The Book of Enoch was banned by the unenlightened 'church fathers'....

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Dear All,

 

It has always been the way for some 'church fathers' (a.k.a. leaders or

coordinators) to try to ban the writings and books of enlightened writers. We

know that Sahaja Yogis such as Jagbir and Dr. Mary Ann have written books that

Shri Mataji approved of, but in each case they have had to face this incredible

opposition from the Sahaja Yoga 'church fathers' too. Apparently the Enochian

Writings experienced a similar fate by the 'church fathers'.

 

The Enochian Writings are known to be what is called " apocryphal " which means

'hidden' or 'secret'. In other words, a person had to have the inner vision and

the inner hearing to know and understand the apocryphal writings. The

'unenlightened church fathers', however, did not understand these Enochian

Writings, so as is their 'wont to do', they just went ahead and banned them. Not

only did they ban them, but they also pronouced a curse on anyone who dared to

read them, inspite of the fact that there is abundant evidence that Christ

approved of the Book of Enoch.

 

As the writer of this article states: - " One by one the arguments against the

Book of Enoch fade away. The day may soon arrive when the final complaints about

the Book of Enoch's lack of historicity and " late date " are also silenced by new

evidence of the book's real antiquity. "

 

violet

 

 

About the Book of Enoch

(also known as " Ethiopian Enoch " or " 1 Enoch " )

 

The Book of Enoch (also known as 1 Enoch) was once cherished by Jews and

Christians alike, this book later fell into disfavor with powerful theologians -

precisely because of its controversial statements on the nature and deeds of the

fallen angels.

 

The Enochian writings, in addition to many other writings that were excluded (or

lost) from the Bible (i.e., the Book of Tobit, Esdras, etc.) were widely

recognized by many of the early church fathers as " apocryphal " writings. The

term " apocrypha " is derived from the Greek word meaning " hidden " or " secret " .

Originally, the import of the term may have been complimentary in that the term

was applied to sacred books whose contents were too exalted to be made available

to the general public.

 

In Dan. 12:9-10 we hear of words that are shut up until the end of time and,

words that the wise shall understand and the wicked shall not. In addition, 4

Ezra 14:44ff. mentions 94 books, of which 24 (the OT) were to be published and

70 were to be delivered only to the wise among the people (= apocrypha).

Gradually, the term " apocrypha " took on a pejorative connotation, for the

orthodoxy of these hidden books was often questionable. Origen (Comm. in Matt.

10.18; p. 13.881) distinguished between books that were to be read in public

worship and apocryphal books. Because these secret books were often preserved

for use within the esoteric circles of the divinely - knit believers, many of

the critically - spirited or " unenlightened " Church Fathers found themselves

outside the realm of understanding, and therefore came to apply the term

" apocryphal " to, what they claimed to be, heretical works which were forbidden

to be read.

 

In Protestant parlance, " the Apocrypha " designate 15 works, all but one of which

are Jewish in origin and found in the Septuagint (parts of 2 Esdras are

Christian and Latin in origin). Although some of them were composed in

Palestine in Aramaic or Hebrew, they were not accepted into the Jewish canon

formed late in the 2nd cent. AD (Canonicity, 67:31-35). The Reformers,

influenced by the Jewish canon of the OT, did not consider these books on a par

with the rest of the Scriptures; thus the custom arose of making the Apocrypha a

separate section in the Protestant Bible, or sometimes even of omitting them

entirely (Canonicity, 67:44-46). The Catholic view, expressed as a doctrine of

faith at the Council of Trent, is that 12 of these 15 works (in a different

enumeration, however) are canonical Scripture; they are called the

Deuterocanonical Books (Canonicity, 67:21, 42-43).

 

The three books of the Protestant Apocrypha that are not accepted by Catholics

are 1-2 Esdras and the Prayer of Manasseh. The theme of the Book of Enoch

dealing with the nature and deeds of the fallen angels so infuriated the later

Church fathers that one, Filastrius, actually condemned it openly as heresy

(Filastrius, Liber de Haeresibus, no. 108). Nor did the rabbis deign to give

credence to the book's teaching about angels. Rabbi Simeon ben Jochai in the

second century A.D. pronounced a curse upon those who believed it (Delitzsch, p.

223). So the book was denounced, banned, cursed, no doubt burned and shredded -

and last but not least, lost (and conveniently forgotten) for a thousand years.

But with an uncanny persistence, the Book of Enoch found its way back into

circulation two centuries ago.

 

In 1773, rumors of a surviving copy of the book drew Scottish explorer James

Bruce to distant Ethiopia. True to hearsay, the Book of Enoch had been preserved

by the Ethiopic church, which put it right alongside the other books of the

Bible. Bruce secured not one, but three Ethiopic copies of the book and brought

them back to Europe and Britain. When in 1821 Dr. Richard Laurence, a Hebrew

professor at Oxford, produced the first English translation of the work, the

modern world gained its first glimpse of the forbidden mysteries of Enoch.

 

Most scholars say that the present form of the story in the Book of Enoch was

penned sometime during the second century B.C. and was popular for at least five

hundred years. The earliest Ethiopic text was apparently made from a Greek

manuscript of the Book of Enoch, which itself was a copy of an earlier text. The

original was apparently written in Semitic language, now thought to be Aramaic.

 

Though it was once believed to be post-Christian (the similarities to Christian

terminology and teaching are striking), recent discoveries of copies of the book

among the Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran prove that the book was in existence

before the time of Jesus Christ. But the date of the original writing upon which

the second century B.C. Qumran copies were based is shrouded in obscurity. It

is, in a word, old. It has been largely the opinion of historians that the book

does not really contain the authentic words of the ancient biblical patriarch

Enoch, since he would have lived (based on the chronologies in the Book of

Genesis) several thousand years earlier than the first known appearance of the

book attributed to him.

 

Despite its unknown origins, Christians once accepted the words of this Book of

Enoch as authentic scripture, especially the part about the fallen angels and

their prophesied judgment. In fact, many of the key concepts used by Jesus

Christ himself seem directly connected to terms and ideas in the Book of Enoch.

Thus, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that Jesus had not only studied the

book, but also respected it highly enough to adopt and elaborate on its specific

descriptions of the coming kingdom and its theme of inevitable judgment

descending upon " the wicked " - the term most often used in the Old Testament to

describe the Watchers.

 

There is abundant proof that Christ approved of the Book of Enoch. Over a

hundred phrases in the New Testament find precedents in the Book of Enoch.

Another remarkable bit of evidence for the early Christians' acceptance of the

Book of Enoch was for many years buried under the King James Bible's

mistranslation of Luke 9:35, describing the transfiguration of Christ: " And

there came a voice out of the cloud, saying, 'This is my beloved Son: hear him. "

Apparently the translator here wished to make this verse agree with a similar

verse in Matthew and Mark. But Luke's verse in the original Greek reads: " This

is my Son, the Elect One (from the Greek ho eklelegmenos, lit., " the elect

one " ): hear him. " The " Elect One " is a most significant term (found fourteen

times) in the Book of Enoch. If the book was indeed known to the apostles of

Christ, with its abundant descriptions of the Elect One who should " sit upon the

throne of glory " and the Elect One who should " dwell in the midst of them, " then

the great scriptural authenticity is accorded to the Book of Enoch when the

" voice out of the cloud " tells the apostles, " This is my Son, the Elect One " -

the one promised in the Book of Enoch.

 

The Book of Jude tells us in vs. 14 that " Enoch, the seventh from Adam,

prophesied... " Jude also, in vs. 15, makes a direct reference to the Book of

Enoch (2:1), where he writes, " to execute judgment on all, to convict all who

are ungodly... " The time difference between Enoch and Jude is approximately 3400

years. Therefore, Jude's reference to the Enochian prophesies strongly leans

toward the conclusion that these written prophesies were available to him at

that time.

 

Fragments of ten Enoch manuscripts were found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. The

famous scrolls actually comprise only one part of the total findings at Qumran.

Much of the rest was Enochian literature, copies of the Book of Enoch, and other

apocryphal works in the Enochian tradition, like the Book of Jubilees. With so

many copies around, the Essenes could well have used the Enochian writings as a

community prayer book or teacher's manual and study text.

 

The Book of Enoch was also used by writers of the noncanonical (i.e. apocryphal

or " hidden " ) texts. The author of the apocryphal Epistle of Barnabas quotes the

Book of Enoch three times, twice calling it " the Scripture, " a term specifically

denoting the inspired Word of God (Epis. of Barnabas 4:3, 16:5,6). Other

apocryphal works reflect knowledge of the Enoch story of the Watchers, notably

the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs and the Book of Jubilees.

 

Many of the early church fathers also supported the Enochian writings. Justin

Martyr ascribed all evil to demons whom he alleged to be the offspring of the

angels who fell through lust for women (from the Ibid.)-directly referencing the

Enochian writings. Athenagoras, writing in his work called Legatio in about 170

A.D., regards Enoch as a true prophet. He describes the angels which " violated

both their own nature and their office. " In his writings, he goes into detail

about the nature of fallen angels and the cause of their fall, which comes

directly from the Enochian writings.

 

Many other church fathers: Tatian (110-172); Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons

(115-185); Clement of Alexandria (150-220); Tertullian (160-230); Origen

(186-255); Lactantius (260-330); in addition to: Methodius of Philippi, Minucius

Felix, Commodianus, and Ambrose of Milanalso-also approved of and supported the

Enochian writings.

 

The twentieth-century discovery of several Aramaic Enochian texts among the Dead

Sea Scrolls prompted Catholic scholar J.T. Milik to compile a complete history

of the Enochian writings, including translations of the Aramaic manuscripts.

Milik's 400-page book, published in 1976 by Oxford (J. T. Milik, ed. and trans.,

The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4, Oxford: Clarendon Press,

1976) is a milestone in Enochian scholarship, and Milik himself is no doubt one

of the finest experts on the subject. His opinions, based as they are on years

of in-depth research, are highly respected.

 

One by one the arguments against the Book of Enoch fade away. The day may soon

arrive when the final complaints about the Book of Enoch's lack of historicity

and " late date " are also silenced by new evidence of the book's real antiquity.

 

http://reluctant-messenger.com/enoch.htm