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The Book of Enoch, and why it is not in the Bible

Who Enoch was, where the Book of Enoch came from, how it survived in Ethiopia and the Dead Sea Scrolls, and why it is not Scripture.

The Book of Enoch is not Scripture. It is not in the Hebrew Bible, and it is not in the Bibles of Protestant, Catholic or most Orthodox Christians; only the Ethiopian and Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo churches count it as canonical. It is a real ancient book, and many sincere people are curious about it. Here is its story, and why Christians do not receive it as God's Word.

Enoch in the Bible

The real Enoch appears in the line from Adam to Noah, and unlike the others, he did not die:

And Enoch lived sixty and five years, and begat Methuselah: And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah three hundred years, and begat sons and daughters: And all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty and five years: And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him. (Genesis 5:21-24)

Hebrews adds: "By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God" (Hebrews 11:5). And Jude records a prophecy he spoke: "And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him" (Jude 14-15).

What the Book of Enoch is

The book usually called 1 Enoch speaks in Enoch's voice, but no scholar believes the Enoch of Genesis wrote it. It was written by unknown Jewish authors, mostly in Aramaic, in the last few centuries before Christ, and set down under his name. Books like this are called pseudepigrapha: writings under a borrowed name.

It is really five works joined together:

Scholars date the oldest parts to the third century BC, possibly earlier. The Parables are the latest and the most debated: estimates run from the century before Christ to the century after.

The Watchers and Genesis 6

The Book of the Watchers grows out of a few verses: "That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose" (Genesis 6:2), and "There were giants in the earth in those days" (Genesis 6:4). Enoch turns this into a long story of two hundred angels who teach forbidden secrets and father giants. GotQuestions.org holds that the "sons of God" were most likely fallen angels, and Scripture does speak of "the angels which kept not their first estate" (Jude 6). But the Bible gives only a few lines; everything Enoch adds is human invention.

How the book survived

The whole book survives only in Ge'ez, the old church language of Ethiopia, translated from Greek. In 1773 the Scottish explorer James Bruce brought Ethiopic copies to Britain. Richard Laurence published the first English translation in 1821, and R. H. Charles of Oxford produced the standard edition in 1912.

Then came the Dead Sea Scrolls. In Cave 4 at Qumran, Aramaic fragments of several copies were found. The oldest, known as 4Q201, was copied around 200-150 BC. Four of the five sections turned up; the Parables never have. So the book is genuinely old and was widely read in Jesus' day. But age does not make a book true.

The early church

Some early Christians valued it: around AD 200 Tertullian argued that Noah could have preserved Enoch's writings through the flood. But most did not accept it, and the Jews never counted it as Scripture. Augustine, in The City of God, explained that these writings were not kept with the Scriptures by the Hebrew priests, and that their claim to such great age made them suspect.

Why Jude's quotation does not make it Scripture

Jude quotes a line found in 1 Enoch 1:9. As GotQuestions.org explains, that shows the particular prophecy is true, perhaps a saying of Enoch handed down for generations, not that the whole book is inspired. That one prophecy is Scripture because it stands in Jude's letter. Paul did the same with pagan poets. In Athens he said, "as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring" (Acts 17:28). He quoted a Cretan poet too: "The Cretians are alway liars" (Titus 1:12). No one takes those poets for Scripture.

Where it goes beyond the Bible

The true Son of Man

Jesus answered that: "And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven" (John 3:13). The Son of Man did not rise from among men. He came down to become a man, to die for sinners and rise again.

So we read 1 Enoch, if at all, as history, and test it by God's Word: "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good" (1 Thessalonians 5:21). We need no hidden book:

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

And the best thing about Enoch is already in the Bible. He walked with God. That walk is no secret. It is open to anyone, through Jesus Christ.

Sources

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