Today’s topic is a bit of a personal one and deals with complex adult issues involving sexuality, sexual addiction, and spirituality (or what some might call a perversion of spirituality). It is intended for mature audiences only. If you have experienced sexual trauma in your life or currently have unhealthy/abnormal attitudes towards sex, it would be best for you to skip this article as it may only increase your unhealthy views or cause you to re-live sexual traumas. You have been warned.
The Original Sin
As you may have picked up from reading my earlier posts regarding the Watchers, I have questioned the origins of the Biblical story of the Garden of Eden and that of the so called “original sin”. Modern Christianity largely holds that the “original” sin was committed by Eve when she disobeyed God and ate from the tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. The punishment for this disobedience was that man (who apparently before this could live forever), would now be subject to death. In addition, he would have to labor for his food and work the ground himself. Furthermore, his partner (the woman), was punished with increased pain in childbirth (a seemingly odd punishment for a non-sexual crime).
We have already begun looking into the story of the Watchers, a mysterious group of beings only briefly mentioned in the official canon of books known as the Bible but for which many outside (or extra-biblical sources) expound upon. According to many Jewish and early “Christian” believers, the Watchers were the ones responsible for the “original” sin. That sin,specifically, was that a group of angelic beings known as the Watchers decided to come down into the physical world and have sexual relations with human women (with Eve perhaps being the first).
According to the Jewish historian Josephus (whom every student of early church history is arguably familiar with), there were three major groups (or divisions) of Jews that existed as early as 160 BCE (less than two hundred years before Jesus’ birth). One of those three major divisions of Jews were known as the Essenes and their beliefs were still well-known and common in the time of Jesus. I have already pointed out that one of the major books of “scripture” read by the Essenes was the Book of Enoch, a book in which our modern “church” didn’t officially reject until hundreds of years after Jesus died. I have also pointed to a few reasons I believe Jesus himself referred to the Book of Enoch as scripture in our modern Bibles and how several other books of the Bible make reference to the book of Enoch as well.
One of the things the book of Enoch made abundantly clear was the possible true reason for the Biblical flood recorded in the book of Genesis, as well as a clear explanation of some obscure verses about the “sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful and had sexual relations with them”. In other words, the book of Enoch (a major book of scripture by both Jews and Christians in the time of Jesus), made it clear that a group of angels in the heavenly realms had came down from heaven in the past and began having sexual relations with human women. This “sin” so so enraged God that he decided to destroy them and all their offspring in a global flood. Furthermore I want to remind you that, according to Josephus, this belief that angels had come down from heaven and had sexual relations with women was the COMMONLY held belief of many at the time early Christianity began.
During this time of the early pre-Christian era, a major schism began to arise between a group of Jews known as the Zadokites and that of the Essenes. This schism specifically related to the nature of the original sin and man’s responsibility to it. According to the book of the author I’m reading:
While the Zadokites believed evil could be held at bay by being faithful keepers of the cosmic order, the “Enochians” [or Essenes]…believed that the world was corrupted by an original sin of the Watchers, who had contaminated God’s creation by crossing the boundary between heaven and earth and by revealing secret knowledge to human beings, their hybrid offspring.
The Watchers: Lost Secrets of Ascension, Resurrection and Perfection, William Henry, location 2288
Furthermore, the two groups of Jews began to argue over the nature of angels with the Zadokites believing it was blasphemous to suggest that angels could ever be “evil” or turn to “evil” and the Essenes who believed that this was EXACTLY what had happened at the “fall”. The author explains:
The good Watchers, led by Michael, defeated the evil Watchers. The hybrid mortal bodies of their offspring were destroyed, but their immortal souls survived as evil spirits, says 1 Enoch 15:8-10. They continue to roam the earth, corrupting human beings and denying cosmic order. Humans are tools or instruments of the Watchers war on original order. The Enochians believe humans are victims of an evil that they have not caused and cannot resist…The boundary…has been been weakened by the frequent crossing of Watchers between the earthly and heavenly, holy and unholy, realms.
The Watchers: Lost Secrets of Ascension, Resurrection and Perfection, William Henry, location 2292
As you can see, this is a MAJOR schism indeed as one group believes that man is able to overcome “sin” and gain access to heaven through obedience while the other group believes man is simply outmatched by spiritual corruptors and incapable of defeating them on their own. Furthermore one group assigns blame to man (or woman) for the original sin while the other group blames the fallen watchers or angels for the corruption of man. To make matters more confusing, BOTH viewpoints are supported in some way or another by our modern Bible.
For example, our modern Bible tells us there is a group of rebellious angels who are being held in captivity awaiting a future day of judgement in which they will be punished for causing the fall of man. In addition, the book of Leviticus documents a religious ceremony preformed yearly on the “Day of Atonement” in which all of the sins of the people are placed on the head of a goat named Azazel which is then led out into the desert to die. Azazel is, according to the Book of Enoch, one of the angels in the Book of Enoch who led a group of angels in the rebellion to come have sexual relations with women. In other words, even in our modern Bibles we see evidence that all sin is blamed on the fall of the watchers. Please note that on the Day of Atonement two goats are selected. One goat is for the “Lord” and the other goat is for “Azazel”. The sins of the people are all then symbolically placed on Azazel, NOT the lamb of God ! But I digress. All of this supports the belief system of the Essenes. I would be happy to provide verses for this belief in the Bible if I’m challenged to provide them.
However, the other belief system can be found in the Bible as well such as the belief that man can achieve immortality by living a “sinless” life in obedience to the law. Arguably, most of modern Christianity still believes man is incapable of keeping the law perfectly and thus must accept the perfect life of Jesus in their place but the notion that one can largely keep sin at by being “good’ and “obedient” is still prevalent in modern Christianity.
So who is Azazel and what did he do? Let’s examine a bit further.
Azazel Teaches Women the Art of Makeup and Seduction
According to the Book of Enoch, Azazel himself was responsible for convincing a group of “watchers” to come down and have sexual relations with human women. He is also specifically credited for teaching women how to use make-up and jewelry to seduce men (and presumably angels). Here for example is from the Book of Enoch:
And Azazel taught men to make swords and knives and shields and breastplates; and made known to them the metals [of the earth] and the art of working them; and bracelets and ornaments; and the use of antimony and the beautifying of the eyelids; and all kinds of costly stones and all colouring tinctures. And there arose much godlessness, and they committed fornication, and they were led astray and became corrupt in all their ways. The corruption brought on by Azazel and the Grigori degrades the human race, and the four archangels (Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, and Uriel) “saw much blood being shed upon the earth and all lawlessness being wrought upon the earth […] The souls of men [made] their suit, saying, “Bring our cause before the Most High; […] Thou seest what Azazel hath done, who hath taught all unrighteousness on earth and revealed the eternal secrets which were in heaven, which men were striving to learn.” “
1 Enoch 2:8
This perhaps is the reason Azazel is assigned responsibility for the sins of man during the annual “Day of Atonement” recorded in the Book of Leviticus. Without reading the Book of Enoch we have NO idea who Azazel is or why. No where else in the Bible is it explained. Without Enoch we are utterly confused why Azazel is responsible for ALL the sins of Israel. Tossing this book out takes away all of the clear and hard to misunderstand meaning behind Azazel and his role in the fall of man.
I have to digress here for a moment for a VERY controversial side tangent. One of the major “sins” Azazel is accredited with is teaching women the use of make-up and adornment and yet, we see in the accepted canon of books known as the Bible that Yahweh himself is described as using make-up and adornment to make his bride beautiful to the point of making her sexually attractive to other men and turning her into a proverbial “whore”. This is important to discuss because in the Gnostic view of things, Yahweh himself is not a “good” god but rather one of the “gods” not unlike Azazel himself.
The following is an allegory from our modern Bibles depicting how God (Yahweh) took for himself a very young bride (Israel) and made her his wife.
8 “Then I passed by you and saw you, and behold, [a]you were at the time for love; so I spread My [b]garment over you and covered your nakedness. I also swore an oath to you and entered into a covenant with you so that you became Mine,” declares the Lord God. 9 “Then I bathed you with water, washed off your blood from you, and anointed you with oil. 10 I also clothed you with colorfully woven cloth and put sandals of [c]fine leather on your feet; and I wrapped you with fine linen and covered you with silk. 11 I adorned you with jewelry, put bracelets on your wrists, and a necklace around your neck. 12 I also put a ring in your nose, earrings in your ears, and a beautiful crown on your head. 13 So you were adorned with gold and silver, and your dress was of fine linen, silk, and colorfully woven cloth. You ate fine flour, honey, and oil; so you were exceedingly beautiful and advanced to royalty. 14 Then your fame spread among the nations on account of your beauty, for it was perfect because of My splendor which I bestowed on you,” declares the Lord God.15 “But you trusted in your beauty and became unfaithful because of your fame, and you poured out your [d]obscene practices on every passer-by to whom it might be tempting. 16 You took some of your clothes, made for yourself [e]high places of various colors, and committed prostitution on them, which should not come about nor happen. 17 You also took your beautiful [f]jewels made of My gold and of My silver, which I had given you, and made for yourself male images so that you might commit prostitution with them. 18 Then you took your colorfully woven cloth and covered them, and offered My oil and My incense before them. 19 Also My bread which I gave you, fine flour, oil, and honey with which I fed you, [g]you would offer before them for a soothing aroma; so it happened,” declares the Lord God. 20 “Furthermore, you took your sons and daughters whom you had borne to Me and sacrificed them to [h]idols to be devoured. Were your obscene practices a trivial matter? 21 You slaughtered My children and offered them to [i]idols by making them pass through the fire.
Ezekiel 8:15-21
Later, in the book of Ezekiel (chapter 23), we are told also that God’s bride particularly liked well-endowed lovers who are described as lovers who’s “genital’s were like donkeys and emissions like horses”. In other words, his bride liked the big D!
Spiritual Adultery
While it is understood that the nation of Israel is not literally a woman and thus she did not literally chase after the big dick, I believe the writers of the Bible wanted to make the connection that to God, worshiping of other gods is just like a woman cheating on her husband. To god, it feels the same way. In fact, God even commanded one of his prophets (Hosea) to marry a prostitute and every time she cheated on him God commanded him to take her back again. I believe the “object lesson” was that God himself feels as if his spiritual wife Israel has cheated on him over and over and yet he keeps taking her back. Perhaps God wanted to drive the point home by having a prophet experience what it’s like to be cheated on over and over.
Sexual Addiction and Human Nature?
The story of the watchers really messed me up as a young man. On a personal level, I already struggled with sexual addiction from a young age. Learning the possibility that the very first sin might have been sexual in nature (i.e. eating the “forbidden fruit” which today still suggests adultery) certainly didn’t help. In fact, there is an entire line of Christian theology called the “serpent seed doctrine” which teaches that an angel impregnated Eve and that her child Cain was “marked” with black skin to indicate that his father was not Adam, but rather “the devil” thus leading to the first interracial coupling in history. My coming to the realization that MANY Jews and Christians once believed that angels who actually lived with and knew God personally still chose to give up their place in heaven to come down to have sex with women, REALLY screwed with my mind. If angels who KNOW better still can’t resist women, how can I (a mere “mortal”) be expected to resist? Reading how Lot impregnating both his teenage daughters on different occassions didn’t help. Reading how King David lusted after another man’s wife (Bathsheeba), had an affair with her and got her pregnant behind her husbands back, and then sent her husband off to the front lines to be murdered while simultaneously being called “a man after God’s own heart,” REALLY didn’t help. And of course the descriptions of Israel lusting after the big dick didn’t help. And then you have the New Testament with the so-called “apostle” Paul telling us that if, even as a believer, we find ourselves continuing to sin when we WANT to do good that it’s no longer our fault but rather “sin living in us,” well, let’s just say I struggled with impure thoughts my entire upbringing.
If the Essenes were correct, mankind has no real chance of resisting “sin”. The sexual sins of the watchers are the REAL “fall” we are facing and our battle (as Paul says) is not with flesh and blood but with the spiritual beings who have corrupted this world. If we are being ‘tempted” by beings who lived with God and STILL chose to come down to have sex with women how can we as mortals who have never seen God be expected to resist the temptations being offered by spiritual beings? Of course for the Christian, the answer is Jesus Christ, but that’s a topic I’m not going to tackle at this time.
Today I am more eastern leaning in terms of spirituality but the notion of sex (and pleasures of the world) still resonate with Buddhist teaching as well for it teaches essentially that we are all spiritual beings but that we have come into this physical world for some reason and are now trapped here due to our continual lusts and desires. Because we WANT and DESIRE experiences here on earth we find our spiritual selves trapped in the attachment to our physical world and the physical pleasures this world has to offer.