Enochic Judaism — a Judaism without the Torah and the Temple?that he was the revealed of the books of his forefathers, including the prime
val Torah in Jub i2:25-27.^45 Nickelsburg interprets the phrase in the context
of Third Isaiah where all humanity will join the Torah and the covenant (Isa
56:6-7; 60; 66:i8-24).^46 An allusion to the law may also be included in the
phrase Dttfp mi?^1 ?, "to the righteous way" (iv, 22), since the Hebrew equiva
lent "|TT is often used in relation to the Torah. Accordingly, there are reasons
to interpret what is revealed in the ninth week to all humanity, not only as
judgment, but also as the law, which forms the basis for judgment and righ
teousness. But we must admit, the wording is ambiguous, since the wording
from the Sinaitic Torah in 93:6 is not repeated.
It is important to notice how these reoccurrences of the chosen ones,
the temple, and the righteous law are arranged. The only reoccurrence up to
the time of the author is the chosen ones, to which he belongs himself. They
are elected out of a perverse generation. The two other reoccurrences lie in
the future. The reoccurrence of the law is especially tricky, because the ter
minology here is not taken from the Sinaitic Torah, but from Abraham and
the chosen ones in the way these are described in the seventh and eighth
week; cf. 1 En 93:10; 91:12; and iv, 12-16. The law to be revealed in the future is
not any longer simply the law from Sinai, but the one rooted in the wisdom
following the line from Enoch to Abraham to the chosen ones, to which the
author belongs.
Election through Abraham, election through the Torah, and election
through the temple are all cornerstones in the two narratives Neh 8-10 and
the Apocalypse. But when we read this from the perspective of the postexilic
period, we recognize that according to the Apocalypse there existed only one
group of chosen ones in contrast to the rest of the people, there existed no
legitimate temple, and there existed no legitimate law, at least outside the
sevenfold wisdom and knowledge the chosen were provided. Thus in rela
tion to Neh 8-10 as an example of a master narrative, the Apocalypse dis
plays all traits of a counterstory, contesting the communicative force of the
master narrative by displacing its plot. Through this displacement we must
conclude that the Apocalypse did not join the Mosaic discourse in postexilic
Judaism. It rather derived its authority from and lent its authority to an
Enochic discourse.
- Cf. Berner, Jahre, I38f.
- Nickelsburg, 1 Enoch 1, 449. The Aramaic J^l is attested in the meaning "law"; cf.
Murabb'at 20,3.8: yi, "law of Moses"; cf. K. Beyer, Die aramaischen Texte vom Toten
Meer (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1984), 309.