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Comment by gjsman-1000 | Hacker News Reader

The Catholic Church at the Council of Rome formally defined what books were considered authentic and which ones were not (and this list was, with some reduction, also used by Protestants). The Book of Enoch was a bit contentious because of the quotation in an inspired book - but it was ultimately determined to be not inspired, and the quotation not necessarily either. (I.e. Imagine if scripture quoted a Roman decree - the decree is not inspired in spite of the quote.)

Despite this, the Book of Enoch and other rejected books do appear in some Bibles, with a warning about how they are apocryphal. Just because they aren’t inspired though (officially-speaking) doesn’t mean they can’t be interesting.

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I never understood the historical relevance of religious texts outside of the context of how they impacted societies. Because these religious texts are hardly orimary sources that state historical facts, they are closer to pure propaganda pieces.

So, for me, the question of forgeries is interesting because if forged texts were used someone had an interst in doing it. If a text is not a "forgery", it doesn't mean the text states objective truths so.

> Because these religious texts are hardly orimary sources that state historical facts,

You're overgeneralizing. The Bible is effectively something like an anthology compiled from texts written in different styles over thousands of years. The character of Genesis is quite different from, say, the New Testament Gospels. While Genesis is not intended to be a scientific text, the New Testament does describe events in a historical kind of manner.

> they are closer to pure propaganda pieces.

I have no idea what that means. You should probably revisit your assumptions.

I have a copy of Enoch 1, 2, 3; but I have not seen it included in any Bible. It is not part of the Apocrypha -- you don't find in the Orthodox Study Bible or a Catholic Bible. What Bible is it in? I would like to get it.

As a protestant I've certainly seen some of the deuterocanonical books in non-Catholic study Bibles. Not the same thing really as Enoch, which I think is a little bit more controversial.

Certainly -- you find Tobit, Judith, 1,2,3 Maccabees, Baruch, Wisdom of Sirach, and a couple others. But if there is a Bible with Enoch in it I want it. I try to read a different Bible every year.

We know much more Jewish and Christian religious literature from antiquity than found its way into the bible. The nomenclature for it is a bit confusing. There are the "apocrypha" of the "Old Testament" in the narrow sense, which are those parts nowadays excluded by the Protestants. And then there are the "apocrypha" in a wider sense, which is the literature that bears a certain generic resemblance to biblical writings. However, some texts related to the New Testaments were typically not called "apocrypha" because the term traditionally had something pejorative about it; so it is not used for "almost" canonical texts that were traditionally recommended as pious reading, such as the so-called "Apostolic Fathers"[1].

To everyone who is interested in the texts and backgrounds of the apocrypha of the New Testament, I can highly recommend the two volumns of Wilhelm Schneemelcher: "New Testament Apocrypha" (or for German speakers: "Neutestamentliche Apokryphen"): vol. I: "Gospels and Related Writings" and vol. 2: "Writings Relating to the Apostles Apocalypses and Related Subjects". They include a lot of texts, many in complete translations, and provide excellent philological introductions to each text. However, the Apostilic Fathers are not included. For this you must look for other editions.

[1] See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostolic_Fathers

> There are the "apocrypha" of the "Old Testament" in the narrow sense, which are those parts nowadays excluded by the Protestants.

Given the pejorative connotations of "apocrypha", Catholics don't accept that term for the books in their OT canon which are rejected by Jews and Protestants – they say the appropriate term is "deuterocanon" ("second canon"). Catholics do use the term "apocrypha" for books of similar antiquity (such as Enoch) which ended up being rejected from the Catholic canon. Many Protestants prefer to call those later books "pseudepigrapha", to avoid confusion with the books of the Protestant apocrypha / Catholic deuterocanon; however, in the strictest sense of the term, that's not entirely correct, since "pseudepigrapha" literally refers to false claims of authorship, and while most of these texts do make such false claims, some of them are instead anonymous.

I once owned a copy of The Gospel According to St. Barnabas (English translation - I'm no scholar), a deuterocanonical gnostic text. Very weird and magical. It describes the events of Jesus' descent into Hell, and his return. There are many resonances with "The Egyptian Book of the Dead".

I believe that it is canonical in ethiopian christianity so I think maybe their bibles contain it.

Ethiopian Christianity is in a lot of way really really special as it predates almost any other surviving christian society, they also claim to possess the literal "ark of the covenant". not to mention claims of links between Ethiopia and Israel doing the time of king David.

Yeah, it's Coptic canon.

The Ethiopian Orthodox Bible.

Yes .. I see Enoch is included in the version I found in Amazon. I wonder if it is just 1st Enoch?

Yes the Ethiopian version is considered Enoch 1.

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