The Books of Enoch, Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4

CHAPTER III
WORKS ATTRIBUTED TO
ENOCH
IN ROMANO-BYZANTINE AND MEDIEVAL
TIMES
AMONG numerous literary compositions attributed to the patriarch Enoch
during the Christian period, by Christians of various denominations as well
as by Jews, the most debated are the Book of Parables and the Slavonic
Enoch. The first is dated almost unanimously to the pre-Christian era; the
second similarly, or else to the early Christian period. An attempt will be
made here to put forward much later dates for both of them. We shall also
describe briefly other writings connected in one way or another with the
person of Enoch.
THE BOOK OF PARABLES AND OTHER ENOCHIC
WRITINGS IN THE ROMAN AND BYZANTINE
PERIODS
The work known in modern times as *the Book of Parables' forms the second
part of the Ethiopic Enoch (En. 37 to 71), the most extensive of the five
sections of this text.
We should note that the conventional title is not at all appropriate. It
would be much better to use the one chosen by the author himself, 'Second
Vision of Enoch' (En. 37: i). This contrasts it with the First Vision, that is,
with the whole collection of revelations contained in the Aramaic and Greek
Enochic Pentateuch in two volumes: the Book of Watchers, the Book of
Giants, the Book of Dreams, the Epistle of Enoch in the first volume, and the
Astronomical Book in the second volume. The Second Vision can be divided
into three 'parables' (En. 37: 5) or, to be more exact, sapiential 'discourses'
or 'sayings', for this is an obvious borrowing from the 'parables' of En. i :2,
"Tll^na [303l] (4QEn* i i 2), Kal dvaXapwv TT^V irapa^oXriv avrov (C; singular
under the influence of Num. 23: 7, etc. ?). The same term reappears in the
Epistle, n'7na ^13[n aoi] (En« I iii 18 = En. 93: i) and H^na yon 302
(En8 I iii 23 = En. 93: 3). The Ethiopic Version omits rr^v Trapa^oXrjv in
En. 1: 2, and replaces it with ^emmasdhefty 'from books', in En. 93.