The Books of Enoch, Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4

En* I i FIRST COPY 143
The text of this first column of the scroll began half-way up the scroll, leaving the upper
part of the column blank, this part corresponding to approximately twelve lines of writing. As
the scribes could not, no doubt for reasons of economy, leave the whole of the first column
blank, they were content occasionally to leave the upper part blank, which meant that the top
of the scroll could be held in the right hand, without soiling and damaging the text of the incipit,
as it was read. There are other examples of such half-blank pages among the manuscripts of
Qumrin Cave 4.
The four fragments of column i of 4Q En* which have been preserved were probably adhering
to the lower right-hand part of column iii, during the time that they lay hidden in cave 4.
The ancient versions to be compared are C and E, the former being a copy, which although
faulty is relatively close to the archetype of the Greek version and to the Aramaic manuscript
used by the translator. The Ethiopic version, on the other hand, gives a somewhat abridged
and
paraphrased text, owing to the Ethiopian interpreter's technique of translation and to the
vagaries of the manuscript's transmission. These comments hold good for the whole collection
of Aramaic fragments of 4Q collated with these two main witnesses of early versions of the
books of Enoch.
(and
L. I (En. I: I). In the title of a book the plural (Hebrew is de rigueur; Xoyos of C
of E) is its normal equivalent in Greek; cf., e.g., Acts I: I.—The reading and the restoration
][n2 ^*n3] appear to be preferable to ^[12], since otherwise one ought to see, on the righthand
margin of the fragment, the left-hand end of the upper bar of the Kaph.—I restore
[]*'D*'B?J? ]*''n*']n2^ without connecting particle, equivalent to c/cAe/crous 8i>Kalovs in C, as
against hiruydn wasddiqdn in E; cf. note to line 5 (En. i: 3) for a similar superfluous addition in
E of *and' in the epithet of God, *the Holy (and) Great'.
LI. 2-4 (En. 1: 2). The corresponding passage in C is a little corrupt and slightly changed
compared with the Aramaic original.
L. 2. The verbs excov, which follow the phrase ianv opams ck dv avrw dvewyfievr), were, in
my opinion, at first the marginal glosses which corrected iartv into
^
*were', in order to put *the
revealing (lit. opening) of the vision' in the past tense, e^cov, 'having', being added to make this
whole clause agree syntactically with 'Ev