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Enochic Studies in the 1500s--Works and Authors

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Overview

At the turn of the 16th century the book of Enoch still remained an elusive presence. In De Verbo mirifico (1494) Johannes Reuchlin repeated Giovanni Pico della Mirandola's complaint against the falsehood and ignorance often hidden behind such splendid titles as the books of Solomon and the books of Enoch. Reuchlin was familiar with the activities of the Collegium Ethiopicum, established in Rome since 1481 under Pope Sixtus IV who also gave the church of St. Stephen of Abyssinians to Ethiopian pilgrims. The presence of Ethiopian pilgrims is attested in Roma since 1315 and a delegation of Ethiopic priest attended the Council of Florence in 1431. Reuchlin visited Rome several times and was in correspondence with Johannes Potken who in 1513 in Rome co-edited with the Ethiopian friar Thomas Walda Samuel the first book ever printed in Ethiopic (Alphabetum seu potius syllabarium literarum Chaldaerarum, Rome, 1513). Neither Reuchlin nor Pico della Mirandola before him, however, seemed to be aware of any special connection between the Book of Enoch and Ethiopia. In De arte cabalistica (1517) Reuchlin implied that Pico had the book of Enoch as one of the "seventy secret books of Ezra," ignoring that Pico had instead only a Hebrew ms (and Latin translation) of Menahem Recanati's work, of which the editio princeps was published in 1523 and a commentary by Mordecai Jaffe appeared in 1595.

The figure of Enoch remained popular in esoteric circles all around Europe. In 1530 the Venetian alchemist Giovanni Agostino Panteo published 26 charachters purporting to be the pre-Flood "Enochian" alphabet. This alphabet was not the result of philological studies but of magical knowledge; after all, the art of alchemy was believed to derive from the fallen angels and be inscribed after the Flood in the Book of Chemes, who was identified with Cam, the son of Noah and descendent of Enoch.

Expectations of the "return" of Enoch continued to be very strong in millenaristic circles. In 1524, Martin Luther himself had to intervene to disprove these beliefs in his commentary on the Letter to Jude. The most notable incident occurred in 1533-34; after Melchior Hofmann predicted that Christ would return to earth, the anabaptist Jan Matthys ruled the city of Munster, Germany as the "New Jerusalem," declaring that he was the prophet Enoch redivivus. Matthys died during the siege of the city, when on Easter Sunday made a sally forth with thirty followers, convinced that Judgment Day had come.

First evidence of the existence of an actual book of Enoch in Ethiopia came in mid-16th century by Guillaume Postel. In 1551 in De Etruriae regionis Guillaume declared that the Enoch's prophesies made before the Flood were preserved in the archives of the Queen of Sheba and that to this day they were believed to be canonical scripture in Ethiopia. In 1553 he wrote in his De originibus that in Rome (most likely, in 1547) he had met an Abyssinian priest who illustrated him the content of 1 Enoch. According to Luis de Urreta, the Librarian of the Vatican Apostolic Library Guglielmo Sirleto also was made aware of the existence of the Book of Enoch in Ethiopia by two friers who visited the country (in 1579?) as members of a delegation sent by Pope Gregory XIII. But no progress was made in the recovery of the actual content of the book of Enoch.

The idea that magic and alchemy could provide a shortcut continued to fascinate European intellectual circles. The works of Panteo and Postel inspired British alchemist John Dee to team with visionary Edward Kelley in the search for the lost book. In 1583 they claimed to have received from the archangel Michael portions of the Book of Enoch written in the angelic (or "Enochian") alphabet that Enoch himself used to communicate with the angels.

@2014, Gabriele Boccaccini, University of Michigan