THE BOOK OF ENOCH

That the Book of Enoch was written in a Semitic language The family of languages including Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, and Ethiopic. is now accepted by everyone, but scholars are divided as to whether the Semitic language in question was Hebrew or Aramaic. Only one valuable contribution on this question has been made, and that by Halévy in the Asiatic Journal original: "Journal Asiatique", April–May, 1867, pp. 352–395. This scholar is of the opinion that the entire work was written in Hebrew. Since this publication, however, fresh evidence bearing on the question has been discovered in the Greek fragment (chapters 1–32) found in Egypt. Since this fragment contains three Aramaic words transliterated Written using the letters of a different alphabet to represent the sounds. in the Greek, some scholars—and among them Schürer, Lévi, and N. Schmidt—have concluded that not only are chapters 1–36, but also the rest of the book, derived from an Aramaic original.

In support of the latter statement no evidence has yet been offered by these or any other scholars, nor yet has there been any attempt to meet the positive arguments of Halévy for a Hebrew original of chapters 37–104, whose Hebrew reconstructions of the text have been and must be adopted in many cases by every editor and translator of the book. A prolonged study of the text, which has brought to light a multitude of fresh passages the majority of which can be explained by retranslation into Hebrew, has convinced the present editor that, whilst the evidence on the whole is in favor of an Aramaic original of chapters 6–36, it is just as conclusive on behalf of the Hebrew original of the greater part of the rest of the book.

To determine the exact limits within which each language is used is a task of no little difficulty. This is due in part to the fact that for four-fifths of the text we have only a translation of a translation Likely referring to the Ethiopic version, which was translated from a Greek version, which was itself translated from the Semitic original., and in part to the close affinities Similarities and shared roots. existing between Hebrew and Aramaic. For the resemblances between the two languages are so great, that frequently retranslation from the Ethiopic into either is sufficient to explain corruptions Errors or changes introduced by scribes over centuries of copying. in the former. Notwithstanding, there is a clear balance of evidence in favor of a Hebrew original of chapters 37–71 and 83–104. There is much room for further study of this question, and it is to be hoped that there will be fresh discoveries of manuscript evidence bearing upon it.

§ 2. GREEK, ETHIOPIC, AND LATIN VERSIONS.

The entire book was translated into Greek and from Greek into Ethiopic about the sixth century of our era, and possibly into Latin. These are fully dealt with in the following sections.