ENOCH LITERATURE

The researches of J. T. Milik (see bibliography) on these complicated and fragmentary Aramaic materials have yet to be fully published; and their implications for the Jewish background of Christianity have still to be worked out in detail. One solid inference would seem to be that the absence from the Qumran texts of any trace of the Parables (or, Similitudes) of Enoch (1 Enoch 37–71) is no mere accident. The highly developed portrayal of a messianic "son of man" in this part of the composite book needs therefore to be reevaluated as to its date and its relationship to the Gospels.

Insight into the cosmic speculations and apocalyptic hopes in Jewish Palestine before the latest books of the Old Testament were written can be gained from these fragments. In the order of their composition as seen by Milik (except for section 3 below), the several parts of the Enoch collection are as follows: 1. A "Book of the Heavenly Luminaries" corresponding to 1 Enoch ch. 72–82. Of four manuscripts (4QEn astr^a–d ), the oldest is from ±200 b.c., the latest from around the birth of Christ. This material was presented independently in ancient times, and has been greatly reduced before being incorporated into the later book, which also lacks the opening and final portions. It began with a long calendrical treatise, reconciling the solar year with the liturgical year of 364 days adopted into the Book of Jubilees and into Essene worship. This and other lore are presented as taught to Enoch during his earthly life by the angel Uriel. Except for ch. 81 of the later work (still earlier than 100 b.c), this section was composed in the Persian period, fifth–fourth centuries b.c. Its mythical geography is cosmic in scope and shows Babylonian influence. 2. The opening part of 1 Enoch (ch. 1–36) is best described as the "Book of Watchers," i.e., of fallen angels to whom the origin of evil among men is attributed. It includes an older core (ch. 6–19) that contains "Visions of Enoch." Five Qumran manuscripts containing half the text of the 36 chapters prove that the section was already fixed in its content early in the second century b.c. Milik sees it as a third-century b.c. composition, with the "Visions" older still.3. Linked to the "Book of Watchers" before 100 b.c. was a "Book of Giants" dealing with the legendary antediluvians of Gn 6.1–4. Fragments of this and related texts exist in no less than 15 manuscripts from four different Qumran caves. Taken over by Mani in the third century a.d., it became an accepted part of Manichaean literature, in languages reaching from central Asia to Africa and western Europe. It was still known in the context of the Enoch compilation to Christian writers in Alexandria in the fifth century a.d. The inference lies ready to hand that it was this "Book of Giants" with its unsavory Manichaean associations for which the "Parables of Enoch" were substituted about the sixth century. Milik dates the "Parables" (he prefers "Discourses") about a.d. 270, and sees them as written originally in Greek in the style of the Sibylline oracles; they depend on the canonical Gospels. This evaluation will no doubt be controverted. 4. The "Book of Dreams" corresponding to 1 Enoch 83–90 comprises two dream visions narrated by Enoch, now thought of as living with his wife in a far-off paradise; he is brought back to earth by angelic guides to instruct his descendants. This section, known from four Qumran manuscripts, is patterned closely on the "Book of Watchers," to which it was composed as a pendant in 164 b.c. (according to Milik). The first dream has to do with the Flood; the second gives a conspectus of world history in highly allegorical terms. From the period of the Exile, 70 successive angelic guardians govern Israel until the end time. A similar scheme (70 generations from Enoch to Christ) underlies the genealogy in Lk 3.23–38.5. The "Letter of Enoch" (1 Enoch 91–105), written in a Hellenistic milieu such as Gaza not later than 100 b.c., is known from two Qumran copies. It transforms the scheme of 70 periods into a cycle of 10 "weeks of years"; of these, the first seven, a jubilee cycle, comprise world history. The remaining three weeks of years are the eschatological end time. This arrangement combines 70 x 7 elements from a third-century b.c. "Book of Periods" with a 10 x 49 pattern from an apocalypse of jubilees transmitted under the name of Ezekiel. Both these sources are known from Qumran; only the former has been partially published. Chapters 106–107 of the Enoch compilation, borrowed from a separate work dealing with the birth of Noah, were already united with the "Letter" in a scroll copied late in the first century b.c.

The scroll just mentioned (4QEn^c) is that which yields (along with 4QEn Giants^a, written by the same scribe) the clearest evidence that the five sections listed above were treated as a two-volume composite work in pre-Christian times: section 1 apart because of its bulk, and sections 2 to 5 combined into a second scroll. Evidence drawn from George Syncellus establishes that this was still the arrangement known in Greek codices to the Christians of Egypt about a.d. 400. The regrouping of the parts into the order 2, "Parables" (instead of 3), 4, 1, 5, which produced the Ethiopic Enoch, is later, the origin of the last chapter (108) is unexplained.

See Also: qumran community.

Bibliography: j. t. milik, "Problèmes de la Littérature hénochique à la lumière des fragments araméens de Qumrân," Harvard Theological Review 64 (1971) 333–378, with further references. j. t. milik and m. black, The Books of Enoch, Aramaic Fragments of Qumrân Cave 4 (Oxford in press).

[p. w. skehan]