Genesis 5:24

Summary

The verse states that Enoch walked with God, and then "he was not," because God took him. It marks a departure from the standard death-formula that closes the other genealogical entries in Genesis 5.

Key words

• va-yit'hallekh ("and he walked about", H1980I) — hithpael (reflexive/iterative) stem of halakh, prefixed with the narrative vav; the reflexive form suggests a repeated or habitual "walking," not a single act.
• chanokh ("Enoch", H2585H) — proper name, masculine, subject of the verb.
• et-ha'Elohim ("with the God", H0854 + H9009 + H0430G) — preposition et ("with") plus the article ha on Elohim, indicating accompaniment with "the God" as the object of the walking.
• eiNEnnu ("he was not", H0369 + H9043) — construct-form negative existential noun eiN with pronominal suffix "him/his," literally "there-is-not-of-him," i.e., "his non-existence [occurred]."
• laqach ("he took", H3947G) — qal perfect of laqach, a completed action; its subject is Elohim ("God", H0430G), repeated at the end of the verse.

What the text says

The sentence is built in three short clauses joined by vav. First, va-yit'hallekh chanokh et-ha'Elohim — "and Enoch walked with the God" — uses the hithpael of halakh (H1980I), a form that in Biblical Hebrew often carries a durative or habitual nuance ("walked about," "went back and forth"), distinct from the simple qal "he walked." The object of this walking is marked by et ("with", H0854), not a spatial preposition, so the verb describes accompaniment rather than motion toward a destination.

The second clause, ve-einennu ("and he was not", H0369 + H9043), is not a normal finite verb but the negative existential particle ein bearing a pronominal suffix, literally "there is no him." This construction states an absence rather than describing an event directly — the text does not use the verb "to die" (as it does for other figures in the chapter), but instead reports his non-presence.

The third clause explains the cause with ki ("for/that", H3588A): laqach oto Elohim — "God took him." The verb laqach (H3947G) is qal perfect, indicating a completed action performed by Elohim, who is both the object of the "walking" earlier and the subject of the "taking" here, framing the whole verse around Enoch's relation to Elohim.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders va-yit'hallekh ... et-ha'Elohim as euērestēsen Henōch tō theō ("Enoch was well-pleasing to God"), shifting the verb from "walking with" to "pleasing," and it uses ouch heuristo ("was not found") for einennu, and metethēken ("transferred/transposed") for laqach. The Vulgate follows the Hebrew more closely with ambulavit cum Deo ("he walked with God") and tulit eum Deus ("God took him"), matching halakh and laqach respectively, while rendering einennu as non apparuit ("he did not appear/was not seen").