How did the Ethiopian Orthodox Church preserve 1 Enoch and why is it canonical there?
Executive summary
The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church preserved 1 Enoch largely by keeping complete Geʽez manuscripts in its monastic and church treasuries over centuries, making the Ethiopian tradition the principal carrier of the full text into the modern era [1] [2] [3]. Its canonicity in Ethiopia stems from an early, relatively independent process of canon formation that retained a wide corpus of Jewish‑Christian writings—among them 1 Enoch—because they were judged authoritative within local tradition and liturgical life, even as other Christian bodies later excluded the book [4] [5] [6].
1. How the text survived: Geʽez transmission and manuscript custodianship
The only complete surviving versions of 1 Enoch were transmitted in Geʽez, the Ethiopian liturgical language, and extant manuscripts preserved in Ethiopian church libraries and monasteries account for the text’s survival into the modern era [2] [3]; while fragmentary Aramaic copies from Qumran demonstrate earlier circulation outside Ethiopia, the Ethiopian corpus is what preserved the whole work for later scholarship [1].
2. Institutional guardians: churches, monasteries and the “custody” of the canon
Ethiopian churches and monasteries functioned as custodians of a broader canon and its manuscripts—housing unique books in church treasuries and using Geʽez as a liturgical and scriptural medium—so ecclesial practice, not accidental luck, explains why Enoch continued to be copied and read within Ethiopia [3] [4].
3. Canon formation inside a distinctive tradition
The Ethiopian canon developed with significant autonomy from Roman and Byzantine centers; that independent canon incorporated many works other churches treated as pseudepigraphal, producing an Old Testament of some 46 books in which 1 Enoch is listed and treated as Scripture [5] [4].
4. Theology, tradition, and the practical reasons for acceptance
Ethiopian acceptance of 1 Enoch reflects a theological habit that privileges tradition alongside Scripture and regards certain Jewish‑Christian writings as authoritative resources for angelology, eschatology, and church teaching—an approach spelled out in Ethiopian materials explaining their 81‑book or broader canons and the role of such texts in shaping doctrine and liturgy [5] [3] [4].
5. Why other churches rejected it: councils, fathers, and critical reception
By the fourth century most churches excluded 1 Enoch from their canons; early canonical lists and influential versions like Jerome’s Vulgate did not include it, and although some Church Fathers used or praised parts of Enoch, later councils did not endorse it as inspired—hence its absence from Western and most Eastern canons [7].
6. Alternative explanations and scholarly context
Scholars note that 1 Enoch enjoyed wide readership in the Second Temple period (as reflected in Dead Sea Scroll fragments) and that some New Testament authors echo Enochic material, yet the divergence in canonical outcomes reflects differing local verdicts on authority rather than a single textual defect; modern accounts emphasize both Ethiopia’s custodial role and the broader history of how canons narrowed elsewhere [1] [8].
7. Limits of the record and what remains contested
While surviving Geʽez manuscripts and ecclesiastical testimony explain preservation and local canonicity, the precise historical moment and deliberations by which Ethiopian authorities fixed 1 Enoch as canonical are not fully documented in the sources provided; extant reporting emphasizes continuity of use and institutional independence rather than a single council decision [3] [4].