78 HANOCH  - ENOCH 78

Names of the sun and the moon; waxing and waning of the moon

78:1   These are the names of the sun: the first, 'Oryares and the second, Tomas.

78:2   The moon has four names: Its first name is Asenya; its second, 'Abla; the third, Banase; and the fourth, 'Era.

78:3   These are the two great luminaries. Their roundness is like the roundness of the sky; and the magnitude of their roundness is equivalent for both.

78:4   There are seven more portions of light that move in the sun's sphere than in the moon's and it increases in measure until seventy portions of the sun are completed.

78:5   The moon comes in and goes out by the western openings, and circles via the northeast and rises through the eastern openings upon the face of the earth.

78:6   When the moon begins its cycle, it appears in the sky one half of a seventh part; it will become fully illumined from the fourteenth day;

78:7   it completes its illumination the fifteenth, becoming fulfilled according to the sign of the year and becoming fifteen parts. Thus the moon waxes in fifteen parts.

78:8   In its waning, the moon decreases on the first day to fourteen parts of its light; on the second day, it decreases to thirteen parts of light; on the third, to twelve parts; on the fourth, to eleven parts; on the fifth, to ten parts; on the sixth, to nine parts; on the seventh, to eight parts; on the eighth, to seven parts; on the ninth, to six parts; on the tenth, to five parts; on the eleventh, to four parts; on the twelfth, to three parts; on the thirteenth, to one half of the preceding; on the fourteenth, all its light decreases to one half of one seventh; and on the fifteenth, all the remaining light disappears.

78:9   In certain fixed months, the moon completes its cycle every twenty nine days, in certain others, every twenty eight.

78:10   Then Uriel showed me another order concerning when light is beamed into the moon, from which direction of the bright sun it is beamed.

78:11   During all the seasons when the moon is made to run its cycle, the light is being beamed into it the moon facing the sun until the illumination of the moon is completed in the course of fourteen days; and when it is lit completely, it radiates light in the sky.

78:12   On the first day, it is called the new moon because on that day the illumination begins to set upon it.

78:13   These illuminations are completed with exactitude on the day when the sun descends into the west, and the moon simultaneously rises in the east in the evening, shining during the night until the sun rises opposite it, and it is over against the sun.

78:14   From the same side where light entered the moon, from there also it gradually wanes until all the illumination disappears and the days of the moon expire, its disk empty without light.

78:15   The moon coordinates, in respect to its days and seasons, four three month divisions. In the course of its recession it makes three months each in thirty days and three months each in twenty nine days; during this season it makes its recession, in the first period, starting in the first gate, in one hundred and seventy seven days.

78:16   In the course of its progression, it appears three months each in thirty days and three months each in twenty nine days.

78:17   By night it appears like a man, and by day it appears like the sky; for there is no other thing in it except its light.