The Book of Enoch

Enoch (also: 1 Enoch) is canonical scripture for the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church and Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church. The only complete copy of an early version of Enoch is available in Ge’ez (Classical Ethiopic), here used with permission by the Bible Society of Ethiopia.

The translation into English used here: 1 Enoch: The Hermeneia Translation. Translated by George W. E. Nickelsburg & James C. VanderKam. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2012. with editorial alterations by Abraham Haile and additional translations by Haileyesus Woldemariam.

abyss, bottomless pit

The Greek and Ge’ez that is translated as “abyss” or “bottomless pit” in English is translated as “unfathomably deep place” or “land below” in Indonesian, “land below” in Batak Toba, or “the deep where the earth opens its mouth” in Sranan Tongo (a term well-known from folk tales). (Source: Reiling / Swellengrebel)

In a 1922 translation into Chagatai, a precursor language of both Uzbek and Uighur, it is translated with hāwiyat, derived from the Arabic Islamic Al-Hāwīya (الهاوية), “the lowest level of the hell” (Source: F. Erbay and F.N. Küçükballı in Acta Theologica 2025 45/2, p. 133ff. and Hawiya )

In the German New Testament translation by Berger / Nord (publ. 1999) it is translated as as Höllenschlund or “entrance to hell (lit.: “throat of hell”).”

See also bottomless pit.

prison

The Greek, Hebrew and Ge’ez that is translated in English as “prison” is translated in Dehu as moapokamo or “house for tying up people” (source: Maurice Leenhardt in The Bible Translator 1951, p. 97ff. ) and in Noongar as maya-maya dedinyang or “house shut” (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang).

See also public prison.