Judgment & the Elect

The Son of Man in the Parables

An enthroned judge figure in Book II — and the most contested dating problem in the book.

ContestedCh. 46Ch. 48Ch. 62Ch. 69Ch. 71

The short answer

The Book of Parables presents a figure called the Righteous One, the Elect One and the Son of Man, seated on a throne of glory beside the Head of Days to judge kings and the mighty. No copy of this section was found at Qumran, which makes its date the sharpest dispute in Enoch scholarship.

Specialists actively disagree. Treat any confident answer with suspicion.

Why the argument is unresolved

Every other major section of 1 Enoch turned up in Aramaic at Qumran. The Parables did not. One camp reads that as evidence of a later composition; another treats the Qumran library as incomplete and the silence as weak evidence. Both positions are held by serious specialists.

We flag this as contested rather than settled, because the honest state of the evidence does not support a confident answer in either direction.

In the text

Chapters that carry this

Read the passage rather than taking the summary on trust.

Chapter 46

Mapped in the structure guide; the full rendering is not published yet.

Chapter 48

Mapped in the structure guide; the full rendering is not published yet.

Chapter 62

Mapped in the structure guide; the full rendering is not published yet.

Chapter 69

Mapped in the structure guide; the full rendering is not published yet.

Chapter 71

Mapped in the structure guide; the full rendering is not published yet.

Roster

Watchers named in these chapters

The chiefs of 1 Enoch 6 and the teachings assigned to them in 7–8.

Yeqon

Ch. 69

Jeqon

Named in the Parables as the one who led the others astray.

Open the full Watchers dossier →

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