Sacred Scripture teaches that Enoch and Elijah were assumed into heaven while still alive and not experiencing physical death.
Revelation 7:4 says, “I heard the number of those who had been marked with the seal, 144,000 from every tribe of Israel.” Verses 5-8 relate that they were sealed, 12,000 from each of the 12 tribes of Israel, giving the total number of 144,000 persons.
No one could be resurrected until Christ came forth from the tomb. So Elijah, in order to perform his special mission, needed to be translated. Translation means to be changed in a way that your body is no longer subject to sickness, death, or physical pain. Translation is not resurrection.
Enoch in classical Rabbinical literature
According to Rashi [from Genesis Rabbah], "Enoch was a righteous man, but he could easily be swayed to return to do evil. Therefore, the Holy One, blessed be He, hastened and took him away and caused him to die before his time.
God is the One who decides who does or does not enter heaven. There's no place in the Bible that says they were saved. But there is no place in the Bible that indicates the couple was lost, either.
Sacred Scripture teaches that Enoch and Elijah were assumed into heaven while still alive and not experiencing physical death.
Many Christians rely on Matthew 22:30, in which Jesus tells a group of questioners, "At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven.”
He answered and said to me: 'This is the son of man who has righteousness, with whom dwells righteousness, and who reveals all the treasures of that which is hidden, because the Lord of the spirits has chosen him, and whose lot has the pre-eminence before the Lord of the spirits in uprightness for ever.
At the beginning of Wadi al-Kharrar, near the monastic complex, or “Laura”, Christian pilgrims have traditionally been shown a hill (known as Jabel Mar Elias in Arabic) where the Prophet Elijah ascended into heaven.
While on Patmos, God gave John a vision of the final days of earth, and a peak at heaven. In the vision, John saw the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down from heaven to the new earth, for the old earth had been destroyed.
In religious or mythological cosmology, the seven heavens refer to seven levels or divisions of the Heavens. The concept, also found in the ancient Mesopotamian religions, can be found in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam; a similar concept is also found in some other religions such as Hinduism.
You enter heaven by forgiveness and through the righteousness that Jesus gives you. You do not enter into heaven by the Christian life. It's always true that where faith is birthed, works will follow, but salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.
In the second heaven, Enoch finds darkness: a prison where rebel angels are tortured. In the third heaven, he sees both paradise represented as the Garden of Eden which is also guarded by angels (similar to 2 Corinthians 12:2) and hell where bad men are tortured.
While Jesus told Nicodemus, “Amen, Amen, I say to you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit” (John 3:5), he did not set baptism as a hindrance to salvation but just the opposite. We so often judge things by human standards, but God is not restrained by our standards.
But in the ancient Middle East, the writers of the Hebrew Bible forbade tattooing. Per Leviticus 19:28, “You shall not make gashes in your flesh for the dead, or incise any marks on yourselves.”
Christians don't believe that "going to heaven" happens automatically; it's the result of conscious decisions made during one's life. While the Bible is very specific about the requirements for human salvation, it says nothing about salvation for animals.
“Elijah went to heaven, but Old Testament saints didn't go to heaven upon leaving this world.” “Elijah is in his glorified body, but he will die during the Tribulation period.”
However, the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament actually gives us the names of three individuals that are traditionally thought of as never having died.
Later Ahab's son, King Ahaziah, appeals to Baal to heal him of an injury, and Elijah once more upholds the exclusive rights of Yahweh by bringing down “fire from heaven.” After bestowing his mantle on his successor, Elisha, the prophet Elijah is taken up to heaven in a whirlwind.
Enoch was instrumental in establishing the pre-eminent place of Michael among the angels or archangels, and in later Jewish works he is said to be their chief, mediating the Torah (the law of God) and standing at the right hand of the throne of God.
The Lord promised Enoch that He would never again flood the earth. The Lord also promised that He would “call upon the children of Noah,” which means that He would invite them to accept the gospel. The Lord also taught Enoch that those who build their lives upon the Savior would never fall. (See also Helaman 5:12.)
I Enoch was at first accepted in the Christian Church but later excluded from the biblical canon. Its survival is due to the fascination of marginal and heretical Christian groups, such as the Manichaeans, with its syncretic blending of Iranian, Greek, Chaldean, and Egyptian elements.
In fact, the Bible indicates we will know each other more fully than we do now. The Apostle Paul declared, "Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known" (1 Corinthians 13:12). It's true that our appearance will change, because God will give us new bodies, similar to Jesus' resurrection body.
7. The reunion of believing loved ones. When Paul writes to believers who grieve the loss of a loved one, he offers them this comfort: “We who are still alive will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air” (1 Thessalonians 4:17, emphasis mine).
Christians who knew and loved each other on earth will know and love each other in heaven. The life we enjoy in heaven is not going to be less than the life we enjoy now. In every respect it will be more. The whole point of this passage is to bring comfort to believers who grieve the loss of a loved one.