Elijah and Enoch went to heaven, what does the Bible say?

About Elijah

Furthermore, Christ’s resurrection is said to be “a guarantee to all men” that God will resurrect others. (Acts 17:31; 24:15) This would not be true if God had been resurrecting righteous men to heaven all through the preceding centuries.

How, then, are we to understand the Bible account about the prophet Elijah, which reads: “As they [Elijah and Elisha] were walking along, speaking as they walked, why, look! a fiery war chariot and fiery horses, and they proceeded to make a separation between them both; and Elijah went ascending in the windstorm to the heavens.” (2 Ki. 2:11) Did Elijah actually go into the heavens of God? Or did he die?

We have the words of God’s greatest prophet, Jesus Christ, who resided in the heavens with his Father for untold centuries prior to his coming to earth. He said: “No man has ascended into heaven but he that descended from heaven, the Son of man.” (John 3:13) Speaking of John the Baptist, Jesus said: “Among those born of women there has not been raised up a greater than John the Baptist; but a person that is a lesser one in the kingdom of the heavens is greater than he is.” (Matt. 11:11) Accordingly, Elijah, not being greater than John, could not be in heaven.

What, then, were the “heavens” into which Elijah was taken by the windstorm? These were the physical heavens, the atmosphere, the “expanse,” also called “Heaven” at Genesis 1:6-8. A windstorm could exist only in this atmospheric expanse, not in the spirit realm of Jehovah’s heavenly presence. Elijah was carried up out of Elisha’s sight by the windstorm.

The Bible does not say that Elijah died on that occasion. As a matter of fact, Elijah was still alive and active as a prophet at least five years later, apparently over in the territory of Judah. The Bible records that Elijah wrote to Jehoram, king of Judah, a few years after he was taken away in a whirlwind.

Note the order of events recorded in the Bible. Elijah's final act is recorded in the reign of Ahaziah, king of Israel, when Elijah told the king Ahaziah that he would die for his sins (1 Kings 1:3-17). Ahaziah's reign lasted only about one year, around 850 BC.

Jehoram proved to be a wicked king, leading the nation of Judah into rebellion against the commandments of God. A few years after Jehoram's reign began, and a few years after Elijah's departure, Jehoram received a letter from Elijah warning him of the dire consequences for the king because of his sins. This letter is found in 2 Chronicles 21:12-15.

The letter proves that the prophet Elijah was still alive and on earth many years after he was driven out by a whirlwind and replaced by Elisha. Since God had chosen Elisha to replace Elijah, he bodily transferred Elijah to another place, where he continued to live for at least some years. Further evidence that Elijah did not die when he was taken to 'heaven' is the fact that Elisha, his servant and successor, did not serve the customary period of mourning for his master at that time. -Post Samuel 19:1; compare 1 Chronicles 7:22; 2 Chronicles 35:24.

About Enoch

What about Enoch, the seventh in line from Adam? Of him, the Bible says: “Enoch kept walking with the true God. Then he was no more, for God took him.” (Gen. 5:24) Enoch as a prophet of Jehovah foretold God’s coming with his myriads of angels to execute judgment against the ungodly. (Jude 14, 15) Persecution was likely brought against him because of his prophesying. However, God did not permit his opposers to kill Enoch. Instead God “took him,” evidently meaning that He cut short Enoch’s life at an age far below that of most of his contemporaries. It appears that, as in the case of Moses’ body, Jehovah disposed of Enoch’s body, for “he was nowhere to be found.”​—Heb. 11:5; Deut. 34:5, 6; Jude 9.

So, in view of Jesus’ clear statement at John 3:13, Enoch was not taken to the heaven of God’s residence. He died, as the apostle Paul, after naming Enoch and other ancient faithful witnesses of God, makes clear in saying: “In faith all these died, although they did not get the fulfillment of the promises, but they saw them afar off and welcomed them and publicly declared that they were strangers and temporary residents in the land.” (Heb. 11:13) These men knew that their reward was far in the future. The prophets of old knew that their Messianic prophecies did not apply to themselves, but had fulfillment later on. Hence, the apostle Peter says to those who are footstep followers of Jesus Christ the heavenly Forerunner: “Concerning this very salvation [promised to Christ’s joint heirs and being a heavenly hope] a diligent inquiry and a careful search were made by the prophets [including Enoch and Elijah] who prophesied about the undeserved kindness meant for you. They kept on investigating what particular season or what sort of season the spirit in them was indicating concerning Christ when it was bearing witness beforehand about the sufferings for Christ and about the glories to follow these. It was revealed to them that, not to themselves, but to you, they were ministering the things that have now been announced to you through those who have declared the good news to you.”​—1 Pet. 1:10-12.

Peter, speaking to the assembled Jews on the day of Pentecost, shortly after Jesus’ resurrection, said of the faithful King David, “a man agreeable to [Jehovah’s] heart”: “Actually David did not ascend to the heavens, but he himself says, ‘Jehovah said to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand, until I place your enemies as a stool for your feet.””’ (Acts 13:22; 2:34, 35) Likewise, Elijah and Enoch, along with others, are in the grave, awaiting the Lord Jesus Christ’s action in putting his enemies under his feet by destroying them. (Acts 2:29) The glorious enthroned Christ will then resurrect these faithful men from the dead, making them “princes in all the earth.” (Ps. 45:16; Rev. 20:11-13) These trustworthy men will work well with the heavenly King to administer righteousness and justice in the earth.

Annotation

The Book of Enoch seems to say that he became the archangel Metatron after the rapture, but this is not true, because it is highly possible that the Book of Enoch itself has been falsified. But there are certainly some passages that are informative. So, if Enoch's rapture is true, then Jesus' statement that no one has ever been raised to heaven could be taken to imply that there is no such person among the generation of those living in Jesus' time. Since Enoch corresponds to the seventh generation from Adam, it can be understood as a template for the rapture that will occur around the time of the seventh millennium, after the six thousand years of the age in which we live have passed.