Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church on 1 Enoch (Mäshafä Henok)

The only Christian tradition that retains 1 Enoch in its scriptural canon. The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (EOTC) and the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church both list Mäshafä Henok (the Book of Enoch) among the 81 books of their broader canon ("the narrower canon" includes 46 OT + 35 NT; "the broader canon" of 81 adds works like Jubilees, 1 Enoch, the Synodos, etc., though enumeration conventions vary).

Why Ge'ez 1 Enoch survived

• Original Aramaic and Greek versions were lost in Latin/Greek/Hebrew transmission streams.
• The Ge'ez translation (from Greek, possibly 4th–6th c.) was preserved in Ethiopian monastic scriptoria.
• James Bruce brought three Ge'ez MSS to Europe in 1773; Richard Laurence published the first English translation from one of them (Bodleian MS Bruce 74) in 1821.
• Today the most important Ge'ez MS traditions are catalogued in the EMML (Ethiopian Manuscript Microfilm Library) / Hill Museum & Manuscript Library.

Reading posture

• Scripture, not apocrypha. Mäshafä Henok is preached and used liturgically; it is not relegated to "useful" or "edifying" the way deuterocanon is in some Catholic / Orthodox usages.
• Enoch's prophecy is read forward to the incarnation; the Watchers narrative is read as a moral warning.

Notable Ethiopian Enoch commentators / sources

• Ethiopian Andǝmta commentary tradition — running scholastic commentary in Amharic on Ge'ez scripture, including Mäshafä Henok.
• Patristic-style usage by Ethiopian fathers (Abba Giyorgis of Sägla, 15th c.).
• Modern Ethiopian scholarly editions: Knibb's The Ethiopic Book of Enoch (1978) uses Ethiopian MSS extensively.

See also

• overview — material context of Ge'ez transmission.
• Manuscript witnesses inventory.

Scholarship pointers

• M. Knibb, The Ethiopic Book of Enoch (2 vols, Oxford, 1978).
• E. Ullendorff, Ethiopia and the Bible (1968).
• T. Erho, ongoing Ge'ez Enoch manuscript work.