Book of Enoch, 1 Peter, 2nd Peter, Jude parallels

[Evang.Benincasa]

Originally Posted by Esaias

I don't think anyone is arguing for including the Book of Enoch into the canon? But the issue is what exactly were Peter and Jude trying to accomplish when referencing Enoch (and possibly other writings)?

On a side note, I am not even entirely convinced they were quoting anybody except in the one instance of 'And Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied...'etc. The other quotations and allusions to the Book of Enoch, and other apocryphal Jewish works, may not be quotations at all. Those works may be quoting Peter and Jude, to be honest. Also, I am currently looking at another possible explanation for the statements that do not involve any apocryphal Jewish beliefs at all... although I must confess that the understanding I outlined in this thread is - currently, to me - the strongest case I have seen that makes the most use of the available data.

I'll be back tomorrow (today? lol) to explore this some more.

The biggest enemies to the Church at its infancy wasn't the Roman empire, but was the Judaizers, the religious Judeans, the political Judeans. Which would then use the the authority of Rome to go after the infant church. Gnosticism is really an offshoot of Kabbalah, and didn't really didn't fully get structured until the mid 2nd century. The early church didn't experience Gnosticism, but Judaic traditions, fables, and mysticism which she adopted from her stay in Babylon. Hence the Babylonian talmud is her most authoritative set of Talmuds.

The book of Enoch would of posed some issues for the fledgling church, because how Enoch contradicts the canon. Take for instance we have Enoch (father of Methuselah) telling Methuselah all about the flood. Genesis 6:11-13, we have God seeing the earth's corruption, and then because of this degradation we are told Noah was informed about a flood. Noah is the great grandson of Enoch, Enoch supposedly (according to the book of Enoch) was the one who knew about the approaching flood. Methuselah name was supposed to mean "when he dies it comes" but Methuselah actually means "man of the spear" like Cain means "possessor of the spear" Methuselah is parallel type to Cain as he was the first murderer. Methuselah name embodied everything which God would be destroying, the corruption of Cain. A carnal man who sought to kill his brother because the works from his religion were evil. There are other issues which the book of Enoch has which I would like to also discuss.