The Books of Enoch, Aramaic Fragments of Qumran Cave 4

THE BOOK OF WATCHERS 39
and hence in the far North, that the effluence and the mouth of the Abyss
are situated (17: 7-8).
Then the author of the Visions of Enoch makes the patriarch go on a journey
round the world in order to explore the reservoirs of the winds, the
corner-stone of the earth, the four cardinal points pictured as 'the pillars of
heaven' (according to E; omitted in C by hmt), the winds which drive the
stars, and the firmament of heaven (18: 1-5). The account of this circular
journey will inspire a similar itinerary during the eastern expedition (En. 33-6).
After this orbital flight the patriarch takes up again his western route and
arrives at the mountain of God surrounded by six other mountains, all made
of precious stones (18: 6-8). The precise detail, 'three mountains on the
eastern side and three on the southern side', shows clearly that the mountainthrone
of God occupies the north-western corner of the universe. (In the
parallel description (En. 24-5) the divine mountain is surrounded by the
garden of sweet-smelling trees which is dominated by the Tree of Life.)
Behind the seven mountains of God, in the place where the heavens end,
the patriarch sees a deep abyss formed of columns of fire. Beyond is a place
without water and without birds, a forsaken and terrible place {tottos
eprjiJios Kal o^€p6sy 18: 2; cf. tottos dKaraaKevaaros Kal o^€p6sj 21: 2), where
the prison of the seven stars and of the fallen angels is situated (18: 9-19: i).
(In the parallel text (En. 21) the prisons of the angels and the stars are
separate; the former suffer in the place which has a 'cleft (Sta/coTr^) going as
far as the abyss', filled with columns of the great fire, and identical therefore
with the great gulf of the Book of the Visions of Enoch.)
The gulf or cleft of apocalyptic imagery reflects the mouth of the abyss of
mythical geography. Now the residence of Ba*l, according to Ugaritic poems,
is situated 'on the heights of the North ... at the source of the rivers, in the
middle of the channels of the two Oceans', mrym spn . . . mbk nhrm qrb apq
thmtm.^ These Ugaritic expressions are found almost unaltered in En. 17:
7-8: mbk nhrm is equivalent to 97 {7r7])yri navTcov rcov rroraficov (v. 8); apq
thmtm is rj eKxvaig rrjg a^vaaov iravrcov vSdrcov (v. 7), taken up by the simple rj
a^vcTGos in v. 8, i8ov ro arofia rrjg {7rri)yrjs Trdvrcov rcov irorajxcov Kal ro crrofxa
rrjs dpvGGOv.
For the two authors of the Book of Watchers the abode of God, which is
located by the second writer in paradise, is also situated essentially in the
North, in particular if one looks at it on the vertical axis. It is into the pit
beneath (or: below) Safon, the mountain of the North, that rebels are hurled
' Ed. Gordon, text 51 iv 19-22; cf. 49 i 5-6; 129: 4; H Aqhat vi 47-8; 'Anatpl. VI, v 14-15.