The Books of Enoch, Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4

258 THE BOOKS OF ENOCH
historians, such as Theophilus of Antioch, Clement of Alexandria, Hippolytus
of Rome, Julius Africanus of Jerusalem. They grant to the world the
duration of 6,000 years (birth of Christ in 5500), to be followed by the 7th
millennium which will be ushered in by the fiml parousia of Jesus Christ.^
The duration of 7,000 years for the historical and eschatological world was
to be applied by the Ethiopic monks to the Enochic apocalypse of Weeks.
One Ethiopic author quite simply attributes the duration of 700 years to
every Week of En. 91 and 93:
'(Table) by which you will know the computation of the ten Weeks of
Enoch.
ist Week: 700 years
2nd Week: 1,400 years
[and so on until]
9th Week: 6,300 years
loth Week: 7,000 years.'^
References to this Ethiopic world-era are to be found in CSCO 221 jAeth.
41: 'the Weeks of Enoch are 700 years each one, that is 7,000 years [quotation
of En. 91: 15]', pp. 53, 28-54, 3; '7,000 years of the Lord, as Enoch proclaims
[quotation of En. 91: 15-17]', p. 64, 2-10; translation: CSCO 2221 Aeth.
42, pp. 47 and 56.
The Ethiopic MS. Paris, Bibl. Nat. 117 (fifteenth or sixteenth century)
contains, in its first part, a sacred history, in which Enoch and his writings
are often quoted.^ The fourth piece is entitled 'Another Discourse concerning
the birth of Enoch'. It paraphrases freely the apocalypse of ten Weeks (En.
93: 2-10+91: 12-17): the first Week, birth of Enoch; the second Week,
Noah saved from the Flood; . . . the sixth Week, the Crucifixion of Jesus
Christ; the seventh Week, the time of Christians; ... the tenth Week, the
time of Antichrist. There follow the formulas for finding the birthdays of
Enoch and of Noah, 7th of Khadar and 7th of Migazya respectively.^
» On the Christian eras of the world see 3 Ed. j. Perruchon and 1. Guidi, PO i, i,
V. Grumel, La chronologie (Traite d*dtudes 1907, pp. 1-97.
byzantinesy i), 1958, pp. 3-25. ^ Ed. S. Gr^baut, PO vi, 3, 1911, pp. 430-4
2 Ethiopic manuscript no. 64 in the Biblio- [172-6] and by E. A. Wallis Budge, The Book
thfeque Nationale, Paris, fol. 63^-64'', published of the Mysteries of the Heavens and of the Earth
by S. Gr^baut, Revue de VOrient Chretien, and other Words of Bakhayla Mtkd"il(Zostmds\
xxii (1920-1), 215-16 (Ethiopic text) and 219 Oxford 1935, pp. 140-4 (translation) and fol.
(translation). 70^ ii-72^ i.