Metatron- Hebrew/Jewish AngelAngel"Prince of the Presence"

Enoch Walked with God

Genesis records a break in its genealogy of the patriarchs. Each entry follows the same formula: a man lived, fathered sons, and died. Enoch son of Jared breaks the pattern: "Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him." He did not die. God took him, and Genesis says nothing more.

3 Enoch tells what happened next. God elevated Enoch above all the hosts of heaven and transformed him into the angel Metatron. His flesh became flame. His sinews became fire. His bones turned to burning coals, his eyes to torches, his hair to blazing light. God enlarged his body until it matched the length and breadth of the world. He was given seventy-two wings and 365,000 eyes, each blazing like the sun. A crown inscribed with the letters by which heaven and earth were created was placed on his head, and the radiance streaming from it dimmed the sun and moon and stars.

God said: "From now on his name shall be Metatron, and I have appointed him as prince and chief over all the princes of my kingdoms." He was given seventy names, one for each nation of the world. One of his titles was "the Lesser YHWH," drawn from Exodus 23, where God speaks of an angel who bears His own name: "Beware of him and obey his voice, for my name is in him." The man who walked with God now stood beside God's throne.

Sixty Lashes of Fire

Metatron sits. In the divine presence, where all other angels stand, Metatron is permitted a throne of his own because his task requires it: he records the deeds of Israel, every merit and every sin, writing ceaselessly in the celestial court.

This seated position is what led the sage Elisha ben Avuyah to ruin. The Talmud in Hagigah 15a tells how Elisha ascended to the heavenly realm and saw Metatron sitting and writing. An angel, seated in God's presence, writing as though he held authority. Elisha concluded there must be two powers in heaven. He left the faith and never returned. They stopped calling him by his name. He became Aher, "the Other."

To prevent such confusion again, Metatron was given sixty lashes of fire. The angel nearest to God was struck to make clear he was not God.

The Dead Children

Metatron has a counterpart: Sandalphon, identified with the prophet Elijah. Enoch was taken without dying; Elijah was carried up in a chariot of fire. The two men who escaped death became the two angels stationed at opposite ends of the celestial realm. Metatron receives prayers ascending from earth. Sandalphon weaves them into crowns for the divine throne.

But the Talmud in Avodah Zarah 3b gives Metatron a smaller duty. He teaches Torah to children who died before their time. He gathers them in a corner of paradise and gives them the education their brief lives denied them. The angel whose crown dims the sun sits with dead children and teaches them the law.

Through the Palaces

The Hekhalot literature preserves accounts of mystics who invoked Metatron's names during visionary ascent through the seven heavens. At each palace gate, angelic guards demanded identification. The ascending soul recited his names and titles as passwords. Without them, the gates stayed sealed. With them, even the fiercest guardian stepped aside.

His name appeared on protective amulets throughout late antiquity and the medieval period, particularly those guarding pregnant women and newborns. The Sefer Raziel HaMalakh invokes him in formulas for protection, healing, and wisdom. A man who once walked the earth as Enoch now had his name written on clay and parchment to ward off evil from cradles.