The Falasha (the “black Jews” of Ethiopia) have their own version of The Testament of Abraham (“Gadla Abraham”). As Wolf Leslau noted:
The Arabic text of the Testament
of Abraham has been translated from the Coptic, and the Ethiopic text is a
translation from the Arabic. There are two versions of the Ethiopic text, a
Christian-Ethiopic and a Falasha version. The Falasha version, called "Gadla
Abraham," The Life of Abraham . . . is probably derived from the Christian-Ethiopic
text. (Wolf Leslau, Falasha Anthology [New Haven: Yale University Press,
1951], 94-95)
As part of the conversation between Abraham and the archangel
Michael, Enoch is identified as an “honorable old man” (cf. “Ancient of Days”
in Dan 7):
I said to the archangel Michael: O
Lord, who is this honorable old man, who has this book in his hand,
comes near the Judge, and recites the bad deeds of this soul?" He said:
"It is Enoch. When God saw that he was a trustworthy man, he gave him the
task to write down all the good and bad deeds that a man's soul would
commit." (Ibid., 100)
In the note for “this honorable old man,” we read that
The Ethiopic adds wārēzā,
"young man," after 'aragāwi, "old man." (Ibid., 179
n. 50)
This is something I will have to delve more into, but perhaps in
some versions of the Testament of Abraham in Ge’ez and Arabic, Enoch is being
re-cast as the Ancient of Days (“honorable old man”) of Dan 7, similar to how
some scholars (e.g., Frank Munoa III; Andrew Chester) believe the Greek text of
the Testament of Abraham (chs. 11-13) recasts Adam and Abel as the Ancient of
Days and Son of Man figures.
