What do you mean when you say it "validates it?"
Well, let me put it in a way that I hope you'll understand, without getting too defensive, as you seem to be doing. The point of discussing the Book of Enoch at all has nothing to do with whether that book is a reliable source of doctrine. If a text had to be scripture to be valid, then you should not have read the news, today, and you never should have picked up a textbook or read letters from your mother. Valid text is not necessarily scripture, and non-scripture is not expected to live up to the same standard as scripture. It is not an authority for doctrine. Otherwise, I should scold you for not throwing away those letters from your mother.
The truth is, I never intended to get into a debate about the truthfulness (or untruthfulness) of the Book of Enoch. This is a fundamentalist forum, and we discuss the Bible as our only authority on matters of doctrine. But the fact is that the Bible, our authority, did reference the Book of Enoch at least twice. When your authority quotes an external source, then there's value to paying attention to that source, otherwise this is not really your authority, much as you like to think it is (and don't accuse me of
ad Hominem, because I am, in fact, directly challenging your assumption, not your person, whom I do not claim to know at all). If my professor, in the course of his teaching, quotes one of the students, then he validates that student. It doesn't mean that the student is as smart as the professor, and it doesn't mean that I need to schedule a lesson to be taught by that student. It does mean that the professor had a certain respect for that student and something that the student had said.
Now, to get back on topic. The subject at hand is the meaning of the term "Sons of God." As already delineated, we can either think of them as humans who follow God, or as angels. The human theory is, quite naturally, the one that best fits the modern mindset. I don't care which one fits the modern mindset. The angelic theory is the one that was widely understood over two thousand years ago, not just by a rogue Jewish sect, somewhere, but by mainstream Jews, so much so that it ended up not only being referenced indirectly in the New Testament through reference to the Book of Enoch, but it also was preserved by an entirely different sect of Jews when that same book was sealed up by the Essenes in the Dead Sea Scrolls. In fact, the entire Mediterranean seaboard believed, one way or another, that spiritual beings had descended to Earth and procreated with human women to create heroes. It's really not at all hard to divine which of the two beliefs was generally accepted at the time of Christ. They believed that the Sons of God were the Watchers of the Book of Enoch, which were angels.
Notice, again, that this has nothing to do with the accuracy of the Book of Enoch. I don't even care if the thing was written by a ten-year-old in his mother's basement on a rainy day. I don't even need to know the details of what's in it. I only need to know the theme, which is that fallen angels procreated with human women in the events leading to the Flood. It's a semantics issue, and nothing more. I need to know what the words "Sons of God" meant to the people who spoke the language, as close to the time of the writing of the Genesis account as possible. Those are the people who would know best what those words mean. Those people did, in fact, believe that the Sons of God were angels. That's a fact. Much as that notion runs against the modern mindset, I much prefer to use the definition known by those people than the one believed by the people of our time.
Again, let me reiterate my point so that we don't get into some senseless debate on the factual veracity of the Book of Enoch: that the Bible references the Book of Enoch does not mean that the Book of Enoch is infallible, inerrant or even reliable. It merely validates it, in the sense that it shows how people understood the events surrounding the Genesis account. If we say that Enoch was a completely made-up fable, and if I were to wholeheartedly agree with you, then my position on the matter would be equally strong as if the Book of Enoch were indisputably the Word of God. Either way, it shows what the people of Christ's time thought the words "Son of God," meant. There's no getting around it. You haven't said a single thing to rebut that.
So you believe at one point the earth did have 364 days in a year?
Not to get too off-topic, but I was reading an article in that old rag Nature, which purports to be scientific, that said that measurements of the Earth's rotation shows that it does, in fact, speed up and slow down from year to year, for no known reason, and in no predictable way, though the changes measured appear to be slight. I just thought that was interesting. Did you know that the ancient Greeks thought there were 360 days in a year, and that's why a circle has 360 degrees, with one degree for each day? Just a bit of trivia. I don't care the slightest bit how many days were in a year during the life of Enoch. By now I hope you see that it has nothing to do with the point of this discussion. I'm sorry I ever let you drag me into that one.
...I don't think you do either, btw. I just think you probably haven't read and understood the book.
Well, I certainly am glad that you were charitable enough not to assume that I was being deliberately misleading. I don't mind so much the assumption that I was ill-informed or confused as I would have chafed at the accusation that I was intentionally malicious.
I guess I spoke too soon. Apparently you think I'm malicious, too.
(Of course I speak in jest. I know you're only employing hard language for the purpose of ardently defending your position, for which I am grateful. I always prefer a spirited debate).
