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1 Enoch

About this book
Chapter 78

1 The sun has two names: the first is Orjârês, and the second is Tômâs. 2 The moon has four names: the first is Asônjâ, the second Eblâ, the third Benâsê, and the fourth Erâe. 3 These are the two great lights,⁠ whose circumference is similar to that of the heaven, and the size of both is alike. 4 The sun contains seven portions of light which exceed those of the moon,⁠ distributed in definite measures until the seventh portion of the sun's light is depleted. 5 Both lights set and enter the portals of the west, orbit via the north, and emerge through the eastern portals facing the heavens. 6 When the moon rises, one-fourteenth of it becomes visible in the sky. By the fourteenth day, the moon reaches full illumination. 7 The moon receives fifteen parts of light by the fifteenth day, completing its full phase according to the annual cycle, growing incrementally by fourteen parts until fully illuminated. 8 As the moon wanes, its light decreases: fourteen parts on the first day, thirteen on the second, continuing to diminish each day by one part until, by the fourteenth day, only a half part remains, and by the fifteenth, all light disappears completely. 9 Some months have twenty-nine days and occasionally twenty-eight. 10 Uriel explained another law regarding how the moon receives light from the sun and on which side the light is transferred. 11 Throughout the fourteen days when the moon is waxing, it gathers light when positioned opposite the sun, achieving full brightness in the heavens. 12 The moon is termed the new moon on the first day, as it begins to capture light. 13 It becomes fully illuminated exactly when the sun sets in the west, rising from the east at night. The moon then shines all night until the sun rises opposite her in the morning. 14 The side from which the moon's light originates is also where it begins to wane until the light completely disappears, concluding the monthly cycle with her circumference empty and devoid of light. 15 The moon has three months consisting of thirty days each, and during her cycle, she also has three months of twenty-nine days each, during which she undergoes waning in the first period of time, lasting one hundred and seventy-seven days through the first portal. 16 During her emergence, she is visible for three months of thirty days each, and for three months of twenty-nine days each. 17 At night, she appears like a man for twenty days at a time, and by day she resembles the sky, containing nothing but her own light.

Texts in conversation

Compare Genesis 1:16 and 1 Enoch 78:3

Hebrew Bible · Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses

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Summary

Genesis calls the sun and moon ‘two great lights’ and describes one as greater and one lesser. 1 Enoch explains this difference by making both equal in size while giving the sun seven times the moon’s brightness.

Passages

Genesis 1:16

Hebrew Bible
15 and let them serve as lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth.” It was so. 16 God made two great lights—the greater light to rule over the day and the lesser light to rule over the night. He made the stars also. 17 God placed the lights in the expanse of the sky to shine on the earth,
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Genesis

1 Enoch 78:3

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses
2 The moon has four names: the first is Asônjâ, the second Eblâ, the third Benâsê, and the fourth Erâe. 3 These are the two great lights, whose circumference is similar to that of the heaven, and the size of both is alike. 4 The sun contains seven portions of light which exceed those of the moon, distributed in definite measures until the seventh portion of the sun's light is depleted.
300 BCE – 100 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in 1 Enoch

References

... The author of the Astronomical Book confronted the same problem that the rabbinic scholars faced much later as they read Genesis 1:16. In other words, the problem is very old in the history of exegesis. The solution he adopted, however, was different. In his system, once created, the luminaries did not change from the situation commanded for them by their maker. Hence there was no room for reducing the size of the moon as a punishment. As we saw above, in 1 Enoch 78:3-4, the problematic phrase in Genesis 1:16, “the two great lights,” is brought into direct contact with the theme of Isaiah 30:26—the sun’s light is seven times brighter than that of the moon. Though the two luminaries are equal in size (“the two great lights”), they differ in brightness. In this way the writer of Genesis 1:16 was justified in calling one the greater and the other the lesser light in the very next phrase after calling both great. ...
James C. VanderKam, “Scripture in the Astronomical Book of Enoch,” in Things Revealed: Studies in Early Jewish and Christian Literature in Honor of Michael E. Stone, ed. Esther G. Chazon, David Satran, and Ruth A. Clements, JSJSup 89 (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 99–102.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Genesis 1:16 and 1 Enoch 78:3

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