The book of Enoch : translated from Professor Dillmann's Ethiopic ...

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The Book of Enoch.
p raiseworthy attempt to popularise a knowledge of these
works. The writer assigns the traditional ground-work to
the years 153-130 B.C., and regards the Similitudes as written
a few years later. Many of this writer's statements on the
theology and influence of Enoch are to be taken with extreme
caution.
Thomson, Books that 'influenced our Lord and His Apostles,
1 891, pp. 95, 103, 108, 225-248, 389-411. Mr. Thomson's
analysis is as follows :
(1) Book of the Similitudes and the Book of the Weeks,
xxxvii-lxxi; xci. 12-xcix, written about the year 210 B.C.
(2) Noachic Fragments, lx; lxv-lxix. 24.
(3) Book of the Fall of the Angels and of the Luminaries,
i-xxxvi; lxxii-xci. 11 ; c-cvii, written not later than 160 B.C.
(4)
cviii. Mr. Thomson's chief ground for regarding
xxxvii-lxxi as the oldest section is derived from the presence
of the Noachic interpolations. As he believes that these
interpolations are confined to this section, he infers that
xxxvii-lxxi is therefore the oldest and that i-xxxvi ;
lxxii-xci
were not yet in existence. Even if Mr. Thomson were right
in his facts, quite another conclusion would be possible. But
this writer's premises are without foundation. Interpolations
are found in every section in Enoch and numerously in the
sections which Mr. Thomson regards as free from them. It
cannot be said that this book contributes much to the better
interpretation of Enoch, and this is all the more to be deplored
as its author obviously possesses abundant ability for the task.
Cheyne, Origin of the Psalter, 1891, pp. 22, 375, 412-
414, 423-424, 448-449, and about fifty references besides.
' Possible Zoroastrian Influences on the Religion of Israel/
Expository Times, 1891, p. 207. Dr. Cheyne accepts pro-
visionally the traditional division of Enoch into the ground-
work, Similitudes and Noachic fragments, and regards the
Similitudes as pre-Christian. He deals mainly with the
dogmatic teaching of the book and its place in the develop-