2 Enoch 17
2 Enoch 17
Section: Heavenly Journey (Ten Heavens)
Translated by W.R. Morfill, ed. R.H. Charles (1896)
Thus the great circle has five hundred
- The fourth part (of one day) is
neglected during three years and the fourth year completes it
exactly.
*On account of this they are omitted from the
heavens during three years, and are not added to the number
of the days*, on which account these change the seasons of
the year *in two new months, to make the number complete
and there are two others to diminish °.
- And when she
has gone through the Western gates, she returns and goes to the Eastern, with her hght, *and so she goes day and night in the heavenly circles, below all the circles more quickly than
1 So she sets by the western gates and finishes the year in 364
days that are accomplished, B.
he an error for 354. B OMITS VERSE §. 5 Bpacts of the lunar year, A.
circle are wanting, Sok.
This may be the original text, or 364 may
2 Eleven days of the solar 4 She
goes through the year on this account and therefore the computation is made apart from the heavens, and in the years the days are not
reckoned, B. > Bom.
XVI. 5. Twenty-nine days. This should be ‘twenty-nine and a half days.’ (Thus the great circle has 532 years.|] I have bracketed these words as they have no real connexion with the context. They arose obviously from a marginal gloss. The writer in this chapter does not get heyond the Metonic cycle, whereas the great cycle of 532 years is produced hy multiplying together the Metonic cycle of nineteen years, and the Solar cycle of twenty-eight years. This great cycle ia called the Dionysian or Great Paschal Period. As it includes all the variations in respect of the new moons aud the dominical letters,
it is consequently a period in which Easter and all the movable and un- movable feasts would occur on the same day of the week and month as in the corresponding year of the pre- ceding cycle. This cycle was first proposed by Victorius of Aquitaine, cire. 457 A.D. It is obvious that any reference to such a cycle here is an intrusion. 6. The fourth part, &e. Explanation of leap year. On which account these change the seasons of the year, &c. Hope- lessly corrupt. 7. With her light. This seems to imply that her light is not borrowed from the snn as it is tanght in the Eth, En. lxxiii.
C %
20 The Book of the Secrets of Enoch.
the winds of the heavens, and there are spirits and creatures, and angels flying’, with six wings to each of the angels ?. 8. * And seven (months) are computed to the circle of the moon during a revolution of nineteen years®,