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language of the book, or the Hebrew or Aramaic, will be discussed later; here we have to decide on the relation existing between the Ethiopic and the Greek, from which our Enoch is a translation. As the Greek text, with the exception of some fragments, has been lost, this question cannot be apodictically decided, but there are means of reaching a probable result, sufficient to permit us to trust the text as we find it in the Ethiopic translation. This result can be reached in two ways, first by analogy, by seeing whether those translations of which the original Greek has been preserved are faithful representatives of these originals, and thus learning the general manner in which translations were made in Ethiopia, and secondly by comparing the fragments of Enoch that still remain with the translation. Following the first method, we naturally begin with the comparison of the version of the Bible, translated in the early days of Christianity among the Ethiopians, not from the Hebrew, but from the Septuagint. Here only one authority has a right to speak, the editor of the Octateuchus Aethiopicus, Prof. Dillmann. As late as 1877, after years of diligent research on this subject, his judgment of this translation and its relation to the Greek is as follow:! “With regard to the translation, it must be said that itis a very faithful one, generally giving the Greek text verbatim, often even the relative position of the words; it abbreviates only now and then whatever seemed superfluous, and must, on the whole, be called a successful and happy version. Notwithstanding its entire fidelity to the Greek text it is very readable and, especially in the historical books, smooth, and frequently coincides with the meaning and words of the Old Testament in a surprising manner. Of course there is a difference in this respect between the different books. The Ethiopic translators were by no means very learned men, and had not an absolute command of the Greek language; especially when they had to translate rare words and technical terms this clearly appears, and consequently some misunderstandings and mistakes have crept into the text through the fault of the translators.” This version of the Old Testament is, then, on the whole, a faithful copy of the Septuagint. The same must be said of the translation of Pastor Hermae, although here “the sins of omission” are much more frequent, especially in Similitudines iv., v., and vi., which are rather an epitome of the Greek than a translation. Positive mistakes do, indeed, now and then occur,! but the main deviations from the Greek are found in the omissions. These are by no means of much importance as to contents, except possibly in Sim. v. 2, and it would be difficult to decide who made these omissions, whether they were already found in the original of the translator, or introduced by him, or are to be ascribed to a copyist.2 A close comparison between the Ethiopic and the Greek text proves conclusively that the former is what can be called a good toe translation. As the Greek text of the Physiologus has never been issued in a critical edition, a reliable examination of the fidelity of the old Ethiopic translation can scarcely be made, yet the evidences seem sufficient to justify an opinion equally as favorable as that passed on the version of the Bible and on Pastor Hermae.3 The Greek text of the Ascensio Isaiae recently discovered, and published by Geghardt in Hilgenfeld’s Zeitschrift fiir wissenschaft. Theologie, 1878, pp. 330-353, is evidently a different recension from the one ' Cf. Dillmann, in Zeitschrift d. D. M. G. xv. p. 121 sqq. 2 Cf. Patres Apostol. ed. Gebhardt, Harnack et Zahn, Prolegomena to Hermas, p. xxx. > Cf. Hommel Die Aethiop. Uebersetzung des Physiologus, etc., 1877, p. xliii, sq. ! The results of these investigations will be mentioned and used in the Special Introduction and in the Notes. 1 Cf. Herzog, Real-Encyklopddie (2d edition), vol. I. p. 204.