Book of Enoch & The Sons of God · Chapter 1 of 10
The Book of Job, Its Place in History, and the Assembly of the Firstborn Enrolled in Heaven
Job 1:6 And it was the day, that the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them.
Job 1:6 and 2:1 describe a council held before the throne of God, and they raise two questions. When did Job live? And who were “the sons of God” (bnei ha-Elohim) who came to stand before the LORD? Some say the book of Job is older than the patriarchs of Genesis, and many say the sons of God in these verses are angels. Both claims pass over what the text itself tells us about names, places, and family lines.
Begin with the names. When the people and places of Job are set beside the genealogies of Genesis, the idea that Job lived before the patriarchs has nowhere to stand.
| Name in Job | Where Genesis first gives it | What it shows |
|---|---|---|
| The land of Uz (Job 1:1) | Uz son of Aram (Genesis 10:23); Uz the firstborn of Nahor (Genesis 22:21); Uz son of Dishan, of the line of Seir (Genesis 36:28) | A name from the descendants of Noah after the flood. Lamentations calls Edom the daughter “dwelling in the land of Uz” (Lamentations 4:21). |
| Eliphaz the Temanite (Job 2:11) | Teman, son of Eliphaz son of Esau (Genesis 36:11) | Eliphaz is the name of Esau’s son, and Teman the name of Esau’s grandson. |
| Bildad the Shuhite (Job 2:11) | Shuah, son of Abraham by Keturah (Genesis 25:2) | Shuah is the name of a son of Abraham. |
Job’s friends came from lands settled by the descendants of Abraham and Esau. This single table of names and places is enough to show that the book of Job is set after the age of the patriarchs.
Then who were the sons of God who came before the throne in Job’s day? Before Job lived, Enoch had already walked with God and been taken without seeing death: “And Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him” (Genesis 5:24; see Hebrews 11:5). It is very likely that the sons of God in that council were the redeemed and godly forefathers who had gone ahead into the heavenly homeland, Enoch among them. The letter to the Hebrews gives that heavenly gathering a name:
Hebrews 12:23 to the festal gathering and ekklesia(called-out community) of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous who have been made perfect,
“The firstborn” (Hebrews 12:23) is the very title the LORD gave His people when He said, “Israel is My son, My firstborn” (Exodus 4:22). Hebrews 12 says that heavenly Mount Zion holds “innumerable myriads of angels” (Hebrews 12:22), and alongside them a second assembly: the ekklesia “of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven,” together with “the spirits of the righteous who have been made perfect” (Hebrews 12:23). The angels and the firstborn are named as two different companies. That distinction matters for everything that follows.
The Gospels give us a scene of the same kind. On the mountain of the transfiguration, Moses, whose earthly life had ended long before, and Elijah, who had been taken up into heaven, appeared in glory and spoke with Yeshua.
Luke 9:30-31 And behold, two men were talking with Him — Moses and Elijah — who, appearing in glory, spoke of His departure, which He was about to fulfill at Jerusalem.
Saints of the Old Testament appeared in glory and talked with Yeshua. Scripture records this plainly. If that is so, it does not fit the witness of the whole Bible to insist that the forefathers who had gone ahead, the firstborn of God, could never have stood in the council of heaven. In heaven, “the sons of God” (Job 1:6) are the redeemed who have reached the homeland first. On earth (Genesis 6:2), the same name belongs to the godly covenant line that would one day be enrolled in that heavenly assembly. These are not two unrelated groups. They are one line: people who belong to God by covenant.