How Many Times Is Enoch Mentioned in the Bible? (Every Verse Listed)
In the King James Version, the name Enoch appears 12 times in 11 verses: nine times in Genesis and once each in Luke, Hebrews and Jude. The same man also appears once more in 1 Chronicles 1:3 under the spelling "Henoch".
There's a catch, though. The Bible has two different men called Enoch, and three of those twelve mentions belong to the other one.
Every mention of Enoch in the Bible (KJV)
| Verse | Times named | Which Enoch |
|---|---|---|
| Genesis 4:17 | 2 | Son of Cain (and the city named after him) |
| Genesis 4:18 | 1 | Son of Cain |
| Genesis 5:18 | 1 | Son of Jared |
| Genesis 5:19 | 1 | Son of Jared |
| Genesis 5:21 | 1 | Son of Jared |
| Genesis 5:22 | 1 | Son of Jared |
| Genesis 5:23 | 1 | Son of Jared |
| Genesis 5:24 | 1 | Son of Jared |
| 1 Chronicles 1:3 | 1 (as "Henoch") | Son of Jared |
| Luke 3:37 | 1 | Son of Jared |
| Hebrews 11:5 | 1 | Son of Jared |
| Jude 1:14 | 1 | Son of Jared |
Counts can differ slightly between translations. Modern versions such as the NIV and ESV spell the name in 1 Chronicles 1:3 as "Enoch", so they have 13 mentions in 12 verses.
The other Enoch: Cain's son
The first Enoch in the Bible is the son of Cain. Cain even named a city after him:
And Cain knew his wife; and she conceived, and bare Enoch: and he builded a city, and called the name of the city, after the name of his son, Enoch.
— Genesis 4:17 (KJV)
That's all we're told about him. He's a different man from the famous Enoch, who comes from the line of Adam's son Seth.
Enoch who walked with God
When people ask about Enoch, they almost always mean this one: the son of Jared, the father of Methuselah, and one of only two people in the Bible who didn't die. (The other is Elijah, taken up in a whirlwind in 2 Kings 2:11.)
Genesis 5: the man God took
Genesis 5 is a list of births and deaths, with one refrain repeated again and again: "and he died". Enoch breaks the pattern.
And Enoch lived sixty and five years, and begat Methuselah: And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah three hundred years, and begat sons and daughters: And all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty and five years: And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.
— Genesis 5:21-24 (KJV)
Two details stand out. "Walked with God" is said of only one other person in Genesis: Noah (Genesis 6:9). And Enoch lived 365 years, far fewer than the men around him, but his son Methuselah went on to live 969 years, longer than anyone else in the Bible (Genesis 5:27).
1 Chronicles 1:3: in the family line
The Chronicler opens Israel's history with a bare list of names from Adam onward: "Henoch, Methuselah, Lamech". It's the same Enoch, spelled differently.
Luke 3:37: an ancestor of Jesus
Luke traces Jesus' family tree all the way back to Adam, and Enoch is in it:
Which was the son of Mathusala, which was the son of Enoch, which was the son of Jared, which was the son of Maleleel, which was the son of Cainan,
— Luke 3:37 (KJV)
Hebrews 11:5: a man of faith
Hebrews explains what "God took him" meant, and why:
By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.
— Hebrews 11:5 (KJV)
The very next verse gives the lesson: "without faith it is impossible to please him" (Hebrews 11:6).
Jude 1:14: Enoch the prophet
Jude, the second-to-last book of the Bible, quotes a prophecy of Enoch:
And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints,
— Jude 1:14 (KJV)
"Seventh from Adam" counts the generations: Adam, Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahalaleel, Jared, Enoch. Jude's quotation closely matches a line from the Book of Enoch (1 Enoch 1:9), an ancient Jewish writing that isn't part of most Bibles. That doesn't make the whole book Scripture, any more than Paul quoting Greek poets in Acts 17:28 makes their poems Scripture. See why Enoch isn't in the Bible and our 10 facts about the Book of Enoch.
What the verses add up to
For a man mentioned in so few verses, Enoch leaves a big mark. Everything the Bible says about him comes back to one idea: he lived close to God for three hundred years, in an age Jude calls "ungodly" (Jude 1:15), and God simply took him home.
It's still the best summary of a life anyone could ask for: "he pleased God".