Enoch and the Mosaic Torah- The Evidence of Jubilees

Gabriele Boccaccini

revealed prior to Sinaitic revelation."^12 In sum: the author of Jubilees wanted
neither to strengthen the Pentateuch nor to replace it.
At first sight the work of the author of Jubilees may appear similar to
that of an exegete who "moves through the familiar texts... solves various
problems that arise from them and at times provides longer clarifications re­
garding the meaning and significance of the biblical events and charac­
ters."^13 Yet, this was not the author of Jubilees' self-understanding. The doc­
ument was neither a new book of Chronicles, as R. H. Charles intended,^14
nor an early midrash that makes explicit what is supposedly already implicit
in the text and clarifies the unwritten, out of respect for the authority and
uniqueness of the Mosaic Torah. "Unlike Chronicles, Jubilees presents itself
as a revelation from an angel."^15

Jubilees claims to contain a written tradition that predates Sinai — a
tradition that started, long before the exodus, with Enoch, and was imple­
mented by Noah, Abraham, Jacob, and Levi and his sons. This parallel writ­
ten tradition was finally revealed to Moses on Mount Sinai along with the
Pentateuch, or "the book of the first Torah" (Jub 6 :22).
The existence of the heavenly tablets as the celestial urtext explains
both the similarities and the differences between Mosaic and Enochic tradi­
tions. They are similar inasmuch as they both depend on the same source.
They are different inasmuch as neither is a full copy of the celestial arche­
type. "Jubilees understands the Heavenly Tablets as an archive of divine
knowledge. The Torah and Jubilees even in combination constitute only a
limited publication of its contents."^16 The heavenly tablets, not Jubilees or
the Mosaic Torah, are the only comprehensive repository of God's will.

2. Mosaic or Enochic?

What makes the book of Jubilees unique is the explicit reference to both the
Mosaic Torah, the Pentateuch (a tradition that historically was handed down

12. Najman, "Interpretation as Primordial Writing," 394. See also Himmelfarb, "To­
    rah," 28: "Wacholder's claim that Jubilees represents itself as super-canonical is inaccurate";
    and J. C. Vanderkam, The Book of Jubilees (Sheffield: Academic, 2001), 12: "[Jubilees'] pur­
    pose was not to replace the first books of the Bible."


13. VanderKam, The Book of jubilees, 12.


14. R. H. Charles, APOT, 2:7: "The author of Jubilees sought to do for Genesis what
    the Chronicler had done for Samuel and Kings."


15. VanderKam, The Book of Jubilees, 135.


16. Himmelfarb, "Torah," 28.