No one has ascended into heaven, but he who descended out of heaven, the Son of Man, who is in heaven.   Yochanan/John 3:13

no one/no man - G3762 - oo-dice'

Including the feminine .. and the neuter

NOT EVEN ONE (man, woman or thing), that is, none, nobody, nothing.

This verse is absolute in its intent. NO "man woman or thing" ascended to heaven before Messiah!

That necessarily has to mean that neither Enoch nor Elijah were taken to heaven before Messiah. Regarding Elijah, please see my programs on that topic.

Regarding Enoch, here is what the Scripture says:

"Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him." Gen 5:24

By faith, Enoch was taken away, so that he wouldn’t see death, and he was not found, because God translated him. For he has had testimony given to him that before his translation he had been well pleasing to God. Heb 11:5

Here we are told that Enoch did not "see death" because "God translated him." Many assume this means he was "translated" to heaven, but the verse doesn't say heaven.

What does "translated" mean?

Strongs defines the Greek word here as follows:

translated - G3346 - met-at-ith'-ay-mee

"to transfer, that is, (literally) transport, (by implication) exchange, (reflexively) change sides"

translate - G3346 - metatithēmi

1) to transpose (two things, one of which is put in place of the other)
1a) to transfer
1b) to change
1c) to transfer one’s self or suffer one’s self to be transferred
1c1) to go or pass over
1c2) to fall away or desert from one person or thing to another

Notice that the word involves being transported to another place, and also involves the idea of moving from one place to another by some sort of exchange. It also involves falling away "from one person or thing to another."

I would note here that this sort of change is exactly what will happen for those in Messiah who survive until his appearing. Paul said:

Behold, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last shofar. For the shofar will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed.
1 Cor 15:51-52

Here Paul is speaking about those who will be living at the "last trump/shofar" - "We will not fall asleep [in death]." While those dead in Messiah will be "raised" we who survive until then "will be changed" without dying first!

This is the future event Hebrews is talking about when it says that Enoch was "translated."

The JFB Commentary observes this meaning of the word, saying:

"Implying a sudden removal (the same Greek as in Gal_1:6) from mortality without death to immortality: such a CHANGE as shall pass over the living at Christ’s coming." (1Co_15:51, 1Co_15:52). (JFB Commentary)

Since this change will occur at "the last trump" that has to be where Enoch was "translated" to! In other words, Enoch did not go to heaven. He was translated directly through time to the "last trump" to be "changed" with the other believers that will then be alive at the resurrection of the overcomers, all of whom will then put on immortality to be with Messiah forever after. This explanation has the benefit of agreeing with Scripture in all respects, without doing violence to the clear statement of John 3:13.
 

From Eliyahu

This week we learn that the Chariot of YHWH was at the Temple for a reason - a very scary reason. To destroy the defiled Temple AND all of those who defiled it! This was to be carried out upon the evil-doers without mercy. Six avenging angels were directed to oversee the slaughter. Preceding them was a man in linen with a writer's ink horn with pen at his side. His job was to put a mark "on the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry over all the abominations" of Jerusalem. These were the remnant. Only these ones who received the mark would be delivered from the merciless destruction that was to immediately follow the marking work. This amazing prophetic vision has great importance today, during this present judgment period. Do you have the mark?

Shalom,

Eliyahu ben David
www.tsiyon.org