Jubilees and Enochic Judaismthat if a comprehensive heading for the concept of calendar at Qumran is to
be chosen, the oft-used term 'solar calendar' is certainly inappropriate and
should be avoided. For those using this type of calendar the constitutive ele
ment was the number of 364 days, which allows the schematic assignment of
weeks or Sabbaths."^34 Ben-Dov notes, "This device is neither solar nor lunar,
nor stellar nor any other astronomical predicate, but rather it is a schematic
364 [day year]."^35 The God of the Enochic paradigm could not possibly
stand behind or authorize a calendar as confused and irregular as one based
on the observations of deviant cosmic phenomena. Where one could point
out a failure of the Enochic construct to correlate with observed reality, the
Enochic response was to deny the validity of that reality. There had been a
cosmic departure from God's order, and that departure is correlated with the
events and the names involved in the actions of Shemikhazah, 'Aza'el, and
their cohort. This correlation may be reflected in the use of stars as allegori
cal representations of these deviant Watchers in AA at 1 En 86:1-3 (cf. also
88:1).
Drawnel^36 demonstrates persuasively that the manner in which AB de
veloped its calculations involving the progression of the moon and the sun
would have had polemical significance in favor of the 364-day calendar as
against the deviance of the Babylonian scribal tradition. The specifically
antilunar polemic of Jubilees may therefore simply reflect the different social
challenges faced by the author.
It is noteworthy that this cosmic rebellion/deviation directly affected
Israel's observation of the liturgical year, in particular, the feasts in 1 En 82:7.
Conclusion
Within the Enochic tradition each of the three exemplars is connected to the
other two. Only the ethnically pure line of the elect could stand outside the
dominion of the demons. To them was given by revelation the skills needed
- Uwe Glessmer, "Calendars in the Qumran Scrolls," in The Dead Sea Scrolls after
Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment, ed. Peter W. Flint and James C. VanderKam
(Leiden: Brill, 1999), 2:213-78 (here 231). See also section II of Bergsma's chapter in this vol
ume. - Jonathan Ben-Dov, "Tradition and Innovation in the Calendar of Jubilees," in this
volume. - Drawnel, "Some Notes on Scribal Craft and the Origins of the Enochic Litera
ture"; cf. Ben-Dov, "Tradition and Innovation in the Calendar of Jubilees."