Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Rolf Furuli" <furuli AT online.no>]

Dear Jack,

I have done much work on the book of Enoch, because I have translated it 
from Ethiopic and into Norwegian. And I must say that some of your words 
below are not entirely correct. The basic problem for those seeing the book 
Enoch as an antecedent of some NT ideas, is its age. The book consists of 
different parts, and some of these parts are written at different times, and 
an exact dating is difficult.

The work of J. T. Milik (1976) "The Books of Enoch Aramaic Fragments of 
Qumran Cave 4" shows that just some fragments of parts of the book are among 
the DSS (a few have been  published after Milik`s book). Different scholars 
have dated Qumran manuscripts differently, and the age of the Enoch 
fragments is by no means certain.

I would say that any claim that NT ideas have its origin in the book of 
Enoch are speculative, including the idea that the words of Jude 1:14, 15 is 
a quote of enoch 1:9. The verb in the clause "he shall come" in Enoch 1:9 is 
in Ethiopic expressed by perfect, and the verb in the clause "The Lord shall 
come" in Jude 1:14 is expressed by Greek aorist. Thus, the perfective aspect 
are in both cases used with future reference, and that is not the most 
common use of the perfective aspect in either of the languages. This 
suggests that that there is a clear relationship between Enoch 1:9 and Jude 
1:14, 15.

However, Greek manuscripts of Enoch 1:9 with words that are similar to those 
used in Jude 1:14, 15 are late, and no such manuscript is older than 
manuscripts of the book of Jude. In the Qumran fragment of Enoch chapter 1 
there are only 21 Aramaic letters in parts of three lines, so we cannot know 
what the Aramaic text said. This means that we cannot exclude the 
possibility that the Greek text of Enoch 1:9 is dependent on Jude 1:14,15 
rather than vice versa. Another possibility is that both sources quote the 
words of the same source, which is older than both. There are many examples 
of such quotes both in the OT and the NT of sources that are not viewed as 
holy Writ.


Best regards

Rolf Furuli
University of Oslo



----- Original Message ----- 
From: <tladatsi AT charter.net>
To: <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Thursday, August 11, 2005 2:13 PM
Subject: [b-hebrew] Evil, God, Satan, & Enoch


> Hello,
>
> Just a note, that the idea * fallen angels * originated
> with the Book of Enoch which was very popular in many
> circles, both Christian and Judaic, between 200 BCE - 200
> AD.  There are three different versions of this story in
> Enoch.  In one version, the leader of the rebellion is an
> overly proud angel called Satanel.  In another version, the
> leader is Azazel(see Lev 16:8-26) who leads the watchers to
> earth and knew the daughters of men (Gen 6:1-4).  As
> punishment, Azazel is cast out of heaven, bound hand and
> foot by the angel Rafa-El, and thrown in a hot hole in the
> desert (Duda'el). Enoch also is the origin of the idea of
> equating the snake in Eden with Satanel who seeks seduce
> Adam and Eve to commit sin.
>
> Enoch fell from favor and was removed from official
> Christian canon in the 4th century, although parts of it
> are quoted in the letters of St. Jude.  Enoch was re-
> discovered in Ethopia and other copies were later found at
> Qumram.
>
> Jack Tladatsi
> _______________________________________________