s use of the “Son of Man” terminology, recalling Jesus’s own use of that phrase. For centuries, the book’s most intriguing section was the so-called Book of the Watchers, which described how the Sons of God descended to Earth to breed with human women, producing a range of bizarre and frightening monsters. 1 Enoch also gave scriptural foundation for the fascination with angels and archangels like Michael and Gabriel.
LOSING ENOCH. Excerpt:
Even so, and despite the condemnation of such ecclesiastical giants as Origen and Augustine, we can trace the influence of the Enochic books for centuries afterwards. That survival is a powerful commentary on the durability of texts, especially when they were read so widely across the very broad canvas of a transcontinental Christian world.
ENOCH ABIDES. Here he suggests that Grendel's name in Beowulf was inspired by the names of the watchers and giants in 1 Enoch. Maybe, but no giants are named in 1 Enoch, and they are the closest analogues with Grendel, although this may have been a fine distinction to our medieval clerical readers. Some version of the Book of Giants may also have been circulating in clerical circles (see the Book of Ogias the Giant, mentioned in the Gelasian Decree, noted here). But as far as I can recall, none of the giants named in the Book of Giants had an "-el" name.
