“And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.” - Genesis 5:24
“Then the Lord Jesus, after he spoke to them, was taken up into heaven and took his seat at the right hand of God.” - Mark 16:15–20
Enoch as one who "walked faithfully with God; then he was no more, because God took him away”
Entering Heaven Alive
THE ASCENSION — 40 days after Easter
- Jesus leads them out to Bethany / the Mount of Olives. He lifts his hands and blesses them. While blessing them, he is taken up, and a cloud receives him out of their sight (Luke 24:50-51 / Acts 1:9)
- Two men in white — "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go" (Acts 1:10-11)
- The disciples return to Jerusalem with great joy. They remain continually in the Temple, praising God (Luke 24:52-53)
⁷For as Heaven and earth become one, even the real world will vanish from your sight. ⁸The end of the world is not its destruction, but its translation into Heaven. ⁹The reinterpretation of the world is the transfer of all perception to knowledge. [CE T-11.VIII.6:7-9]
The fulfillment of the Kingdom, the translation of the world
Ascension - Jesus ascends into heaven in the presence of His disciples.
Assumption
The Books of Kings describes the prophet Elijah being taken towards "shamayim" in a whirlwind, but the word can mean either heaven as the abode of God, or the sky (as the word "heavens" does in modern English)
In Arthurian literature, Sir Galahad is returning to Camelot after taking the Holy Grail to Sarras when he is visited by Joseph of Arimathea and is carried into heaven by angels.
Entering heaven alive (called by various religions "ascension", "assumption", or "translation") is a belief held in various religions. Since death is the normal end to an individual's life on Earth and the beginning of the afterlife, entering heaven without dying first is considered exceptional and usually a sign of a deity's special recognition of the individual's piety.[1]
In the Hebrew Bible, there are two figures – Enoch and Elijah – who are said to have entered heaven alive, but both wordings are subject of debate. Genesis 5:24 says "Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, for God took him," but it does not state whether he was alive or dead nor where God took him. The Books of Kings describes the prophet Elijah being taken towards the heavens (Hebrew: שָׁמַיִם, romanized: šāmayim) in a whirlwind, but the word can mean either heaven as the abode of God or the sky (as the word "heavens" does in modern English).[citation needed]
According to the post-biblical Midrash, eight people went to (or will go to) heaven (also referred to as the Garden of Eden and paradise) alive:[2]
- Enoch, Noah's great grandfather (Genesis 5:22–24)
- Elijah (2 Kings 2:11)
- Serah, daughter of Asher, son of Jacob (midrash Yalkut Shimoni, Yechezkel 367)
- Eliezer, the servant of Abraham who chose Rebecca to be Isaac's wife
- Hiram I, king of Tyre, who helped Solomon build the first temple
- Ebed-Melech, the Ethiopian
- Jaabez, the son of Judah ha-Nasi, who was editor of the Mishnah
- Pharaoh's daughter, sometimes called Bithiah
- Four Rabbis Visited Heaven. Four entered the orchard: Ben Azzai, Ben Zoma, Acher (i.e., Elisha ben Avuya), and Rabbi Akiva. One looked and died. One looked and was harmed. One looked and cut down the trees. And one went up in peace and went down in peace.
In Mandaeism, the Left Ginza mentions that Shitil (Seth), the son of Adam, was taken alive to the World of Light without a masiqta (death mass).[22]
This site is traditionally associated with the biblical account of Christ's ascension, described in the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles, which state that Jesus led his disciples to Bethany, on the Mount of Olives, where he blessed them before being taken up into heaven. The rock is venerated as the last earthly point touched by Jesus. According to tradition, the left footprint was removed during the Middle Ages and is now located in the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount.
Apotheosis
To be “Spirited away”
Library of Light Edition 1.0 — Last revised: April 2026
Expanded Study: Ascension and Enthronement
The Ascension in Luke and Acts
Luke ends his Gospel with the Ascension and begins Acts with it, making the event the hinge between the life of Yeshua and the life of the apostolic community.
Acts says that after forty days of appearances and teaching about the Kingdom, Yeshua leads the disciples to the Mount of Olives. He is lifted up and a cloud receives him from their sight.
The cloud is biblical theophany imagery:
- the cloud of Sinai,
- the cloud of the wilderness,
- the cloud filling the Tabernacle and Temple,
- the cloud of the Transfiguration,
- the cloud associated with the Son of Man in Daniel.
Ascension is therefore not simply “flying upward.” It is entry into the divine sphere and heavenly kingship.
“Why Do You Stand Looking Into Heaven?”
Acts places two figures in white beside the disciples:
“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven?” — Acts 1:11, RSV
The disciples are immediately redirected from passive staring toward mission and expectation.
Ascension is not an invitation to abandon the earth. It marks the transition by which the disciples must now embody what they have received.
Psalm 110 and the Right Hand of God
The New Testament repeatedly interprets Christ’s exaltation through Psalm 110:
“Sit at my right hand.” — Psalm 110:1, RSV
To sit at the right hand of God is royal enthronement language.
The Ascension therefore completes the kingship paradox of the Passion:
thorn-crown → Cross → Resurrection → heavenly throne.
The mocked King is revealed as the enthroned Christ.
Daniel 7 and the Son of Man
The Ascension also resonates with Daniel 7, where “one like a son of man” comes with the clouds before the Ancient of Days and receives dominion, glory, and kingdom.
During his trial Yeshua invokes this imagery precisely when he appears most powerless.
Ascension reveals the other side of that saying: the condemned Son of Man is vindicated and enthroned.
The Mount of Olives
Acts locates the Ascension at the Mount of Olives.
This mountain already gathers many moments of the final Gospel drama:
- Yeshua’s teaching,
- the Olivet Discourse,
- Gethsemane,
- arrest,
- and now Ascension.
The mountain of agony becomes the mountain of exaltation.
The Ascension Rock
Later Christian tradition identified a particular site on the Mount of Olives as the place of Ascension. A stone traditionally said to bear the imprint of Yeshua’s foot became an object of pilgrimage.
Whether or not such a physical trace can be historically established, the tradition expresses the incarnational intuition that the one who enters heaven is the same one who walked upon the earth.
Ascension and Absence
The Ascension creates a paradox.
Yeshua is no longer present to the disciples in the ordinary visible way, yet the New Testament presents his presence as becoming more universal, not less.
Matthew ends with:
“I am with you always.” — Matthew 28:20, RSV
The visible teacher departs; the indwelling and Spirit-mediated presence begins.
Ascension and the Human Vocation
Traditional Christianity does not understand the Ascension as only something that happens to Yeshua.
Humanity itself is carried into the divine presence in him.
The Incarnation moved:
God toward humanity.
The Ascension completes the arc:
humanity toward God.
This is one reason the event became central to Christian ideas of theosis / deification.
Ascension in Eastern Christianity
Eastern hymnography treats Ascension as both departure and promise. Christ ascends in glory while assuring the disciples that the Holy Spirit will come.
Iconography often places Christ above in a mandorla, carried or attended by angels, with Mary and the apostles below.
Mary’s central stillness frequently contrasts with the apostles’ movement and astonishment.
The Ten Days of Waiting
Ascension does not immediately produce Pentecost.
There is an interval of approximately ten days in which the disciples return to Jerusalem and wait.
Acts emphasizes that they devote themselves to prayer with the women, Mary the mother of Yeshua, and his brothers.
The pattern is important:
promise → waiting → prayer → descent of the Spirit.
The community does not manufacture Pentecost. It prepares and waits.
Translation
Your use of translation is especially apt as a symbolic term.
In biblical and esoteric vocabulary, translation suggests passage from one mode of existence into another without simple annihilation.
Ascension may therefore be contemplated not as escape from creation but as the translation of embodied life into glorified participation in God.