The Books of Enoch, Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4

THE MIDDLE AGES 119
During his visit to the paradise of Adam, Paul meets the Virgin Mary, the
patriarchs, Moses, twelve prophets. Lot, Job, Noah, Elijah, and Elisha; at
least, he does so according to the Greek, Latin, and Syriac texts, which end
with the speech of Elijah, but the Coptic text replaces Elisha with Enoch and
ends the procession of the saints in paradise with Zacharias, John the Baptist,
Abel, and Adam (James, p. 554). According to the Apocalypse of Zephaniah
an angel meets Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Enoch, Elijah, and David in
paradise (James, p. 540 n.). In the Descent into Hell^ added to the Gospel of
Nicodemus {Acta Pilati) no earlier than the fifth century, Christ descends
to hell and frees Adam and other saints; upon entering paradise they meet
Enoch, Elijah, and the good thief: 'And there met with them two men,
ancients of days, and when they were asked of the saints: "Who are ye that
have not yet been dead in hell with us and are set in paradise in the body
then one of them answering said (James, p. 140; Latin recension A, chapter
IX): "I am Enoch which was translated hither by the word of the Lord, and
this that is with me is Elias the Thesbite who was taken up in a chariot of
fire; and up to this day we have not tasted death, but we are received unto the
coming of Antichrist to fight against him with signs and wonders of God,
and to be slain of him in Jerusalem, and after three days and a half to be
taken up again alive on the clouds/
A Latin work, now lost, on Enoch and Elijah's stay in the terrestrial paradise,
is summarized in verse by Godfrey of Viterbo (d. 1191) in his Pantheon
sive Universitatis Lihriy qui Chronici appellantur^ xx^ He claims to have found
this 'History of Enoch and Elijah' in a book of Acts of the apostles preserved
in ecclesia Sancti Matthaety ultra Britanniam in finibus terraCy probably the
Pointe-de-Saint-Matthieu in Finistere, also called Saint-Mah^ and Saint-
Matthieu-de-Fin-des-Terres, an abbey founded in 1157 on the site of an
oratory where the head of the evangelist, carried from Ethiopia by seafarers
from L6on, was supposed to have been laid. This account is connected
with the mythical journeys to the West, a favourite theme of ancient Celtic
literature, the most famous of which is Navigatio Brandani; in these stories
Enoch and Elijah are mentioned occasionally.^ Here is a summary of it:
A hundred or so monks of Saint-Matthew undertake, under the direction
of two priests, a journey in the Western Sea; on the high seas, two statues of
(text) and 1048 (translation); cf. James, The d'Enoch ed Elia', Cittd di Vita (Firenze), ii
Apocryphal N,T., p. 536 (chapter 19). (i947), 228-36 (not seen by me); P. Grosjean,
« Basle 1559, cols. 93-6. Analecta Bollandiana, bcv (1947), PP- 301-2.
* See M. Esposito, *Un apocrifo Libro