ALLUSIONS IN SACRED BOOKS OF THE EAST. 



215 



The author represents Enoch as having received the true 

 ordinances of heaven by a divine revelation, and these ordinances 

 are presented in this book. In vision Enoch saw the coming 

 of a man* to whom his brethren would listen, and who would 

 open their eyes to the truth. Then the true ordinances would 

 be restored, Messiah would appear, and the faithful would be 

 received into the kingdom, while the blind and disobedient, 

 whether luminaries, angels or men, would be punished. 



The Book of Enoch then gives us clearly to understand some 

 negative facts about its author. He was neither orthodox Jew 

 nor orthodox Christian, nor even a scientific heathen. Neither 

 Hillel, nor St. Paul, nor Hipparchus could have conceived 

 of the heavenly bodies as possessing independent volition and 

 wandering from their divinely-appointed paths in accordance 

 with their own self-will. The XlXth Psalm expresses at once 

 the Jewish, the Christian, and the scientific attitude. The 

 movements of the heavenly bodies are the material expression 

 of perfect and divine order. The attitude of Pseudo-Enoch 

 cannot be put down to that of a pious but ignorant Jew, pious 

 and learned in the law, but ignorant, necessarily, of the 

 principles of science, because he had the misfortune to be born 

 before our own time, which is the age of sweet reasonableness 

 in all matters scientific. He was not an ignorant Jew, nor 

 a pious one ; he had the Hebrew Scriptures before him. He 

 even quotes the Tersanctus from Isaiah, and varies it to suit 

 his purposes. His piety, had it been genuine, would have saved 

 him from his crass violation of the principles of science. 



the end of heaven and earth : this has become a prison for the stars and 

 the host of heaven. 15. And the stars which roll over the fire are they 

 which have transgressed the commandment of the Lord in the beginning 

 of their rising, because they did not come forth at their appointed times. 

 16. And He was wroth with them, and bound them till the time when 

 their guilt should be consummated (even) for ten thousand years.' " — 

 Eth. En. xviii, 13-16. 



4. " And the moon shall alter her order, and not appear at her time. 

 5. And in those days the sun shall be seen and he shall journey in the 

 evening on the extremity of the great chariot in the west. And shall 

 shine more brightly than accords with the order of light. 6. And many 

 chiefs of the stars shall transgress the order (prescribed). And these 

 shall alter their orbits and tasks, and not appear at the seasons prescribed 

 to them. 7. And the whole order of the stars shall be concealed from 

 the sinners, and the thoughts of those on the earth shall err concerning 

 them. And they shall be altered from all their wavs." — Eth. En. lxxx, 

 4-7. 



* This is evidently Pseudo-Enoch himself, the actual writer of the 

 book. 



