The back side of P.Mich.inv. 5552, showing portions of the Book of Enoch in Greek. This manuscript is part of the Chester Beatty Papyri, and is the 3rd leaf of the surviving manuscript.
The Books of Enoch are a collection of Jewish literature that are traditionally attributed to the Biblical figure, Enoch, the great-grandfather of Noah . There are only three known surviving works, however, 2 Enoch indicates that Enoch had written exactly 366 books,[1] which may possibly include the The Invisible God roll.[2]
The three known literary works attributed to Enoch are:
- The Book of Enoch, or 1 Enoch, dating to the 2nd century BCE or earlier. It survives in the Ge'ez language, with small portions also extant in Aramaic and Greek.
- The Book of the Secrets of Enoch, or 2 Enoch, dating to the 1st century CE, and survives only in Old Church Slavonic.
- The Hebrew Book of Enoch, or 3 Enoch, dating to the 5th century CE, and survives in Hebrew.
Sources[]
- ↑ 2 Enoch 23:3
- ↑ 2 Enoch 67:2