The following chart contains three columns. The first column contains the text of a fragment from 1 Enoch found in the Dead Sea caves. It is truly a mere scrap with less than 10 complete words on it. Yet it is enough to show that it is the same as the passage in a much later document of 1 Enoch, shown in the second column. The Dead Sea cave fragment is in Aramaic; the later document is in Ethiopic. Thus, the Dead Sea cave fragment demonstrates that the later Ethiopic document preserves a pre-Christian Jewish text. This may be compared with the text of Enoch as quoted in the New Testament letter of Jude (verses 14–15), which is shown in the third column. Jude, however, has changed the prophecy of Enoch. In the original Enoch, the lord “will arrive.” As quoted in Jude, the passage is taken to refer to the Christ, “the Lord came.” Moreover, in Jude the “holy myriads” supposedly referred to in Enoch are “his” (Christ’s), a possessive not found in the original Enoch. According to Professor Charlesworth these changes were made for Christological purposes—“Christ is the Lord.”
