Thanks Pete; that is helpful, and eye-opening.
Glennonite
You are welcome!
And let me say a little more because, if you get into discussions about this with non Catholics, they will probably not be satisfied with what’s been said so far.
The Catechism identifies the Catholic canon as the “complete list” (
, 120CCC). The Catechism is here drawing from
, 8Dei Verbum, where it says that “the Church’s full canon of the sacred books is known” through sacred tradition.
Dei Verbum, however, does not identify the list of books to be included in this “full canon” that they are talking about. But the Catechism does. We’ll want to keep this in mind when we talk about the possible status of Enoch.
It may be that the completeness that is spoken of at Vatican II and in the Catechism is meant to be taken in contrast with the lack of completeness found in the Protestant canon. Taken in this sense, we would be saying that the Church’s use of “full” (Latin:
integer) in this context means that our canon is not injured by missing the additional books found in the Ethiopian canon — i.e., the additional books found in the Ethiopian canon or anywhere else do not add anything of material substance to what God has deemed necessary for mankind to know for the sake of salvation — while it
is thus “injured” if we are missing any one of the books in the Catholic canon. And this would also fit in with the idea that the Ethiopian Catholic Church is working with different definitions of “inspired” and “canonical” for the extra books not included in the canon recognized by the Roman Catholic Church. The
Bishop of Embeder seemed to be saying this at the Synod of Bishops in 2008:
“As it is for all Christian churches, for the Eritrean-Ethiopian tradition the Bible is “the inspired Word”, “the Word of God”. One of the Biblical witnesses invoked in support of this affirmation is the passage from 2 Timothy 3:16-17 which says: ‘All scripture is inspired by God…’
“The sacred authors are enlightened, rather ‘inhabited’ by the Holy Spirit. All the books of the Bible which are considered canonical by other Christian churches are such also for the Eritrean-Ethiopian Church which, moreover, possesses the greatest number of inspired books: 81 books, 46 in the Old and 35 in the New Testament. In the Eritrean-Ethiopian tradition, the concept of canons is flexible and tends to include, rather than exclude. The inspiration which gave life to the sacred books is conceived of as a dynamic process which continues within the community of believers.
The vast patrimony of the Christian tradition is rightly considered as irradiation, many texts as seeds of the Word of God. This is why certain Biblical texts present in the canons of the Eritrean-Ethiopian Church are described as awald (sons, progeny [of the Bible]).
“The Eritrean-Ethiopian tradition views the translation of Biblical texts from their original languages to geez and their interpretation as two sisters, two sides of the same coin. The same Spirit which illuminated the sacred author also guides the heart and mind of the interpreter who, with faith, searches for the mystery enclosed in the word. The commentaries known as andemta have above all an everlasting pedagogical value. The first step, the fundamental step, is the learning of the Word. One reads the geez text and translates it into modern language seeking to include the various shades of meaning of the original. Grammatical analysis follows the lectio, and a discussion of the eventual questions of textual criticism. The first key to its understanding is to be found within the Bible. Explaining the Bible with Bible itself is one of the fundamental elements of Eritrean-Ethiopian hermeneutics. Furthermore, the Fathers of the Church are a source which interpreters embrace completely” (
Eighth General Assembly).
The 81 books indicated as comprising the canon seem to be the books enumerated here:
1. The Broader Canon
“The main source for this is the traditional Amharic commentary on the Geez text of the Fetha Nägäst.[4] It gives 46 as the total for the books of the Old Testament, made up as follows: - Octateuch (8), Judith (1), Samuel and Kings (4), Chronicles (2), 1 Esdras and the Ezra Apocalypse (2), Esther (1), Tobit (1), Maccabees (2), Job (1), Psalms (1), books of Solomon (5),[5] Prophets (16), Ecclesiasticus (1), Pseudo-Josephus (1); Jubilees and
Enoch are to be included in the number (by counting Samuel and Kings as only 2 books). It gives 35 as the total for the books of the New Testament, namely the Gospels (4), Acts (1), the Catholic epistles (7), the Pauline epistles (14), Revelation (1), Sinodos (4 sections), the Book of the Covenant (2 sections), Clement (1), Didascalia (1)” – (
The Broader Canon).
But from what Bishop Ghebreghiorghis said, it sounds like they consider all of the extra books as of secondary status, as “sons of the Bible,” and that this is how everything fits together. Viewing it in this way, we could say that these extra books are viewed in the same way that the deuterocanonical books were viewed by many Catholics prior to Trent: they are ecclesiastical books brought forward for the edification of the Church, but not fully inspired in the same sense, or for the establishment of doctrine.
Have a blessed day!
In Christ,
Pete
