There Was No Conspiracy to Suppress the Book of Enoch
A Response to Tim Alberino
Does the Book of Enoch (1 Enoch) actually bear witness to Jesus, and could that be the reason it was excluded from the Jewish canon?
Tim Alberino argues that it does, and that this was a deliberate move by Judaism to hide the truth about the Messiah.
In this short video, I address that claim. Along the way, I also mention a significant contradiction between 1 Enoch and the New Testament, consider the status of 1 Enoch in the Ethiopian Orthodox canon, reflect on what early Christian writer Tertullian had to say about it, and touch on the popularity of the Enochic traditions during the Second Temple period.
Hope the video blesses you!
Video Transcript:
Tim Alberino: “The reason why the Jews rejected the Book of Enoch—1 Enoch—in their canon is because it testifies of the man they crucified. That’s why they rejected it. Full stop. That’s why they rejected it.”
Hey, thanks for the video. There are at least three problems that I see here. First, if the claim is that Jews excluded 1 Enoch from their canon because it supposedly bears witness to Jesus, then why are books like Isaiah, Daniel, and Zechariah included in their canon? These texts contain even more explicit Messianic prophecies that point to Jesus, and the New Testament authors directly apply these prophecies to Jesus. If there were a Jewish conspiracy to exclude writings that testified of Jesus, it is difficult to explain why these other books were accepted.
Second, 1 Enoch as we know it today very clearly does not, in fact, testify of Jesus. In fact, it presents Enoch—not Jesus—as the Messiah. In 1 Enoch 71:14, Enoch himself is explicitly identified as the divine Son of Man seen earlier in the visions. So, when it comes to the identity of the Messiah, 1 Enoch—at least as we know it today—directly contradicts what the New Testament teaches. (For more on this, see this paper from James C. VanderKam.)1
Third, it wasn’t only Judaism that rejected 1 Enoch as canonical; Christianity rejected it as well. There was one church father who claimed it was Scripture, and we’ll talk about him in a moment, but Christianity never officially accepted 1 Enoch as Scripture. And this wasn’t because 1 Enoch was unknown. It was widely read in both early Jewish and Christian circles. Now, some like to point to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and say that they accepted 1 Enoch as canonical, but that is an oversimplification. The Ethiopian tradition contains multiple “canons” or collections of sacred texts, and not all of them include 1 Enoch. Scholar of Ethiopian liturgy Emmanuel Fritsch explains, “My understanding is that there is no canon in the generally received sense; rather, there are various codices which include various books, not always the same.”2 Significantly, the Ethiopian Orthodox Church’s Holy Synod published A Short History, Faith and Order of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church in 1983, and in its section titled “Holy Books of the Old Testament,” 1 Enoch is not listed.3
In any case, there are several reasons why 1 Enoch was not included in the biblical canon, but it had nothing to do with a supposed Jewish conspiracy to hide the truth about the Messiah.
Tim Alberino: “Tertullian knew this. He wrote a treatise on it.”
Yes, it is true that Tertullian regarded 1 Enoch as Scripture. He references it in his treatise On the Apparel of Women, primarily to argue against the use of cosmetics by women. He supports that argument by appealing to 1 Enoch. However, it’s also important to note that in the same treatise, Tertullian himself admits that other Christians disagree with him and did not consider 1 Enoch to be Scripture. In fact, he stands out as the only church father who gives a clear statement of acceptance of 1 Enoch as Scripture.
Roger Beckwith provides a helpful overview of how 1 Enoch was viewed and treated in early church thought over time:
[T]hough the vogue of this kind of literature in the early church was so great, it was also short-lived. Even Clement of Alexandria, who uses it so freely, seems to admit that its use is confined to ‘initiates,’ and Tertullian, in his treatise On Women’s Dress 1.3, has to defend at length his use of 1 Enoch against those who, he acknowledges, rejected it as uncanonical and spurious. By the mid third century, Origen is only using this literature with caution. He quotes from it such things as he can approve of, but that is all: he also refers to things there which he does not approve of…in Against Celsus 5.54f. he rebukes his opponent for imputing to Christians ideas drawn from 1 Enoch, and for not knowing that ‘in the churches the books bearing the name of Enoch are not by any means in circulation as divine.’ From this date, the decline of the apocalyptic and prophetic Pseudepigrapha could only be rapid. By the fifth or sixth century, works like pseudo-Athanasius...were listing them in a separate category as not just uncanonical but harmful.4
So, although it is true that Tertullian considered 1 Enoch to be Scripture, he represented a minority view. Tertullian does claim, like the person in this video, that the Jews excluded 1 Enoch from their canon because it supposedly spoke of Jesus, but this is simply Tertullian’s attempt to provide an ad hoc justification for its rejection. Moreover, this explanation does not account for why Christians also rejected the book as Scripture.
Tim Alberino: “And of course, they were appalled—the Jews of the first century were clearly appalled by the notion that angels could have sexual intercourse with human women. So that notion was rejected, and I think that’s the main reason—the primary reason—why the Book of Enoch was excluded from the canon. It was because its content was unsavory to certain people.”
Well, that would be very strange, especially when you consider the fact that it was Jews during the Second Temple period who originally wrote the story of angels and human women that we read about in 1 Enoch. This tradition was actually quite popular at the time—it had a significant influence on the Jewish community at Qumran, and even a couple of the Jewish authors of the New Testament, like Jude and Peter, reference it. So, the idea that “the Jews of the first century” rejected 1 Enoch because they found that tradition unsavory doesn’t really hold up.
To be sure, you do have a different tradition that began to develop that the sons of God in Genesis 6 are humans instead of angels. We see this tradition in Philo, the Targumim, and this was the view generally held by the later rabbis, but the acceptance of that alternative tradition was not universal. Certainly, some later mystical strands of Judaism, like the authors of 3 Enoch, highly valued the Enochic traditions.5
In any case, the reason for the exclusion of 1 Enoch from the Jewish canon probably had more to do with the fact that it was just written so late. Parts of what we know today as 1 Enoch may not have even been written until the late first century AD. But the notion that the Jews conspired to exclude 1 Enoch because they didn’t like the tradition about the angels and human women is simply false. Again, this tradition was very popular in Second Temple Judaism.
Tim Alberino: “But nevertheless, the story of Enoch is foundational to the biblical narrative. Foundational, Old and New Testament.”
Well, it certainly was not foundational to the Old Testament because 1 Enoch was mostly written during the intertestamental period.
Tim Alberino: “And the prophecies of Enoch, namely in the Book of Parables in 1 Enoch, is foundational to the eschatology of the writers of the New Testament. The writers of the New Testament were exceedingly conversant with the Book of Enoch. In fact, their Christology, their understanding of who Jesus was—much of it is derived directly from the oracles of Enoch.”
Okay, so first, as I mentioned earlier, what we know today as 1 Enoch teaches that Enoch—not Jesus—is the Messiah. So that means that 1 Enoch’s Christology directly contradicts the New Testament’s Christology. Now granted, that section of 1 Enoch you mentioned (the Book of Parables, which is chapters 37–71) was likely written in the late first century AD. Nevertheless, if you are arguing for including what we know today as 1 Enoch in the biblical canon, that is a major contradiction. (For more on the late date of the Book of Parables, see Richard Bauckham’s book Son of Man.)6
In any case, as I mentioned earlier, the Enochic traditions were indeed popular in Second Temple Judaism, so it is no surprise that they influenced the New Testament authors, who were part of that same cultural and religious context. However, instead of saying that the New Testament authors were getting their doctrine from 1 Enoch, I think it is more accurate to say that the New Testament authors were familiar with and expressed certain concepts that also feature prominently in 1 Enoch. Although there are similarities in areas like Christology and eschatology, this does not mean that the New Testament authors were directly getting these ideas from 1 Enoch—especially when you consider the fact that the Book of Parables was written so late. Rather, both the authors of the Book of Parables and the authors of the New Testament were engaging with the Hebrew Scriptures and operating within the same religious and cultural context, so of course we’re going to see some similarities.
Now, having said all that, I personally find 1 Enoch fascinating. I’ve read through it numerous times, and I recommend that Christians read it to get a window into the world of Second Temple Judaism, which is the historical context of the New Testament. But there is no Jewish conspiracy to suppress 1 Enoch. It was widely read among the early Jews and Christians. There are good reasons that Jews and Christians don’t consider it Scripture though. And when you consider the fact that the version of 1 Enoch that we know today teaches a false messiah, it’s probably best that Christians don’t get their doctrine from this book.
Ultimately, if you approach this topic from a standpoint of faith in God, well, God did not want 1 Enoch in the canon. Just as he providentially guided the writing of Scripture, he also providentially guided the development of the canon. So, you can take that for whatever it’s worth, but there is no Jewish conspiracy here.
Hey, thanks again for the video, and I hope you find this response helpful.
James C. VanderKam, “Righteous One, Messiah, Chosen One, and Son of Man in 1 Enoch 37–71,” in The Messiah: Developments in Earliest Judaism and Christianity, ed. James H. Charlesworth (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992), 169–91.
Leslie Baynes, “Enoch and Jubilees in the Canon of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church,” in A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam, Vol. 1 (Netherlands: Brill, 2012), 802.
Ibid., 803.
Roger Beckwith, The Old Testament Canon of the New Testament Church: and Its Background in Early Judaism (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1985), 397–398.
George W. E. Nickelsburg, 1 Enoch: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch, Chapters 1–36; 81–108, Hermeneia (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001), 79–82.
Richard Bauckham, The Son of Man: Volume 1: The Origins of the Son of Man Tradition (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2023)