Book of Enoch

Composed in stages between the 3rd century BC and the 1st century AD, in Aramaic and Hebrew. Fragments of every section but one were found at Qumran. The complete book survives only in Ge'ez, preserved by the Ethiopian Church, and returned to Europe in 1773 through the Scottish traveller James Bruce.

Canonical in the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church. Elsewhere it was excluded as pseudepigraphic and for teaching about fallen angels and giants with a freedom that rabbis and church fathers came to avoid. Even so, the Epistle of Jude quotes 1 Enoch by name — the only citation of an extrabiblical book inside the New Testament.

• The Book of the Watchers tells of the angels' fall and of what they taught mankind — knowledge that, the text says, was never meant to come down.
• The Book of Parables presents the Son of Man in a heavenly courtroom, in language that reappears in the Gospels.
• The Astronomical Book describes the 364-day solar year that Qumran adopted and rabbinic Judaism rejected.
• The Animal Apocalypse retells the whole history of Israel with beasts standing for the nations, from Adam to the Maccabees.

Is the Book of Enoch in the Bible?

In the Ethiopian Orthodox Bible, yes. In Catholic, Protestant and Greek Orthodox Bibles, no. But the New Testament quotes it: Jude 1:14-15 reproduces a prophecy from 1 Enoch 1:9 and attributes it to Enoch by name.

Why was the Book of Enoch removed from the Bible?

It was not removed — it was never in the canons that exclude it. It circulated widely among Jews and Christians in the early centuries and was gradually left out as the lists closed, both for its attributed authorship and for its content about the fallen angels.

How many books of Enoch are there?

Three, and they are distinct works: 1 Enoch (Ethiopic), 2 Enoch (Slavonic) and 3 Enoch (Hebrew). Only the first is canonical in Ethiopia. All three are in this collection.