More insight into the Book of Enoch passages about the ‘Son of Man’: The Hebrew scriptures which followed on from the original prophecies of Enoch include the accounts about Moses and the ancient Israelites and here can be found the explanation of what is meant by what Enoch called the Son of Man. Moses was one of few, perhaps one or two, people in history who God spoke to and conversed with face to face. The directness of this communication with the Most High God is unsurpassed in history, except for one person, the Son of Man. Moses was a kind of Son of Man figure himself. This is because the greatest directness of human communion with the Almighty is beyond most humans. When Israelites started to get close to this kind of immediacy with God they panicked. They realised just how terrible in shock and awe this communication could be when it started to mean face-to-face encounters with the fiery supernatural being that God is and the kinds of responsibilities this would put on them all. They had to kill animals which approached the mountain to which God was physically descending. The mountain itself became fiery like a volcano, not from any lava burst but from the supernatural fire coming upon it by God’s physical descent on its heights. Moses actually went up to God and as he returned his whole face was visibly glowing. He became too terrible to gaze at. Then came the greatest physical phenomenon of all, one of the greatest in human history, as God physically wrote commands on stone pieces which Moses took down to these people, and they realised they were in a predicament. If Moses kept up these round trips to the physical presence of God it could go further still and the writing of God on stone tablets might lead to actual immediate encounters between this topmost God and the ordinary Israelites, men, women, children. They could not see how they could possibly survive such contact, so they pleaded with Moses to not let God contact them immediately but for Moses to always act as intermediary with God. So was started the concept of human mediator with God. Moses could do it. Others could not. Moses would not always be around though. God promised the Israelites, throughout history until today, to never have to deal directly with God but eventually that God would provide a new Moses-like go-between who could meet with God face-to-face, even beyond normal prophetic encounters (usually in dreams and visions), and pass on to Israelites the word of God. This is surely what ‘Son of Man’ entails, a human mediator, messenger from God, like Moses but eternal, never to leave the people without mediation with God. In Acts in the New Testament it is recorded that Apostle Peter told the Israelites two thousand years ago that Jesus is this One. Jesus’ own proclamations of this are recorded in John’s gospel in detail and the other gospels in summary. The Epistle to the Hebrews reiterates it. The human follower of God could normally not cope with direct contact with God, being told commands by God face-to-face. Someone who can do this is needed, but someone truly human with whom people can converse easily and without fear of harm. This is surely where a Son of Man meets the need, and for this we see Jesus as this One, when God gives us faith to believe. Holding to Jesus’ teachings with this faith makes us his disciples and he gives eternal life to those who are freed from their sins this way. The Way, the Truth, the Life. The Word of God made flesh.
