What is the historical origin of the Ethiopian biblical canon and when were texts like Jubilees and Enoch accepted?

1. Why Ethiopia kept the books others dropped — a surviving Septuagint thread

The Ethiopian canon’s historical origin is strongly tied to the Septuagint stream and subsequent Ge'ez translation activity between late antiquity and the medieval period, which transmitted Greek textual traditions into Ethiopia. Multiple accounts claim the Old Testament in Ethiopia derives from a Lucian or Septuagint recension current in Syria and was translated into Ge'ez over centuries, with the New Testament likewise translated from Greek. This transmission explains why the Ethiopian corpus includes not only the Hebrew Bible but also Greek and pseudepigraphal works that circulated in Hellenistic Jewish and early Christian contexts. The Church’s translation practice and manuscript culture created a distinct repository of texts that preserved books like 1 Enoch and Jubilees that had already fallen out of Western canons ^{[1] [3]}.

2. How long Enoch and Jubilees were present — manuscript and liturgical evidence

Evidence collected in modern manuscript studies points to 1 Enoch’s prominent position in Ethiopian manuscript collections, frequently appearing early in codices and widely quoted in Ethiopian literature. European discovery of complete Ge'ez texts in the 19th century (notably by travelers such as James Bruce) demonstrated that these books had been preserved in full only in Ge'ez manuscripts until modern editions appeared in Europe. Jubilees and Enoch have deep roots in Second Temple Jewish literature — with Jubilees likely composed in the 2nd century BCE and sections of Enoch older — and the Ethiopian Church’s manuscript tradition shows they were not recent additions but long-standing parts of local liturgical and theological life ^{[2] [4] [5]}.

3. When were they formally “accepted”? The ambiguity of Ethiopian canonicity

Scholars emphasize that the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church does not present a single neat moment of formal canon closure comparable to Western councils; instead, canonicity is fluid and communal, defined by liturgical use, theological reception, and manuscript circulation. Some studies suggest formal recognition processes occurred over centuries and that texts such as Enoch and Jubilees were effectively canonical well before late medieval listings, though a specific formalization has been attributed by some sources to the 15th century in certain accounts. The key scholarly consensus is that acceptance was gradual and contextual, rooted in longstanding use rather than a single decretal act ^{[6] [7] [8]}.

4. Scholarly debates and evidence: influence versus formal status

There is a scholarly split between emphasizing textual influence — Enoch’s ideas permeating Ethiopian theology and literature, including works like the Kebra Nagast — and insisting on a distinct, formal canonical status. Manuscript studies show 1 Enoch’s textual dominance in collections and quotes across Ethiopian writings, strengthening claims of practical canonicity; other scholars note that lists of canonical books vary and that the Fetha Negest and Sinodos sometimes reflect narrower or different counts. The disagreement often tracks disciplinary emphasis: philological and manuscript evidence highlights early and continuous use, while ecclesiastical-history perspectives stress the absence of a single formal canonization event in Ethiopian records ^{[4] [1] [3]}.

5. Big picture: what this means for understanding biblical canons globally

Ethiopia’s example shows that canons form through local practices of translation, liturgy, and community memory rather than solely through universal decrees; the survival of Enoch and Jubilees in Ge'ez underscores how regional traditions preserve texts lost elsewhere. The Ethiopian case cautions against assuming a single, globally uniform canon in antiquity: manuscript prominence, theological utility, and liturgical embedding determined what communities treated as Scripture. Modern scholarship converges on three firm points: the Ethiopian canon springs from Septuagintal and Greek transmission into Ge'ez, Enoch and Jubilees were preserved and used there for many centuries, and their canonical status is best understood as the product of gradual local reception rather than a single formal acceptance moment ^{[1] [2] [9] [8]}.