This book considers the early history of Jewish-Christian relations focussing on traditions about the fallen angels. In the Book of the Watchers, an Enochic apocalypse from the third century BCE, the 'sons of God' of Gen 6:1-4 are accused of corrupting humankind through their teachings of metalworking, cosmetology, magic, and divination. By tracing the transformations of this motif in Second Temple, Rabbinic, and early medieval Judaism and early, late antique, and Byzantine Christianity, this book sheds light on the history of interpretation of Genesis, the changing status of Enochic literature, and the place of parabiblical texts and traditions in the interchange between Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity and the early Middle Ages. In the process, it explores issues such as the role of text-selection in the delineation of community boundaries and the development of early Jewish and Christian ideas about the origins of evil on the earth.

Annette Yoshiko Reed (BA McGill; MTS Harvard; MA, PhD Princeton) is Associate Professor in the Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies and the Program in Religious Studies at New York University. Her research spans Second Temple Judaism, early Christianity, and Jewish/Christian relations in Late Antiquity. Particular areas of interest include angelology and demonology; the reception of Second Temple Jewish traditions in late antique Judaism and Christianity; and the parallels and overlaps between Jewish and Christian self-definition in Late Antiquity. She is the coordinator of the Philadelphia Seminar of Christian Origins (PSCO) as well as a member of the Editorial Board of the book series Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism, published by Mohr Siebeck.