Paradise. If it be necessary that I should have undergone death, I have undergone it. If it be necessary that I should have seen Hell, I have seen it. Now I am come to Paradise, and that is my home; God has promised it to me, and now that I have entered I will leave it no more."
The dispute waxed hot, but it was terminated by the order of God, who bade Ridhwan open the gate and re-admit Enoch into Paradise, where he still dwells.[1]
2. THE BOOK OF ENOCH.
The Book of Enoch, quoted by S. Jude in his Epistle, and alluded to by Origen, S. Augustine, S. Clement of Alexandria, and others of the Fathers, must not be passed over.
The original book appears from internal evidence to have been written about the year 110 B.C.[2] But we have not the work as then written; it has suffered from numerous interpolations, and it is difficult always to distinguish the original text from the additions.
The book is frequently quoted in the apocryphal "Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs," which is regarded, as canonical by the Armenian Church, but the references are for the most part not to be found in the text. It was largely used by some of the early Christian writers, either with acknowledgment or without. The monk George Syncellus, in the eighth century, extracted portions to compose his Chronography. This fragment in Syncellus was all that was known of the book in the West till the last century. The Jews, though remembering the work, had lost it in Hebrew; but it was alluded to by the Rabbis down to the thirteenth century, and it is referred to in the Book Sohar, though the writer may not have read the book of Enoch. Bruce, the African traveller, was the first to bring it to Europe from Abyssinia in two MSS., in the year 1773. Much attention was not, however, paid to it till 1800, when De Sacy in his "Magasin Encyclopédique," under the title "Notice sur le Livre d'Enoch," gave some account of the work. In 1801, Professor Laurence gave to the public an English translation, accompanied by some critical remarks. Since then,
