the-book-of-enoch-r-h-charles - Fallen Angels

150 The Booh of Enoch [Sect, ill
solstices. (3) He knows apparently the length of the synodic
months (cf.
78i'' ^^), -which was not published till the time of
Gamaliel II, A. d. 80-115. (4) His attempt to reconcile the lunar
year and his peculiar year of 364 days by intercalations, in the
third, fifth, and eighth years, furnishes strong presumption that he
liad the Greek eight-year cycle before him, and the presumption
becomes a certainty, when we consider that, whereas every detail
in the Greelc cycle is absolutely necessary to the end desired, in
the Enochian system, on the other hand, though these details are
more or less reproduced, they are absolutely idle, as Enoch's system
is really a one-year cycle, and the lunar year is reconciled to his
solar year of 364 days by the addition of ten days each year;
cf.
74}^~^^.
Calippus, 79^ (note).
(5) He alludes to the seventy-six years' cycle of
The writer puts forward a year of 364 days, but this he did only
through sheer incapacity for appreciating anything better ; for he
must have been acquainted with the solar year of 365J- days.
His acquaintance with the Greek cycles shows this. Moreover,
in 2 Enoch the year of 365J days is distinctly taught. It is
surprising also that any writer under cloak of Enoch's name should
fix upon a year of 364 days, as Enoch was early regarded as the
teacher of the solar year of 365 days, owing to the significant
duration of his life. And our surprise is not lessened when we
consider that all the surrounding nations and peoples—the Egyptians,
Persians, Arabs, Cappadocians, Lycians, Bithynians, the inhabitants
of Gaza and Ascalon— observed a year of 365 days. But this year
was generally a movable year of 365 days exactly, and consequently
one in which New Tear's day ran through all the days of the year
in the course of 1,461 such years, and the festivals continually
changed their season. Now the writer of Enoch recommends his
year of 364 days especially on the ground that the position of the
years is not prematurely advanced or delayed by a single day, 74^^.
It was, therefore, nothing but his national prejudices, and possibly
his stupidity, that j)revented him, knowing as he did the Greek
systems, from seeing that only a year of 365i- days could effect
such a result. j\.s for Wieseler's theory that the writer held to
a year of 364 days with one intercalary day each year, and one
every fourth year, there is no evidence for it in the text. The
author's reckoning of the year at 364 days may be partly due
to his opposition to heathen systems, and partly to the fact that
364 is divisible by seven, and amounts to fifty-two weeks exactly.