Latter Day Saint (module)
LDS Module — The City of Enoch / Zion Translated
The City of Enoch / Zion translated
A distinctive LDS Enoch motif with no exact parallel in 1 Enoch: Enoch builds a city of righteous people called Zion; the entire city is "translated" — taken bodily into heaven — and continues to exist as a heavenly community, expected to return in the Last Days.
Primary sources (LDS)
- Moses 7:18–21 — the city is established; "the Lord came and dwelt with his people... and the city of Enoch was caught up... and it was called Zion."
- Moses 7:62–64 — Zion will return in the Last Days, joining the New Jerusalem.
- D&C 38:4 — "Zion which I have taken unto mine own bosom."
- D&C 45:11–14 — Enoch's city held in reserve for the Last Days.
Read it (LDS Gospel Library)
What it does (in LDS theology)
- Models a society of "one heart and one mind" with "no poor among them" (Moses 7:18) — a normative pattern for the gathering of Zion in the latter days.
- Identifies Enoch as the foremost antediluvian builder of consecrated community.
- Connects to LDS eschatology: the literal return of Enoch's city is awaited.
1 Enoch parallel (or lack thereof)
1 Enoch describes Enoch's removal to heaven (esp. 1 En 70–71) but does not describe a translated city. The community of "the elect" appears in the Apocalypse of Weeks and elsewhere as an eschatological community, not an antediluvian translated city.
The "no exact parallel" can be read as evidence that:
- Moses 7 received material not preserved in 1 Enoch (Nibley, LDS view), or
- Moses 7 develops antediluvian sociology in a way that 1 Enoch's apocalyptic genre never had occasion to (critical view).
See also
Entertainment / individual-study posture.