Demonic · The Watchers · c. 400 BCE
Azazel
Also called Azaz'el, Aza'zel · also recorded as Scapegoat, עזאזל, عزازيل (per Wikidata)
The scapegoat's destination in Leviticus, and the Watcher who taught weapons and cosmetics in 1 Enoch. Translators cannot even agree whether the word is a name, a place or an abstraction.
Well sourced
Leviticus 16 sends one goat 'to the LORD' and the other 'to Azazel'. Translators have never agreed what the word is: a place (a rocky cliff), an abstraction ('complete removal'), or a proper name — a demon of the wilderness receiving a counterpart offering. 1 Enoch settles firmly on the last and makes him the chief offender of the Watchers, who taught men to make swords and shields and women to paint their eyes, so that 'the whole earth has been corrupted through the works that were taught by Azazel: to him ascribe all sin.' Raphael is sent to bind him hand and foot in the desert of Dudael. Two irreconcilable readings have to sit side by side in his entry, and neither can be dropped.
Identity
Where does the name come from?
What the name means
Disputed at the root. Read as a place ('rugged cliff'), an abstraction ('complete removal'), or a proper name. The ancient translators already disagreed.
Where it was actually worshipped
The wilderness, by definition — the goat is sent away from settlement.
A figure with temples and a figure that only ever existed on a page are different kinds of thing, and the difference is easy to lose once both are entries in a list.
At a glance
Vitals
Vitals
Also known as
- First attested
- Hebrew Bible & Deuterocanon · c. 900–100 BCE
- Rank
- Chief Watcher
- Order
- The Watchers
- Base of operations
- The wilderness, by definition — the goat is sent away from settlement.
- Era
- c. 400 BCE
- Traditions
- Jewish, Islamic, Enochian, Folk & Demonological
Traits
- Domain
- The wilderness, forbidden craft, weapons, adornment
- Traditional form
- A goat-like figure, or a Watcher bound beneath rocks
Stats
Known connections
Chain of command
Identified with
4 attributed
What is it said to do?
Where these powers cluster
The 4 offices attributed to Azazel, grouped by kind. Segment width is the share of powers falling in each category.
A bar dominated by one colour means a specialist; an even spread means a figure the sources credit with almost anything.
- knowledge2
- malefic2
knowledge
- Teaches Herbs & Stones1 Enoch (The Book of Enoch)
Antimony, dyes and the beautifying of the eyelids.
- Teaches Handicrafts1 Enoch (The Book of Enoch)
Swords, knives, shields and breastplates.
malefic
2 texts
Which texts say so, and where do they disagree?
When these texts were written
Each dot is one of the 2 texts that names Azazel, placed at that text's approximate date.
A wide spread means the figure was carried across many centuries and traditions; a tight cluster means a single period produced the whole record.
2 texts spanning roughly 200 years
Where the texts differ
- Rank: given as Uncertain — place, abstraction or entity; Chief of the Watchers
Receives the goat sent into the wilderness on the Day of Atonement.
“One lot for the LORD, and the other lot for Azazel.”
Taught the making of weapons and of cosmetics; all sin is ascribed to him and he is bound in Dudael.
“The whole earth has been corrupted through the works that were taught by Azazel.”
Connections
What is it connected to?
Identified with The Sons of God
1 Enoch's Watchers are an expansion of the sons of God of Genesis 6, and Azazel is among their leadership there.
Commanded by Semjaza
Ringleader of the two hundred, though the text gives Azazel the theological weight.
Thwarted by Raphael
1 Enoch 10: Raphael is told to bind Azazel hand and foot and cast him into the darkness of Dudael.
Identified with Anzu
Rebellions against divine order by a subordinate, both ending in defeat rather than dualist stalemate.
Identified with Harut and Marut
Angels who impart forbidden knowledge — though the Qur'an frames Harut and Marut as a sanctioned trial, not a fall.
Afterwards
What did later readers make of it?
The English word 'scapegoat' comes from Tyndale's rendering of this passage, and now means something almost opposite: the one who is blamed rather than the one who carries blame away.
Kept in its own section on purpose. Everything above is what the cited texts say; this is what was built on top of them afterwards, and blending the two is how most popular demonology goes wrong.
Answered from the sources
Common questions
Which texts mention Azazel?
Is Azazel the same as The Sons of God?
What rank is Azazel?
How else is Azazel spelled?
What is Azazel said to do?
How old is Azazel?
Nearest in the corpus
If Azazel is what you came for, these are next
Chosen by proximity rather than by popularity: the same pantheon first, then the same rank, then the same kind of figure.
Asherah
Mother of the Gods · Deliverance tradition
Consort of El at Ugarit and mother of the gods, whose cult objects stood in the Jerusalem temple itself for long stretches — and who disappears from English Bibles behind the word 'grove'.
The Etemmu
The Dead Who Return · Mesopotamian
The Mesopotamian ghost of a person, and a problem of neglect rather than of malice: the etemmu that troubles the living is usually a spirit nobody buried and nobody remembers.
Abaddon
Angel of the Abyss · Infernal Court
A place-name in the Hebrew Bible — 'destruction', a synonym for the grave — that Revelation personifies as the king of the locusts of the pit.
Behemoth
Beast of the Land · Infernal Court
Job's land-beast, paired with Leviathan — presented there as a creature of God, not an enemy of him.
Samael
Prince of Accusers · Chief Princes
Both an archangel and an adversary. Jewish tradition makes him the accusing angel, the angel of death and the guardian prince of Rome; all three are offices he was assigned, not verdicts on his character.
The Ifrit
Class of Jinn · Jinn
A powerful class of jinn — and jinn, crucially, have free will, so an ifrit may be Muslim, hostile, or neither.
The books behind Azazel
Every claim on this profile is attributed to one of these. They are public domain, listed oldest first, and each links to a full text where one is freely available.
Hebrew Bible & Deuterocanon
Various · c. 900–100 BCE · Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek
Read Hebrew Bible & Deuterocanon in full ↗Cover: Public domain · see en:Aleppo Codex; scanned by · Wikimedia file page
1 Enoch (The Book of Enoch)
Anonymous; tr. R. H. Charles · c. 300–100 BCE · Ge'ez (from Aramaic)
Read 1 Enoch (The Book of Enoch) in full ↗Cover: Public domain · Wikimedia file page
Corpus last revised 29 August 2026. A reference site’s credibility rests on being maintained, so this is the date the sourced records last changed — not the date the page was rebuilt.