Enoch

Enoch appears in the genealogy of Genesis 5 as the seventh generation from Adam through Seth. His life of 365 years is conspicuously short beside his relatives — Methuselah lived 969 years — and the repeated phrase 'he walked with God' sets him apart from the others in the list, of whom only Noah earns the same description. Genesis 5.24 says simply: 'Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.' The New Testament treats this as a bodily translation: Hebrews 11.5 says he was commended as one who pleased God and 'did not experience death.' He is one of only two people in all of Scripture of whom this is said — the other being the prophet Elijah, who was taken up in a whirlwind. Jude 14–15 quotes a prophecy attributed to Enoch about God's coming judgment, drawing on traditions that circulated widely in the Second Temple period. His removal from the earth made him a figure of great fascination in Jewish and early Christian thought.