The Perspective of 1 Enoch and Jubilees on the Essenes

The Perspective of 1 Enoch and Jubilees on the Essenes

1 Enoch, composed between the 3rd century BC and the 1st century AD and Jubilees are works which were warmly held by the Essenes, which in the case of Enoch was also until the time of Jerome and Augustine, numbered among the Christian apocrypha, but rejected from the Hebrew canon. Eleven copies of Enoch were found at Qumran and twelve of Jubilees. Enoch was the imortal seventh partiarch who was mythically taken up to heaven or sacrifced as Moses was Gen 5:24 "And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him." He has ancient parallels with the seventh king in the Sumerian king list and the seventh Sumerian sage. The Book of Jubilees similarly singles out Enoch as the one chosen by God "to forsee and fortell the future right down to the Day of Judgement" (Cohn 1993 177).

Both 1 Enoch and Jubilees are unmistakable products of Hellenistic civilization. A world view so encyclopaediac that it embraced the geography of heaven and earth, astronomy, meteorology, medicine was no part of Jewish tradition - but was familiar to educated Greeks, but attempting to emulate and surpass Greek wisdom, by having an integrating divine plan for destiny, elaborated through an angelic host with which Enoch is in communication through his mystical travels. (Cohn 1993 178).

More clearly than in the Hebrew Bible, these works tell of a last judgement which is to occur at the consummation of time. "On the day of great condemnation ... judgement is executed on all who have corrupted their ways ... for every creature and for every kind" - Jubilees. Even rebellious stars are punished with fire. This message purports to be not inconsistent with the Sinai law, (for example even the [male] angels were circumcised), but being much older, and for all mankind. Sinfullness is presented as a form of disorder, an offence against the divinely appointed order of the universe. The Jewish lunar calendar was believed to be erroneous by comparison with solar calendar of the Jubilees putting the heavenly sabbath and other rituals out of alignment because the "great eternal light which for ever and ever is named the sun" appointed the heavenly course of time. Many of these factors are consistent with Persian influence, including the sun worship and the conflict between order and disorder.

These works consequently include a form of the devil mastema, which unlike the Old Testament shaitan of Job is a genuinely evil chaos entity, accompanied by a host of angels tarnished by cavorting with women (Cohn 1993 182): Gen 6:2 The sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose." God had to send the flood to destroy the resulting race of giants, similar to the Titans who tore apart Dionysus. These spirits were locked away in the earth, but Mastema persuaded God to keep out one in ten to tempt humanity until the judgement and to commit all forms of transgression.

In the Day of Judgement all such spirits will be consigned to eternal torment and humanity renewed in spirit back to the generations of Adam:

"And the days will begin to grow many and increase amongst the children of men
till their days draw night to a thousand years ...
And there will be no old man ...
For all will be as children and youths"

The Tree of Life, fragrant and wonderful to behold will be returned to the centre ground, and the New Jerusalem will be built by God - just as later described in Revelation.

However when the righteous dead are mentioned in 1 Enoch or Jubilees, they seem to be destined for a blissful existence as disembodied souls, a notion so un-Jewish that it is presumed to be a Greek idea. No particular sect is identified in these works although they were used extensively at Qumran.