JUBILEES CHAPTER 1 ~ 4

THE BOOK OF JUBILEES

The Book of Jubilees is found in the Ethiopian canon of Scripture after the Book of Enoch and before the Book of Joshua. It is known there as The Book of the Divisions (of the Times), which also reflects references to it in the Qumran scrolls. The title Jubilees refers to the 49-year period that makes up the basis of dating in the book. The book is presented as being given as revelation to Moses by the Angel of the Presence, and covers the same material as the Pentateuch from the beginning up through about Exodus 16, although legal material from the rest of the Pentateuch is liberally referred to, ascribing it to pre-Mosaic times. It is within the same tradition as the Book of Enoch, which it quotes, and gives the details of the Jubilees calendar, which is based on 52 weekly cycles in one year and four seasons of 13 weeks each. Its emphasis on the heavenly tablets places it directly in the line of pre-Islamic revelation leading up to the Qur’an. The Books of Enoch and Jubilees form a triad with the Qur’an within the context of popular faith in Yemen and the Axumite kingdom in contrast to Monophysite Trinitarian Christianity. It is alluded to in the Qur’an in the prohibition of adding a thirteenth month. The story of Abraham beginning in Jubilees 12 has more in common with the Qur’an than with Genesis.

The original book was certainly in Hebrew, as the fragments in the Qumran texts demonstrate, but this versification is dependent on the translations I have been able to find from the Ethiopic, basically that of R. H. Charles, with reference to notes by many scholars including Joshua Williams (whose dating system I have followed completely), James C. VanderKam, James Charlesworth, Raymond R. Surburg, Leonhard Rost, Emil Schürer, Jellinek, Frankel, Beer, Dillmann, Rönsch, and Drummond. Perhaps I owe the greatest debt to Ras Feqade I’s comments on the Amharic text. I have checked the Qumran fragments with the Ethiopic text and noted a high degree of fidelity. Modern scholars tend to agree with R. H. Charles’s assessment that the book was written during the Hasmonean period between 109 and 105 B.C.E. Needless to say, conservative Ethiopian scholars find contradicting evidence and continue to maintain the Mosaic origin of the book. Along with Enoch, the Book of Jubilees as it appears in The Beloved and I contains the least scholarly contribution and in fact I have examined the Ethiopic text directly only in a few passages. These must be seen as little more than versifications, and my contribution lies almost entirely in the poetic commentary.

This is the story of division
Of the days of the law’s precision
And of the testimony true,
Of the events of years not few,
Of their year weeks, and Jubilees
Throughout all the chronologies
Of years of the world, as YHWH spoke
To Moses from Mount Sinai’s smoke
When he went up to get the tables
Of the law, the law that enables
Commandment by Ælohim’s voice
When he told him to make his choice,
‘Go up to the top of the Mount,’
To find that YHWH’s no catamount.

WEEK 15 JUBILEES 1

1 It happened in the first year that
The children of Israel who’d sat
In Egypt came out of that land,
In the third month, the sixteenth day
Of the month [day which was so scanned
As the week’s second day the way
The Jubilees calendar works,
Better than others without quirks,
The year was twenty-four fifty
Of the earth or Anno Mundi]
That YHWH spoke saying to Moses,
And said “Come up to Me on this
The mount, and I will give you two
Sapphire tablets of the law, clue
Of the commandment, that I’ve written,
So you may teach their hearts unsmitten.”

The Book of Jubilees, that holy script
That You gave to those who came from Egypt
By Your call out of slavery and to serve
You and Your holy name and never swerve,
Begins extolling the law writ on stone
That is what You spoke publicly alone,
And by it Moses should teach what is law
And how to understand with pious awe
The Scriptures of the prophets and the sent:
For this the Book of Jubilees was meant.
Beloved, may I hear Your voice in these songs
And follow Your guidance against all wrongs
Until I meet You and Your saints upon
A jubilee encrusted holy dawn.

2 And Moses went into the mount
Of Ælohim, and the account
Of YHWH’s glory stayed on Sinai,
And a cloud veiled him six days nigh.
3 Upon the seventh day he called
Moses out of the cloud enthralled,
And he saw YHWH’s light like a flame
Of fire upon the mountain came.
4 And Moses was on the mountain
Forty days and forty nights, in
That time Ælohim taught him all
The early and the later call
Of the division of all days
Of law and testimony’s ways.

Beloved, I’ve also fasted forty days,
And prayed that You might ever guide my ways,
And I have taken tablets from Your hand
Wrought in the shining jewels of Samarqand,
And writ with divine words in number ten.
I’ve heard Your voice, the voice that spoke to men
Once at Sinai, and so I take these words
At hand of prophet, though not jewelled sherds,
But ink and paper, yet the gems glow still
To tell me, my Beloved, to do Your will.
Let me live in that light of cloud and flame
That opens now Jubilees and Your name,
Division of all days and divine law
Laid bare before my eyes opened in awe.

5 And he said “Set your heart to each
Word which I’ll speak to you and preach
On this mountain, and write them in
A book so that their sons may win
A sight of how I’ve differed from
Them for the evil that has come
From their sinning against the pact
I made between myself and you
For their descendants not a few
Today on Mount Sinai I act.

Upon a mesa in New Mexico
There is an ancient stone whose faces show
The Hebrew writing of the Decalogue
In a strange script of old that was in cog
For decades as the coming White men tried
To decipher the message the words hide.
The faith of humankind is summarized
The words that Sinai’s summit realized.
Another stone Hopewellian dug out deep
Shows the same words that You asked us to keep,
And that too was thought but a hoax until
It turned out its writing style gave a thrill
At being unknown at the time of finding.
Beloved, Your law is still on all men binding.

6 “And so when all these things occur
To them, they shall know that they were
Not so true as I in their thoughts
And in their deeds, and they’ll have lots
Of evidence I’m in their plots.
7 “And write for yourself all these things
That I declare to you like kings
Today, for I know their rebellion
And their stiff neck, and like a hellion,
Before I bring them to the land
Of which I swore in My command
To their fathers, to Abraham
And Isaac and Jacob his lamb,
Saying ‘To your descendants I
Shall give a land beneath the sky
Flowing with milk and honey,’ 8 and
They will eat and be satisfied,
And they will turn to strange gods’ hand,
To gods who cannot take their side
Delivering them from tribulation.
And this witness in its own station
Shall be heard for a testimony
Against them, for they will be phoney,
Forgetting all My commandments,
Even all I’ve told them with sense,
And they will follow Gentiles’ way,
And after their uncleanness’ sway,
And after their shame, and will serve
Their gods, and these will in their verve
Prove unto them an offence and
A tribulation and affliction
And snare. 9 “And many with conviction
Will perish and they will be taken
Captive, and will fall, being shaken,
Into the hands of enemy,
Because they have forsaken Me
And My ordinances and My
Commandments, and festivals by
My covenant, Sabbaths, and My
Holy place which I’ve hallowed for
Myself among them and their store,
And My tabernacle, and My
Sacred sanctuary, which I
Have hallowed for Myself on earth,
That I should set my name of worth
Upon it, and that it should stay
There, 10 “and they’ll make themselves one day
High place, graven image, and grove,
And they will worship, each his Jove,
So as to go astray, and they
Will sacrifice their children to
Demons, to all works that endue
Their hearts with error. 11 “And I’ll send
Witnesses to them to contend
Against them, but they will not hear,
But will press onward without fear
And will slay the witnesses too,
And they will persecute those who
Seek the law, and they’ll abrogate
And change everything in their hate
So as to work their wickedness
Before My eyes. 12 “In my distress
I’ll hide My face from them, and I’ll
Deliver them into the guile
Of the Gentiles’ captivity,
And for a prey, and for freely
Devouring, and I will remove
Them from the land’s midst and to prove
I’ll scatter them among the nations.

No wonder book of Jubilees was dropped
From the book of the law, because it propped
A prophecy that Your folk given law
And blessing would forget the fear and awe
That overcame them before Sinai and
Before the Decalogue of Your command,
That they would wrest the Scriptures from the truth
And depart from the way of right and ruth.
You told them what they would do in the land
Of milk and honey, and You told what snare
Would catch their minds and feet gone anywhere.
Beloved, keep me from every ancient flaw
Arising from idolatry and lack
Of taking Decalogue to read the slack.

13 “They’ll forget My adjudications
And all My commandments and all
My judgments, and will follow call
To go astray as to first days
Of the months, and Sabbaths, and ways
Of festivals, and jubilees,
And ordinances. 14 “After these
They’ll turn to Me then from among
The Gentiles with all heart and tongue
With all their soul and all their strength,
And I’ll gather them from the length
And breadth amongst all the Gentiles,
And they will seek me by the whiles,
So that I shall be found by them,
When they seek me with stratagem
Of all their heart and all their soul.
15 “And I will show to them the goal,
Abounding peace with righteousness,
And turn them to the law for goal,
With all My heart and all My soul.

You said beforehand they would take the timing
Of Babylon to start the month moon rhyming,
And still that thing is done, and so Your Sabbath
Becomes a profaned thing to him who stabbeth,
Be he a Jew or Christian or one given
Islam or peace after he’d vainly striven.
Indeed, Beloved, gather to You again
From all these profane faiths vouchsafed to men,
And turn all to Your law, ten-splendoured code
That echoes still where the archangel rode.
With all Your heart and soul turn us again,
Beloved, to Decalogue to rule all men.
And I shall rest in Your sweet thunderings
Until the moment passes with its stings.

They shall be for a blessing, not
For curse, and they shall be the knot
And not the tail. 16 “And I will build
My sanctuary among them,
And I will surely live with them,
And I will be their God and they
Shall be My people all the way
In truth and righteousness. 17 And I
Will not abandon them to sod
Nor ever fail them, because I
Am YHWH” He told him, “and their God.”

Where is Your sanctuary now, Beloved?
It’s broken down and all its tent-stakes shoved.
And yet the ark of testimony still
Contains the tablets of Your divine will,
And though it may be hidden from the eye,
It still shines brightly from the place I try
To make Your temple in a heart of flesh
Where Psalms of David and Your law enmesh.
Do not abandon me, but be my God
In the unholy pathways where I trod
As I go on the earth to seek Your face
That shines within the tabernacle’s place.
Thus I may be a blessing as I whirl
About this slaughterhouse like any churl.

18 And Moses prayed in face prostration
And said “Abandon not Your nation,
O YHWH my God, do not throw out
Your folk and heritage devout,
To wander in the error of
Their hearts, and do not, without love,
Deliver them into the hands
Of their enemies, Gentile bands,
Lest they in ruling them should cause
Them to sin against You and laws.
19 “Let your mercy, O Lord, be lifted
Upon Your people who have drifted,
Create in them an upright heart,
Let not Beliar’s spirit’s part
Rule over them accusing them
Before You, and to ensnare them
From all the paths of righteousness,
So that they come into distress
And perish from before Your face.
20 “But they are Your people and race,
Which You delivered with your great
Power from the Egyptians’ estate,
Create in them a clean heart and
A holy spirit, let them stand
Not to be ensnared in their sins
From henceforth till for ever wins.”

Prayer on the face, prostrated on the ground,
Is prayer of every prophet to be found,
Not only Moses, but from first to last.
I also on my face let prayers go past.
Beloved, the prayer of Moses in behalf
Of Israel about to meet the calf
Is prayer I take upon my lips today.
Have mercy on a world caught in the sway
Of idol worship in the church and mart.
Have pity on the petty, profane heart
That rules the world I live in from the start.
I share distress of Moses not just for
Two millions of Your folk and hardly more,
But for a world taught to be idol whore.

21 And YHWH said unto Moses “I
Know their contrariness and why
Their thoughts and their stiff-neckedness, and
They will not obediently stand
Till they confess their own sin and
Sin of their fathers. 22 “After this
They’ll turn to Me in uprightness,
With all their heart and all their soul,
And I will circumcise the toll
Of foreskin on their heart as well
As foreskin on their children’s spell
Of heart, and I’ll create in them
A holy spirit, not condemn
But I will cleanse them so they’ll not
Turn from Me that day till the lot
Of all eternity is cast.
23 “And their souls will cleave to Me fast
And to all My commandments, they
Will fulfil My commandments’ way,
And I will be their Father, they
Shall be My children too, 24 “and they
All shall be called the children of
Ælohim the Living above,
And every angel, every spirit
Shall know indeed that these are near it,
My children, and that I’m their Father
In uprightness and without bother
In righteousness, and that I love them.
25 “And write down for yourself above them
All these words I declare to you
On this mountain, the first and few
Until the last, which shall come to
Pass in all the divisions of
The days in the law from above
And in the testimony and
In the weeks and jubilees grand
Unto eternity, until
I descend and live with them still
Throughout eternal days fulfil.”
26 And He said to the angel of
The presence “Write down the above
For Moses from creation’s start
Till My sanctuary has part
Among them built for all time and
Eternity. 27 And YHWH’ll appear
Before the eyes of all who fear,
And all shall know that I’m the God
Of Israel and Father with rod
To all the children of Jacob,
And King on Mount Zion for all
Eternity, and Zion’s hub
Jerusalem, holy and tall.”

Write down indeed! What words of grace are these,
That form a book of knowledge, one that frees
Men for all time from all idolatry,
Revealing You, Beloved, one Deity
The God of Israel and Father of
All the children of Jacob, Lord of love
And King on Mount Zion eternally!
For life eternal, YHWH, is knowing Thee,
And so I seek Your face in every place
That is Your sanctuary in this race,
And find my refuge in palace above
This book and rhyme that is Your written love.
The Scripture is spelt out in rhymes of men,
But Jubilees writing is angel’s ken.

28 The angel of the presence who
Went before Israel’s camp seized new
Tablet on which were scribed for fears
All the divisions of the years.
29 He seized the tablet with the writing
Of the law and witness enlighting
The weeks of jubilees according
To their years and to their affording
The number of the jubilees,
From the time of creation’s breeze
Up to the full creation of
New earth beneath and heaven above,
By all the heavenly hosts of love.
30 By all creation of the earth,
Till YHWH’s sanctuary of worth
Shall be made in Jerusalem
On mount of fortress, every gem
Of luminaries be renewed
For healing and for peace, not feud,
And for blessing all the elect
Chosen of Israel, to inspect
That it is so from that day and
To all the days of the earth’s land.

JUBILEES 2

1 And the angel of the presence
Spoke to Moses according to
The sacred, lovely word of YHWH,
Saying “Write the whole story’s sense
Of the creation, how in six
Days YHWH Ælohim without tricks
Finished all His works and all that
He had created, and kept at
The seventh day the Sabbath and
Hallowed it for all ages, and
Appointed it to be a sign
For all His works good and benign.
2 “For He’s created on the first
Day heavens that are not the worst,
And He created earth and waters
And all the spirits and their daughters
That serve before Him not accursed.

Upon the finishing of Your creation
You mounted on the throne of adulation
Observing Sabbath in Your praise and honour.
The earth was done and everything upon her
As evening neared and sixth day, day of blessing
Drew to a close. The warm night was caressing
The new world that bowed down before Your throne,
Confessing in each tongue that You alone
Are God, Creator, Sovereign over all.
From gnat to brontosaur they heard the call
To worship and they came. I do the same
On this new Sabbath day remembering
That You, Beloved, are Sovereign and my King,
As I recite from breath to breath Your name.

And He created angels of
The presence, and angels above
Who praise, angels appointed on
The fire, and the darkness till dawn,
And on the light, angels of frost,
And on the hail, on water tossed,
On lightning and on thunder too,
Angels appointed as winds do,
Angels appointed on all winds
Contained in ice, where frost rescinds,
In autumn and in rainy season,
In dry and in the springtime season,
On ordered earth and heaven’s reason,
Angels set over all the streams
And over darkness till it gleams
On dusk and on the dawn that YHWH
Prepared in knowledge from His cue."
He told him saying, “Write all things
Of which the great creation sings.”
3 And at that time we saw His works
And praised Him greatly without shirks
Because of all the things He’s done,
For seven great things on day one.

On the first day, Beloved, You made the spirit
Of every thing, of heaven and all things near it,
Of darkness and abyss, of snow and hail,
Of cold and heat, of frost, of calm and gale.
You made the angel watchers of all things
And spirits of all creatures in their rings.
The angels of the presence and of fire
Were born that day prepared of Your desire,
The knowledge of Your heart. Therefore they saw
Your works in praise, and stood in joyful awe
To laud Your name. Let angel watchers come
Upon my breathing on the first day’s sum
And praise the work of seven You have done
Upon my heart beginning new day one.

4 And on the second day He made
Expanse between the waters stayed,
For on that day waters divided
For half to go up as provided,
And half to go down towards the earth
With the expanse between for worth
And He did only this task on
The second day and for its dawn.
5 And upon the third day He said
“Let the waters in one place led
Upon the earth be there defined,
And make the earth appear inclined.”
He did everything like He said.
6 And as He commanded the waters
Just so they did, and all the waters
On earth went to one place to stay
And were confined in ocean spray
Beneath expanse on the earth’s way.
7 And on that day He did create
The depths of sea each in its state,
And all the streams to go their way,
And all springs at the mountains’ root
Within the earth, that upward shoot
According to their place and time
From mountains’ root, and wells that climb
Up in the earth. And He created
Each seed of every seed kind mated,
All seeds to eat, orchards of trees
That bear their fruit and plants that He’s
Created for their Paradise,
On the third day these four things nice.
8 And on the fourth day He created
The moon and sun, stars complicated,
And He set them in the expanse
That they might all shine there and dance
Upon all the earth. And He made
Them rule night and day, boundary stayed
Between the dark and light arrayed.
9 And YHWH created sun for sign
Greatly upon the earth’s design,
To be a sign for Sabbath days,
For other days and holidays,
For months, for Jubilees and for
The times and eras still in store,
For all the seasons of the year,
10 For light and darkness that appear,
For healing all the things that sprout
And grow upon the earth no doubt,
11 These three things He created by
The fourth day on the earth and sky.

Note well, Beloved, how in the story that
You tell before the Genesis that sat
On lesser and the greater lights for sign,
That here only the sun gives the design,
Not only of the days, but of what’s more,
The months, and takes up every other chore.
Moon worship clouds the mind and eye of all
Who choose the almanac of fateful fall
Of Babylon, and call months by the names
Of heathen gods and wicked pagan shames.
Though moons may guide the priesthood’s yearly roll,
All festivals are counted by the toll
Of sun except Hajj pilgrimage when done
And Ramadhan, by moon instead of sun.

Upon the fifth day He created
Great whales in deep waters elated.
All of these were created by
His power, for all flesh under sky
And blood, and all creatures that swim
Within the waters made by Him,
All birds that fly and also fish
Of every kind made you could wish,
12 And the sun rose on them for life
Above all on earth without strife,
All things that sprout in woods and bear
Fruit, and on all flesh everywhere.
13 All these three things He has created
On the fifth day, He was elated.
And on the sixth day He created
All animals and beasts related
All kinds upon the earth instated.
14 After He created all this
Creation He made in His bliss
One man, He created female
And male, and gave them without fail
Dominion over all the earth
And what is in the sea of worth,
Dominion gave him over beast
And bird, all things at last at least
Upon the earth of animals,
On all the world his power falls,
15 He did create these four creations
Upon the sixth day in their stations.
All the created things that were
Numbered twenty-two that occur,
16 Upon the sixth day He had done
With all He made on earth and won
In heaven and in the deep and sea,
Between the dark and light to be
Upon the earth under the sun.
17 And He gave us a great sign in
The Sabbath day, to rest therein
From all our work on seventh day
For having worked six days for pay.
18 All angels who praise and all those
Angels of presence, these enclose
Both many parties, He commanded
That we might honour Him full-handed
On earth and in heaven who chose
To keep the Sabbath as it goes.
19 He told us thus, “I shall divide
Parties from amongst peoples wide,
To keep the Sabbath unto Me
In honour and most faithfully,
To bless them holy unto me
As I have blessed the Sabbath day,
And I shall honour them that way,
Who are My folk and I their God.
20 “I chose the seed of Jacob’s rod
From all on earth, and wrote him down
As first born child in My own town,
To honour him eternally.
And I’ll show them the Sabbath day
That they may keep Sabbath each way
And rest upon it from all work,
21 “To make My sign and not to shirk,”
But keeping with us holiday
To eat and drink and bless the way
On seventh day of Him who made
And blessed and sanctified arrayed
A people for His own to keep
The Sabbath with us and not sleep,
But praise YHWH that Creator stayed.
22 He caused His commands to ascend
As a sweet savour to amend
Acceptable to Him all days.
23 Two and twenty heads in their ways
Of mankind from Adam to Jacob,
And twenty-two kinds of work wake up
Until seventh day, this is blessed
And holy, indeed holy rest,
24 And serves for sanctifying and
For blessing that they might in hand
Who keep the law and covenant
Be honoured and a separate nation
In all their days just as He sent
Once honour and appreciation
Upon the seventh day to make
A Sabbath. 25 Six days He did take
Creating heaven and earth and all,
And Ælohim made at His call
The seventh day holy, for all
His works, therefore He commanded
That whosoever on it did
Any work should die, and that he
Who defiles it shall surely be
Put to death. 26 Wherefore do you tell
Children of Israel to keep well
This day that they may keep it holy
And not do on it, fast or slowly,
Any work, so they shall not be
Rooted out of land of the free,
For it’s a holy day and blessed.
27 And all who break it shall die death,
For it’s holy, sanctified breath,
For Israel’s folk to keep this day
Through all their generations’ way,
And put to death all persons who
Take up any tasks there to do,
Die for eternity distressed.
28 And every one who stays to rest
And keep Sabbath thereon from all
His work, will hear the holy call
And be blessed throughout all his days
Even as we are in our ways.
29 Declare and say to Israel’s sons
The law of this day and its shuns
Both that they should keep Sabbath and
That they should not forsake its band
In their hearts’ error, that it’s not
Lawful to do work as is taught
Thereon which is unseemly, and
Their own pleasure, that they should stand
Not to prepare thereon their food
Nor any drink, for that is rude,
Nor to draw water, or bring in
Or take out thereon, which is sin,
Through their gates any burden, which
They had not prepared in a pitch
For themselves on the sixth day in
Their dwellings. 30 And they shall not bring
In nor take out from house to house
On that day, for that day’s a thing
More holy and blessed than the douse
Of any day of jubilee
Of jubilees, on this we see
To keep Sabbath in heaven above
Before it was made known in love
To any flesh Sabbath to keep
Upon the earth sowing to reap.
31 And the Creator of all things
Blessed it, but He did not make holy
All peoples and nations made lowly
To keep on it the Sabbath day,
But only Israel saw the way.
So He let them both eat and drink
And keep Sabbath and so not sink
Upon the earth. 32 And the Creator
Of all things blessed this day which later
He had created for blessing
And holiness, glory to sing
Above all days. 33 This law and its
Testimony was given as fits
To the children of Israel as
A law for ever and that has
Strength as each generation sits.

The Sabbath is a blessing given to
The sons of Israel, for them to do
And for no other people. Does that mean
That Rabbis in New York alone have lien
On divine law? No, the true Jew is he
Who takes the blessing of eternity
Once given to our father Abraham
And spoken to Moses by great I AM,
And walked about with Adam and with Noah.
The true Jew’s not the man caught in the Shoah
Alone, but every man and woman joined
To divine temple by the covenant
Of their obedience to You to plant
Their prayers toward Your house, in faith new-coined.

WEEK 16 JUBILEES 3

1 On the six days of second week
We brought, according as to seek
The word of Ælohim, unto
Adam all the beasts, cattle too,
And all the birds, and everything
That moves on the earth, everything
That moves in water, according
To their kinds, and by all their kinds,
The beasts on the first day, the cattle
On second day, the birds to rattle
On the third day, and all that moves
Upon the earth the fourth day proves,
And that moves in the water on
The fifth day from evening to dawn.
2 And Adam named them all by their
Respective names, and what their share
He called them, that was their name fair.

In six days working, You, Beloved, made all
The world and what is in it without awl
Or thread, the canopy of stars at night
And every bird and yawling beast in sight.
You need no time nor space to make the world,
But time and space are something You unfurled,
A canvas where You paint Your masterpiece.
The days arise in turn, nor do nights cease,
Since You sang lovely words creating sound
And light, and shaped the dazzling world a round.
The human being took as long and quickly,
To name the beastly souls You made so thickly.
Six days I name the labours of the week,
The seventh dare to take Your name and speak.

3 And on these five days Adam saw
All these, male and female, by law
According to every kind that
Was on the earth and where he sat,
But he was alone and found no
Help corresponding to his show.
4 And YHWH said unto us “It’s not
Good that alone a man should plot,
Let us make a help corresponding
To him.” 5 YHWH our God not desponding
Caused a deep sleep in trance to fall
Upon him, and he slept withal,
And He took for the woman one
Side from among his two sides done,
And this side was the origin
Of the woman from his sides’ bin,
And He built up the flesh instead,
And built the woman and well fed.
6 And He awakened Adam out
Of his sleep, on waking from doubt
He rose on the sixth day, and He
Brought her to him, and also he
Recognized her, and said to her,
“This is now bone of my bones, sir,
And flesh of my flesh, she shall be
Called my wife, because she was taken
From her husband.” 7 Therefore man shaken
And wife shall be one flesh, therefore
Shall a man leave his father’s store
And his mother, and cleave unto
His wife, and they shall be one true
Flesh. 8 In the first week human being
Created was, and the side freeing,
His wife, and in the second week
He showed her unto him to seek.
And for this reason the command
Was given to keep in their confinement
Of defilement, for a male’s hand
Seven days, and for the refinement
Of a female twice seven days.
9 And after Adam had his stays
Of forty days in the land where
He’d been created, we would bear
Him into the garden of Eden
To till and keep it, put the seed in,
But his wife they brought in upon
The eightieth day and at dawn,
And after this she entered in
Garden of Eden without sin.

Three kinds of thought are set in mind of man
And woman to reveal Your divine plan.
The first is reason, deduction’s array,
The thought we use to quarrel in our way
When one is logical, the other not.
The second is experimental plot,
Empiricism that we use in science
To produce technological appliance.
The third is mythopoeic-magical
That sees connexion between art and sal.
Because Eve appeared in fortnight of days
And Adam after seven, for Your praise,
Confinement on each birth in mimicry
Follows the weeks throughout eternity.

10 And for this reason the command
Is writ on heavenly tablets grand
About her that gives birth, “If she
Bears a male, she shall remain free
In her uncleanness seven days
According to first week of days,
And thirty and three days shall she
Remain in blood of purifying,
And she shall not touch in defying
A hallowed thing, nor enter in
The sanctuary to her sin,
Until she finishes these days
Which are enjoined as in the case
Of a male child. 11 “But in the case
Of a female child she’ll remain
In her uncleanness two weeks reign
Of days, according to the first
Two weeks, and sixty-six days burst
In blood of her purification,
And they will be within that station
In all eighty days.” 12 And when she
Had completed these days eighty,
We brought her into Eden’s garden,
For it is holier than pardon
Of all the earth besides, each tree
That’s planted in it is holy.
13 That’s why there was ordained about
Her who bears male or without doubt
A female child the statute for
Those days that she should touch no more
Holy thing, nor enter into
The sanctuary until few
These days for the male or female
Child are finished, 14 this is the law
And testimony which in awe
Was written down for Israel,
In order that they should do well
Observing it all days that fell.

The law of Moses, it is true, goes back
To principles well-founded without lack
In Genesis and in the world’s creation.
The selfish look only to their salvation,
While faithful seek instead Your own design,
Beloved, and where in all You put the sign
Of divine presence and of happy grace.
The faithful seek instead of life Your face.
And rather than Your face at first they find
The life that You have given, not to the blind
Who gloat on human sacrifice, but on
The faithful who find Your law in the dawn
And keep the days from forty on to eighty
In matters light and matters firm and weighty.

15 In first week of first jubilee, [1-7 A.M.]
Adam and his wife were freely
In the garden of Eden for
Seven years tilling, keeping store,
And we gave him work and we taught
Him to do all things as he ought
In agriculture, 16 and he tilled
The garden, and was naked filled
And did not recognize it, and
Was not ashamed, and he lent hand
Protecting the garden from birds
And beasts and cattle, and their turds,
And gathered its fruit, ate, and put
Aside remainder for his foot
And for his wife and put aside
That which was saved there to abide.
17 And after the completion of
The seven years, which he in love
Completed there, seven years exact, [8 A.M.]
And in the second month, in fact
On the month’s seventeenth day first
Day of the week, the serpent worst
Came and approached the woman, and
The serpent told the woman grand,
‘Has Ælohim commanded you,
Saying you shall not eat the due
Of every garden’s tree on cue?’

It is a trial that serpent is content
To meet each lady and her man who went
Before the tree of knowledge of the right
And wrong on Sunday mornings and to bite
Once more the fruit forbidden. Church doors wide
Are opened on that serpent-chosen day
And week by week seduce the meek inside
With fruitless entertainment in the bay.
The seventeenth day of the second comes
Each spring as bud appears and new bee hums,
But no one has the front to celebrate
The serpent festival, and yet of late
The weekly meeting spreads his scaly word
To Christian and non-Christian undeterred.

18 And she said to it, ‘Of the fruit
Of all the garden trees to boot
Ælohim’s said to us, eat, but
Of the fruit of the tree of what
Is in the midst of the garden,
Ælohim’s said unto us men,
You shall not eat thereof, nor shall
You touch it, lest you die for sal.’
19 And the serpent upon the earth
Going for all the snake was worth
Said to the woman, ‘As YHWH knows
That upon the day that you chose
To eat of it, your reason’s eye
Shall be opened into the sky,
And you shall be as Ælohim,
Discerning good from evil dream.
You shall not surely die a death.
20 And the woman saw in one breath
That the tree was desired and fine
For eye to see, its fruit benign
For food, she sliced and ate the same,
21 And when she’d first covered her shame
With fig leaves, she gave some to eat
To Adam and he ate the treat,
And their eyes were opened to view,
And he saw he was naked too.
22 He took fig leaves and sewed them up,
And made an apron for his sup.
23 And YHWH cursed the serpent condemned
Forever. 24 And His anger stemmed
Upon the woman, since she heard
The thing the serpent told in word,
Ate the fruit of fig undeterred,
He told her “I will multiply
Your sorrow greatly by and by
And your pains in your toil, a child
Will be born, bring unreconciled
Sadness and sorrow. When he’s born
Turn to your husband, and forlorn
Take comfort in his ruling horn.”

Here is new light that Genesis neglects,
Although it’s something every man suspects,
That You, Beloved, were angry with the lady
As well as with the serpent and the shady
Remarks he made upon the tree. To read
The story in the first book I take heed
That You believed the slim excuse she gave
That serpent in his wording played the knave
And with word-play deceived her innocent.
No doubt it’s true, and veils are still unrent
Between the truth and what I fail to see.
Belovèd, let no anger fall on me.
I turn from right and wrong and knowledge of
Them both to flee to You and to Your love.

25 And to Adam also he said
“Since you have heard what your wife read
And eaten from that fruit of fig,
That I commanded you renege,
That you might not eat of the thing,
Therefore upon the earth I sing
A curse for your sake, let it make
Thorn and thistle and for your sake,
As you have been found from the earth
And as you will return toward earth,
Eat your bread in sweat of your face,
Till you return unto your place
On the earth from where you were found,
Agonized, toiling on the ground.”
26 He dressed them in clothes made of hide
And sent from Garden to abide.
27 On that day on which Adam went
Forth from the Garden, there he meant
To offer as a sweet aroma
An offering savour and diploma,
Of frankincense, galbanum, and
Stacte, and spices in the land
At morning with the rising of
The sun from the day push for shove
When he covered his shame with glove.

The sacrifices first laid down to You,
Beloved, were not the blood of goat and ewe,
Nor were they flour and oil and wine outspread
As in the law of Moses it was said
That each might bring up to a certain rate
As he turned to You worried for his fate.
Ah no, the sacrifice of Adam raises
The savour of the frankincense in blazes,
And spices sweetly in the morning sun.
Let my prayers and remembrances be done
In sweetness to Your name, in galbanum
And stacte, till I make the glorious sum
Of one in You and in all only You
Who are Beloved and great in what You do.

28 And on that day was closed the mouth
Of all beasts from the north to south,
And of the cattle, and of birds,
And of whatever walks with words,
And of whatever moves, so that
They could no longer speak for spat,
For they had all spoken before
With one another with the store
Of lip and tongue, one language more.

In days gone past, according to both myth
And book of revelation both bird with
The beast were blessed with tongue to speak like man
And woman, laying open thought and plan.
Now such communication seems to be
In dream and vision only, or story.
No animal greets man with human words,
No animal at all and but few birds.
Although they cannot praise with human speech,
That does not mean they fail indeed to reach
The ultimate in truth or in recital.
To sing Your name is all that’s truly vital.
And all things in their own tongues cantillate
The word of truth and of Your sovereign state.

29 And He sent out of Eden’s field
All flesh of Eden’s Garden’s yield,
And all flesh was scattered abroad
According to its kinds and mod,
And according to all its types
Into the places without gripes
Created for them. 30 And alone
To Adam did He give as shown
To cover up his shame when grown,
Of all the beasts and all the cattle.
31 On this account, and not for battle,
It’s written on the heavenly plates
Concerning all who know the rates
Of judgment of the law, that they
Should cover up their shame that way,
And should not uncover themselves
As do the Gentiles and their elves.
32 And on the first day of the fourth
Month (fourth day of the week as pour’th),
Adam and his wife went both forth
From the Garden of Eden, and
They lived in Elda in the land
Of their creation. 33 And Adam
Called the name of his wife not Sam
But Eve. 34 And they had no son till
First jubilee rose on the hill. [8 A.M.]
And after this he knew her still.
35 Now he would till the land as he
Had been instructed when once free
In the Garden of Eden’s spree.

JUBILEES 4

1 And in the third week in the second
Jubilee she gave birth as reckoned
To Cain, and in the fourth she gave
Birth to Abel, and in the wave
Of the fifth she gave birth to her
Daughter Awan, as must occur.
2 And in the first year of the third
Jubilee, Cain killed, as occurred,
Abel because Ælohim did
Accept Abel’s sacrifice bid,
And did not accept that of Cain.
3 So in the field Abel was slain,
And his blood cried out from the ground
To heaven, complaining at the sound
Because he’d killed him. 4 And YHWH spoke
Reproving Cain because the bloke
Abel was dead, because he had
Killed him, and so he made the lad
A fugitive on earth because
Of the blood of his brother’s paws,
And he cursed him upon the earth.
5 And on this account it was worth
Writing upon the heavenly slates,
“Cursed is the one who smites his neighbour
With treachery or other labour,
And let all who have seen and heard
Say, ‘So be it’, and undeterred
The man who has seen not declaring
Let him be accursed as a swearing.”
6 And for this reason we announce
When we had come upon the pounce
Before YHWH our God all the sin
Which is committed in the bin
Of heaven and on earth, and in
Light and darkness, without, within.

Confession is the first remembrance of
The divine name, the name of grace and love.
Who come before Your face in judgment or
In worship first proclaim this thing before
They take Your hallowed name on human lip.
So I confess to You in what I slip
And every sin in heaven and earth to make
My voice clean that would else unworthy take
Your gracious name. Beloved, let me announce
What needs forgiveness and fully renounce
The evil way as I stand naked on
The dergah floor before the stone knife drawn.
Then from my bowing rise to whirl in light,
The sacred dark and everywhere in sight.

7 And Adam and his wife mourned for
Abel four weeks of years, what’s more [99-127 A.M]
And in the fourth year of the week
Number five [130 A.M.] they came to their peak
And became joyful, so Adam
Again knew his wife for a slam,
And she bore him a son, and he
Called his name Seth, and because he
Said “God has raised a second seed
To us on earth after the bleed
Of Abel, for Cain slew him.” 8 And
In the sixth week [134-40 A.M.] he got in hand
His daughter Azura. 9 And Cain
Took Awan his sister as wife
And she bore him Enoch for strife
At the close of fourth jubilee. [190-196 A.M.]

While Enoch son of Cain bears the same name
As Enoch who walked with You without blame,
The two are as unlike as any two
Initiated in secrets to do.
Perhaps one took the name of enemy
And so perpetuated enmity
In epithets. Perhaps the title won
In the initiation caused the fun.
But has anyone had pity upon
The mother of Enoch and wife once drawn
By lot for Cain, first murderer in kind?
Perhaps she stood behind her men and blind.
Perhaps she suffered that her brood became
A wicked crew, perhaps basked in their fame.

And in the first year of the wee
First week of the fifth jubilee, [197 A.M.]
Houses were built on earth, and Cain
Built a city, called not in vain
After his son Enoch by name.
10 And Adam knew his wife of fame
Eve and she bore yet nine sons more
That’s twelve in all, lacking of score.
11 In the fifth week of jubilee
Number five [225-31 A.M.] Seth made family
With Azura his sister as
Wife, and in the fourth year he has
Of the sixth week [235 A.M.] she bore to him
Enos. 12 And he began with vim
To call upon the name of YHWH
Upon the earth. 13 And in third week
Of seventh jubilee [309-315 A.M.] the meek
Enos took Noam his sister for
To be his wife, and so she bore
To him a son in the third year
Of the fifth week, [311 A.M.] it does appear
He called his name Kenan. 14 And at
The end of the eighth jubilee [325, 386-392 A.M.]
Kenan took Mualeleth out flat
His sister for to be his wife,
And she bore him a son by fife
In the ninth jubilee, and in
The first week in the third year’s bin
Of this week, [395 A.M] and he called his name
Mahalalel. 15 And in the same
Second week of tenth jubilee [449-455 A.M.]
Mahalalel himself made free
To take to wife Dinah, the daughter
Of Barakiel, she was the daughter
Of his father’s brother, and she
Bore him a son in the third wee
Week in the sixth year, [461 A.M.] and he called
His name Jared, and not appalled,
For in his days YHWH’s angels came
Down on the earth, those with the name
Of Watchers, that they should instruct
The children of men to conduct
Themselves in judgment and uprightly
On earth and do so well and sprightly.

The tribe of Seth knows to recite Your name
And make of that a far more glorious claim
Than all the wealth and civilized acclaim
Of Cain’s tribe. Your name and the names of men
Are not the only things to sound again.
Azura, Noam, and Mualeleth
Dinah, four generations after Seth
Prove that You hold women in such esteem
At least as equal with their husbands’ dream.
As time goes on the rank of woman slows,
Which makes it a wonder the scholar knows
The book of Jubilee a writing late.
The mention of women would make it great,
Of early times a worthy candidate.

16 And in eleventh jubilee [512-18 A.M.]
Jared took himself wife to be,
And her name was Baraka, she
Was daughter of Rasujal, and
A daughter of his father’s band,
His father’s brother, in the week
Numbered four of this jubilee, [522 A.M.]
And she bare him a son sweetly
In the fifth week, and in the year
Number four of the jubilee,
And he called his name to appear
Enoch. 17 And he was the first from
Among men that are born to come
On earth who learnt writing and sum
Of knowledge and of course wisdom
And who wrote down the signs of heaven
According to the order given
Of their months in a book, that men
Might know the seasons come again
Of years by the order of their
Separate months. 18 And he was there
First to write a witness and he
Testified to the sons that be
Of men among the generations
Of the earth and the earthly nations,
And recounted the weeks that come
In jubilees, and made known sum
To them the days of all the years,
And set in order the months’ gears
And recounted the Sabbaths years
As we showed to his eyes and ears.

The months are unknown to the great traditions,
The popular temples and their seditions.
The calendars of mankind fail to make
Distinction of Your months, Sabbaths in wake,
And years and weeks and Jubilees. I take
From You alone, Beloved, the counting of
The moments of my heartbeat and the love
I wonder coming from Your throne above
To those few who seek out Your law and live
By its few precepts, willingly forgive
The slaughterer so common in the sieve
Of this day as in every age that’s known.
And yet this age above all ages prone
To gross apostasy’s with mercy sown.

19 And what was and what will be he
Saw in a vision sleepily,
As it will happen to the sons
Of men throughout the colophons
Of generations till the day
Of judgment, he saw all the way
And understood everything’s sway,
And wrote his testimony, and
Placed the witness on earthly land
For all the children of men and
For their generations’ command.

Enoch, Beloved, wrote out the vision well
And left it written to ride out the spell
Against what’s spoken by the tongues of hell.
Obscurely kept in Axum’s caves and hearts,
Hidden in Qumran for its lovely parts
That spoke against hypocrisy and arts
Of false theology in every Christian church
And in the wicked synagogues that perch
Above You, it would seem, to tell Your law
Accommodating always Roman awe.
Beloved, I praise Your name for Enoch’s touch
And for the words of comfort and as much
For the fierce judgement that his hand portrays.
Beloved, I flee to You though Your hand slays.

20 And in the twelfth jubilee, [582-88] in
The seventh week of bulletin,
He took himself a wife, and her
Name was Edna, it would infer
She was the daughter of Danel,
The daughter of his father’s brother,
And in the sixth year of that spell,
In this week [587 A.M.] she bore him as mother
A son he called Methuselah.
21 And he was moreover in awe
With the angels of Ælohim
Six jubilees of years and dream,
And they showed him everything which
Is on earth and in heavens’ pitch,
The rule of the sun, and he wrote
Down everything, 22 and witnessed quote
To the Watchers, who’d sinned upon
The daughters of men for their spawn,
For these had begun to unite
Themselves, so as to be a fright,
Defiled, with the daughters of men,
And Enoch testified again
Before them all. 23 And he was taken
From among humankind forsaken,
And we conducted him into
The Garden of Eden as due
In majesty and honour, and
Indeed there he writes down by hand
The condemnation and judgement
Of the world, all the argument
Of wickedness of humankind.

The book of Enoch in every detail
In which he wrote it tells how men will fail
To follow the simple law that You give.
Instead they find complexities to live
And answers to question on question sieve
Until the soul is darkened from the path
And enters into the eternal wrath.
I bend my squandered energies to find
Your will, Beloved, but not from deaf and blind,
But from the syllables resounding still
In folklore and in Scripture from the hill
Of Sinai where You repeat righteous bill
To everyone who comes and all who will.
I seek Your love, Your will, Your heart and mind.

24 And on account of it designed
Ælohim brought the waters blind
In flood upon all Eden’s land,
For there he was set down and signed
The parchment according to call
And that he should witness to all
The children of men by command,
That he should recount all at hand
The deeds of every generation
Until the day of condemnation.
25 And he burnt the holy incense,
Even sweet spices of expense
Acceptable before YHWH on
The Mount. 26 For YHWH has four states drawn
Upon the earth, the Garden of
Eden or pleasure for His love,
As well as the Mount of the East
[Which is at Mecca’s springs increased],
And this mountain on which You are
This day, Mount Sinai under star,
And Mount Zion which will be made
Holy in new creation swayed
For a sanctification of
The earth, through it and by its love
Will the earth be made holy, clean
Of all its guilt, uncleanness seen
Throughout the ages of the world.

The four gates have their four states on the earth
In mountains set above spiritual dearth
To give the flowing waters of life to
The righteous and the just as is their due.
The first gate is of Eden and of law,
The second is of Mecca and Your awe
In loving contemplation and the third
Is of Mount Sinai where Your golden word
Of law and love was graciously conferred
In the awareness of Your justice done.
The fourth gate is the gate of truth begun,
The glories of Your fortress Zion’s wall
Arising beneath sun at David’s call.
On earth I find at last celestial hall.

27 When fourteenth jubilee’s unfurled [652 A.M.]
Methuselah took him a wife,
Edna the daughter and the life
Of Azrial, the daughter of
His father’s brother for her love,
In the third week, and in the first
Year of this week, [701-7 A.M.] he was embursed
To get a son, he called his name
Lemech. 28 And in the renewed claim
Of fifteenth jubilee and in
The third week Lemech without sin
Took to himself a wife whose name
Was Betenos the daughter of
Baraki’il, the daughter of
His father’s brother, man of fame.

Baraka was the name of Enoch’s mother,
A blessing she was more than any other.
And Enoch married Edna and his son
Took on her namesake when the day was done.
Enoch’s success was no doubt in part due
To the blessing that his mother’s name threw
Across his life. A great man deeded two
Women to make him great, a thing he knew
In taking Edna for daughter-in-law
Of Baraka, though pleasure in the awe
Of You, Beloved, is not enough for crew.
It takes a walking in obedience
Before a man can rise up and make sense.
Without a wife every man remains dense.

And in this week she bore to him
A son and he called his name slim
Noah, saying “This one will be
A comfort for my trouble, see,
And all my work, and for the ground
That YHWH has cursed and all around.”

The name of Noah is a comfort rest
To those who know the holy prophet best.
His name reminds that You, Beloved, once cursed
The ground and not the man, who was the worst.
I pray that those who curse me shall be found
One day themselves upon the holy ground,
Rejoicing in the name that You release
Upon an earth once cursed by the police.
I seek, Beloved, a plot remote, in peace,
Far from the waters of Hudson and Thames,
And in my solitary days find gems
Of dew and snow sparkling along the edge
Of dead-end road beside my growing hedge.
Beloved, I take comfort in Noah’s fleece.

29 At the nineteenth Jubilee’s close,
In the seventh week which arose
And in the sixth year [930 A.M.] thereof, died
Adam, and all his sons and pride
Buried him where he had been made,
And he was the first under spade
To be buried within the earth.
30 And he lacked seventy years of worth
To be one thousand years of age,
For one thousand years are a page
As one day in testimony
Of the heavens and therefore, see,
It was written about the tree
Of knowledge, “On the day you eat
Of it you shall die for the treat.”

Though one day in Your sight can surely be
As one thousand years born eternally,
I fear the flight of Adam was addressed
In the same length of days I have confessed.
Some days are long, a thing You may not know,
And so when thousands such complete the show,
To human hearts set in the garden row,
Eating such fruit forbidden may be worth
Its ecstasies of nectar in the dearth
Of knowledge of the good I see around.
Perhaps it’s good today such tree’s not found
Except in metaphor for what it means
To rely on other than divine scenes,
Since You alone have right to wield and know.

And that’s why he did not complete
The years of this day, for he died
During that time. 31 At the end side
Of this jubilee Cain was killed
After him the same year fulfilled,
For his house fell upon him and
He died in his house on his land,
And he was killed by its stones’ hand,
For with a stone he’d killed Abel,
And by a stone that on him fell
Was he killed in righteous judgement.
32 For this reason it had been sent
Ordained on heavenly tablets spent,
“With the instrument with which man
Kills his neighbour with the same plan
Shall he be killed, after the same
Manner that he wounded to maim,
In like manner with him they’ll deal.”

Beloved, I see that justice has been done
Even after the centuries have run
When no man was allowed to touch the son
Because of the mark laid on him and bun.
Beloved, lay now a mark on all the Cains
That rape the earth and with the fatal banes
Of pestilence spread out democracy
Upon the world for every land to see.
Beloved, take in Your hand of justice now
Or in a thousand years, but anyhow,
Bring justice to the slain and the oppressed
Who in patience and love Your name confessed.
Beloved, with the same instrument I wield
Cut from my heart what wickedness I’ve peeled.

33 On twenty-fifth [1205 A.M.] jubilee’s heel
Noah took to himself a wife,
And her name was Emzara, life
And daughter of Rake’el, and
The daughter of his father’s band,
His father’s brother, in the first
Year in the fifth week [1207 A.M.] and not worst.
And in the third year of that week
She bore him Shem to have a peek,
And in the fifth year [1209 A.M.] she bore him
Ham, and in the first year in rim
Of the sixth week [1212 A.M.] she bore to him
Japheth, a son both slim and trim.

Like many women lucky to be known
At all, Emzara has a name that’s shown
In nothing more than who her husband was
And how many sons she bore without flaws.
The dear Qur’an adds one more to the list,
But he was one the evil fates had kissed.
Ah my Beloved, I with my woman’s soul
Live in obscurity to find the goal,
And flee both love and hate, indifference
To share with bird and beast a bare twopence.
But unlike famous Emzara known to
All men for husband and three sons that grew,
I have neither husband nor sons, but wait
A lone dervish upon Your royal state.


AUTHOR: THOMAS G. MCELWAIN

Copyright © 2007 Adams & McElwain Publishers and Thomas McElwain First Published in two volumes, The Beloved and I 2005, and Led of the Beloved, 2006. Second Edition, 2010 Third and revised edition, 2012 All rights reserved. No part of this verse commentary on the sacred Scriptures may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from publisher.

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