Enoch and the Mosaic Torah- The Evidence of Jubilees

Lutz Doering

riods of purification with a sacrifice. However, this does not imply "that a

birthing woman has no way of becoming pure"^12 but rather reflects the liter­

ary choice and perhaps the traditions of the author: before the apparent in­

vestiture of Adam to priesdy service (Jub 3:26-27), there is no priest in the

narrative world, let alone animal sacrifice. Purification is simply achieved by

waiting for the set number of days.

2. Awareness of ritual defilement through sexual intercourse. In Jubilees, as

G. Anderson has convincingly argued, Adam and his wife have sex before and

after their sojourn in Eden, but not in the Garden itself, according to Jub 3:6,

dealing with the time before they were brought to Eden, Adam "knew her (wa-

'a'mara)." And after their departure from Eden, we learn in 3:34 that "They

were childless throughout the first jubilee; afterwards he knew her?^13 Thus, no

sex in Paradise, but there had been some before, outside Eden. It stands to rea­

son that this is again a reflection of the notion of Eden as sanctuary, just as CD

12:1-2 and nQTa 45:11-12 ban intercourse or someone having had intercourse

from the Temple City. If this is correct, Jubilees can be said to share and apply

the notion of sexual intercourse as ritually defiling (cf. Lev 15:18). Additionally,

this seems to stand in the background of the prohibition of intercourse on the

Sabbath as well. Just as Eden is holier than any other place in the primeval

world (see n. 7), so the Sabbath is "holier than all (other) days" (Jub 2:26, with

extant Hebrew: 4Q218 1 2; cf. Jub 2:30,32). According to Jub 50:8," the one

"who lies with a woman" on the Sabbath incurs the death penalty. Ritual de­

filement by intercourse on the Sabbath is to be avoided because it is incom­

mensurate with the holiness of the Sabbath (cf. CD 11:4-5).^15

a higher degree of purity ("Purity and Impurity," 80) is unconvincing, since it makes no sense

of the specific periods of forty and eighty days.

12. Thus, however, Ravid, "Purity and Impurity," 77.

13. Cf. Anderson, "Celibacy," 128-29. Ravid's claim that pre-Eden sex would "contra­

dict the texts as we have them" ("Purity and Impurity," 78) is misleading.

14. L Ravid, "The Relationship of the Sabbath Laws in Jubilees 50:6-13 to the Rest of

the Book" (in Hebrew), Tarbiz 69 (2000): 161-66, claims that Jub 50:6-13 is a secondary addi­

tion to Jubilees, but her arguments are unconvincing; cf. L. Doering, "Jub. 50:6-13 als

Schlussabschnitt des Jubildenbuchs — Nachtrag aus Qumran oder ursprunglicher

Bestandteil des Werks?" RevQ 20, no. 79 (2002): 359-87; J. C. VanderKam, "The End of the

Matter? Jubilees 50:6-13 and the Unity of the Book," in Heavenly Tablets: Interpretation, Iden­

tity, and Tradition in Ancient Judaism, ed. L LiDonnici and A. Lieber, JSJSup 119 (Leiden:

Brill, 2007), 267-84.

15. Cf. Anderson, "Celibacy," 129-30 (temple-Sabbath analogy); L. Doering, "The

Concept of the Sabbath in the Book of Jubilees," in Studies in the Book of Jubilees, 179-205,196

("sanctification" analogous to Exod 19:10,14-15).