5 min read

Abraham Sees the Ten Plagues and the Elect One at the End of Days

An unclean bird landed on the split carcasses and told Abraham to run before the fire took him. He stayed, and learned how long the age had left.

Curated by Arthur · Told by Maggid ·
Table of Contents
  1. The Bird That Came Down on the Carcasses
  2. The Angel Took the Robe Off Him
  3. The Picture Spread Out Under Him
  4. Ten Blows at the Twelfth Hour
  5. The Trumpet and the One With One Measure
Abraham Sees the Ten Plagues and the Elect One at the End of Days Click for full size

The Bird That Came Down on the Carcasses

Abraham had done all of it exactly as the angel said. The animals cut down the middle, the halves laid out facing each other on the high ground, the birds kept back and handed over. Now there was nothing to do but stand there until evening and wait for whatever was coming.

An unclean bird dropped out of the air onto the meat. He waved it off. It came back, and it spoke to him.

"What are you doing up here, Abraham, on the holy heights? Nobody eats here. Nobody drinks here. There is no food on this mountain for a man. The ones standing next to you burn everything with fire, and they will burn you up along with it. Leave the man you came with. Run. If you go any higher they will finish you."

Abraham turned to the angel beside him and asked what he was hearing.

"That is ungodliness," Iaoel said. "That is Azazel."

The Angel Took the Robe Off Him

Then the angel turned on the bird.

"Disgrace on you, Azazel. Abraham's portion is in heaven. Yours is on the earth. You picked the earth to keep your uncleanness in, so the Eternal made you live in it, and every lying spirit comes through you, and every rage and every trial that lands on the ungodly generations comes through you. The bodies of the righteous were never put in your hands. Get away from this man. You cannot turn him, because he is your enemy. And the robe that used to be yours up here has been set aside for him. The dying that was his has been handed over to you."

The bird went. Abraham stayed on the mountain, and the evening came, and the vision started.

The Picture Spread Out Under Him

He went up on the wings of a dove, past the firmament, and stopped where he could see everything at once.

What lay under him was not a landscape. It was a picture, and his own descendants were in it, and so was the ground where they would stand to worship, and that ground was burned and empty. God told him to count it up and look closer.

"How long is an hour of this age?" Abraham asked.

"Twelve. Twelve hours I have set for this ungodly age to run among the nations and in your seed. Until the end of the times it stays as you saw it."

Ten Blows at the Twelfth Hour

He watched the twelfth hour arrive.

"Before the age of the righteous begins to grow," God said, "my judgment comes down on the lawless nations, and it comes through the people of your seed, the ones I set apart for myself. In those days I bring ten plagues onto every creature on the earth. Misfortune. Disease. The groaning of the soul in its own grief. All of that, because of how they provoke me and what they do to what I made."

Some of Abraham's line came through it. Their number was kept secret, held back with God and told to nobody, and they were moving fast toward a place prepared for them beforehand, which was the same burned ground he had just been looking at in the picture.

The Trumpet and the One With One Measure

"Then I sound the trumpet out of the air," God said, "and I send my Elect One. All my power is in him, one measure of it. He calls my despised people back in from the nations."

The rest of what Abraham heard was fire. Fire for the ones who insulted that people and ruled over them for the length of this age. The men who covered God with mockery handed over to the mockery of the age coming, dropped into the fire below the ground, sent flying back and forth through the dark under the earth with no place to stop.

And underneath the sentence, something that was not a sentence.

"I was hoping they would come to me. That they would not love a strange god and praise him. That they would not hold onto someone they were never allotted to. They walked out on the mighty Lord instead."

Then the voice turned back to the man standing in it.

"See, Abraham, what you have seen. Hear what you have heard. Know what you have come to know. Go to your inheritance. I am with you forever."

He went back down to the plain, into the same body the bird had told him to save, and said nothing to anyone. Everything he had been shown was still in front of him and would take generations to arrive. Up above, folded away where he could not reach it yet, a robe was waiting that used to belong to something else.

MessiahEnd TimesRedemptionAbrahamJudgmentAzazel
← All myths

From the tradition

Sources

3 sources

The texts behind this telling. Some cards carry a translation of the source; others are our own retelling of it, and each card says which. Every card links out to the original.

Apocalypse of Abraham XXXIApocalypse of Abraham

Retold in our words. Read the original at the link below.G. H. Box and J. I. Landsman public-domain English translation (1918) · Public Domain

After the ten plagues, after the final convulsions of the dying age, God revealed to Abraham the moment everything would change.

"Then I will sound the trumpet out of the air and will send my Elect One, having in him all my power, one measure."

The Elect One. The Messiah. A title drawn from the prophet Isaiah (Isaiah 42:1), used throughout the visions of 1 Enoch, and here given its most concentrated description. "One measure" of all the divine attributes, a human being who reflected in miniature the totality of God's character. Not a supernatural angelic being like Metatron, but a divinely endowed man, full of the power of the Holy Spirit (Isaiah 11:1), sent by God at the appointed time.

"This one shall summon my despised people from the nations."

The ingathering of the exiles. The same hope expressed in the daily liturgy: "Sound the great horn for our freedom; lift up the ensign to gather our exiles, and gather us from the four corners of the earth."

"And I will burn with fire those who have insulted them and who have ruled over them in this age. I will give those who covered me with mockery to the scorn of the coming age. I have prepared them to be food for the fire of the underworld and for ceaseless flight through the air beneath the earth."

The punishment of the wicked was twofold: fire below and restless wandering above. Their bodies consumed by the worm of Azazel. Their spirits finding no rest until the judgment.

"For they shall decay in the body of the evil worm Azazel, and be burned with the fire of Azazel's tongue. For I had hoped that they would come to me, and not have loved and praised a strange god, and not have adhered to one for whom they were not allotted. But instead they forsook the mighty Lord."

Even in judgment, the note of grief. God had hoped. He had waited. They had chosen otherwise.

Full source
Apocalypse of Abraham XIIIApocalypse of Abraham

Retold in our words. Read the original at the link below.G. H. Box and J. I. Landsman public-domain English translation (1918) · Public Domain

Abraham did everything the angel commanded. He slaughtered the animals, divided them, and gave the portions to the angels who had appeared beside him. Iaoel took the birds. Abraham waited for the evening sacrifice.

Then an unclean bird swooped down upon the carcasses.

Abraham drove it away. But the bird spoke.

"What are you doing, Abraham, upon the holy Heights? No man eats or drinks here. There is no food for mortals in this place. These beings will consume everything with fire and burn you alive. Forsake the man who is with you and flee! If you ascend to the Heights, they will make an end of you."

Abraham turned to the angel. "What is this, my lord?"

"This is ungodliness," Iaoel said. "This is Azazel."

Then the angel addressed the fallen one directly, and his words were a sentence of cosmic judgment:

"Disgrace upon you, Azazel! Abraham's lot is in heaven, but yours is upon the earth. Because you chose and loved this world for the dwelling-place of your uncleanness, the Eternal Mighty Lord made you a dweller upon the earth. Through you comes every evil spirit of lies. Through you comes wrath and trials for the generations of ungodly men."

But God had drawn a line. "The Eternal Mighty One has not permitted the bodies of the righteous to be in your hand, so that the life of the righteous and the destruction of the unclean may be assured."

Iaoel's final words to Azazel were devastating: "Begone with shame from me. You cannot lead this man astray, because he is your enemy. The heavenly garment that was once yours has been set aside for him. And the mortality that was his has been transferred to you."

Azazel had traded his angelic glory for the earth. Abraham, the mortal idol-smasher, had inherited an angel's robe.

Full source
Apocalypse of Abraham XXIXApocalypse of Abraham

Retold in our words. Read the original at the link below.G. H. Box and J. I. Landsman public-domain English translation (1918) · Public Domain

Abraham asked again: "How long a time is an hour of the Age?"

God answered: "Twelve years have I ordained of this ungodly age to rule among the heathen and in your seed. Until the end of the times it shall be as you have seen. Reckon and understand and look into the picture."

The present age was the age of ungodliness, where the organized forces of evil were dominant, a world where Azazel held a share of God's heritage. But it had a fixed duration, measured in divine hours, and each hour was ticking toward a conclusion.

Before the age of the righteous could begin to grow, God declared, His judgment would come upon the lawless heathen through the agency of Abraham's own descendants.

"In those days I will bring upon all creatures of the earth ten plagues, through misfortune and disease and the sighing grief of their souls. This much will I bring upon the generations of men on account of the provocation and corruption of creation, whereby they provoke me."

Ten plagues mirroring Egypt but cast on a cosmic scale. Not liberation of one people from one empire, but the final reckoning of all creation before the dawn of the new age.

"And then shall righteous men of your seed be left, in the number which is kept secret by me, hastening in the glory of my Name to the place prepared beforehand for them, which you saw devastated in the picture."

The place was Jerusalem. Devastated in the vision of the Temple's destruction, but prepared for restoration. A remnant of the righteous would survive the plagues and gather there. Their number was fixed in advance, known only to God.

"They shall live and be established through sacrifices and gifts of righteousness and truth in the age of the righteous, and shall rejoice in me continually. They shall destroy those who destroyed them, and shall insult those who insulted them, and shall spit in the face of those who scorned them."

Then God spoke the final words of the cosmic vision directly to Abraham:

See, Abraham, what you have seen,
And hear what you have heard,
And take full knowledge of what you have come to know.
Go to your heritage.
And I am with you forever.

Full source