The Book of Enoch?

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Hey, I was reading up on the Book of Enoch and I don’t understand why it wasn’t included in the cannon. I’ve been looking, but I havn’t found any resources that can give me the answer. New Advent only made me wonder more, showing its popularity amoung the Church Fathers.

Does anyone know why it wasn’t included? How can Jude, an inspired book qoute it, while the book of enoch itself isn’t inspired? I just don’t understand… :confused:

God bless you and thank you in advance because any help would be great.
 
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Spence06:
Hey, I was reading up on the Book of Enoch and I don’t understand why it wasn’t included in the cannon. I’ve been looking, but I havn’t found any resources that can give me the answer. New Advent only made me wonder more, showing its popularity amoung the Church Fathers.

Does anyone know why it wasn’t included? How can Jude, an inspired book qoute it, while the book of enoch itself isn’t inspired? I just don’t understand… :confused:

God bless you and thank you in advance because any help would be great.
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Martin Luther’s formal excuse fore removing Maccabees was that it wasn’t part of the Jewish canon. Therefore, he also had to remove all other books that the Jews didn’t have. This included Enoch. I’m not sure if there were other reasons. By the way, the book of Hebrews 11:5 also refers to the book by speaking of Enoch’s assumption.
 
The Book of Enoch has a very interesting history, and it’s possible that when it came time to make the Bible, there simply weren’t enough full copies of the Book to really examine, as it seems to have been fragmentary even at that time.

Another possibility is that it was viewed to be true, but not necessary to teaching. Census reports weren’t made canon, after all, and neither were agricultural studies or other official histories. A book didn’t have to contain errors to be excluded from canon Scripture, it simply had to be considered unnecessary for the purposes of revelation.
 
True. Books once considered as scripture by the early christians were not included in the final cannon, including the Book of Enoch. This does not however mean everything in it, or in any other book not included, is false.

The following is an excerpt from A Brief Introduction to the Canon and Ancient Versions of Scripture by Michael Marlowe, answering a question as to how the elders of the Church determine which books should be regarded as scripture:

The answer is simple: They received the writings of the apostles and their closest companions, and the writings endorsed by them. The entire Old Testament was received by the implicit endorsement of the apostles. The Gospel of Matthew was written by an apostle. The Gospel of Mark was written by the apostle Peter’s closest disciple. The Gospel of Luke was written by the apostle Paul’s close companion. The Gospel of John was written by an apostle. The Acts of the Apostles was written by Paul’s close companion. Thirteen letters were received from Paul. The epistle to the Hebrews was received as from Paul. The epistle of James comes from the brother of the Lord, who exercised authority in Jerusalem with the apostles. The epistle of Jude was from another brother of the Lord. The two epistles of Peter are from an apostle. The three epistles of John are from an apostle, who also wrote the Revelation. We may ask, How did they know that these writings were not forgeries? The churches did not receive them from strangers. These documents were hand-delivered by friends of the apostles to elders who also knew the apostles personally. Forgeries would be obvious, especially if the writing promoted strange doctrines.

Gerry 🙂
 
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Spence06:
Hey, I was reading up on the Book of Enoch and I don’t understand why it wasn’t included in the cannon. I’ve been looking, but I havn’t found any resources that can give me the answer. New Advent only made me wonder more, showing its popularity amoung the Church Fathers.

Does anyone know why it wasn’t included? How can Jude, an inspired book qoute it, while the book of enoch itself isn’t inspired? I just don’t understand… :confused:

God bless you and thank you in advance because any help would be great.
Click to expand...
I believe the Book of Enoch was rejected because its authorship is considered spurious.
 
Enoch was and is included in the Biblical Canon of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. I haven’t read it at all.

The Ethiopian Orthodox Church also has the book of Jubilees and the Rest of the Words of Baruch.

fact-index.com/a/ap/apocrypha.html says “Enoch was accepted as scripture because the book of Jude in the New Testament quotes it as scripture.” I haven’t investigated that claim.

Another interesting source of information about the book of Enoch is
islamic-awareness.org/Bible/Text/Canon/ethiopican.html
 
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