1 Enoch / Chapter 34

1 Enoch 34

3 verses • Ge'ez (Ethiopic)

Translator's Introduction

What This Chapter Is About

Enoch travels to the north and sees three gates of heaven through which cold winds, snow, frost, and ice come.

What Makes This Chapter Remarkable

The meteorological observations — specific weather phenomena associated with specific cosmic gates — reflect a systematic attempt to explain weather patterns theologically.

Translation Friction

None significant.

Connections

Job 37:9-10 (cold from the north); Job 38:22-23 (storehouses of snow and hail); Jeremiah 10:13 (wind from storehouses).

1 Enoch 34:1

Ge'ez text per Charles/Knibb editions

From there I went northward to the ends of the earth, and there I saw a great and magnificent structure at the farthest edges of the whole earth.

REF From thence I went towards the north to the ends of the earth, and there I saw a great and glorious device at the ends of the whole earth.

1 Enoch 34:2

Ge'ez text per Charles/Knibb editions

There I saw three gates of heaven open — through each of them the north winds blow. When they blow, they bring cold, hail, frost, snow, dew, and rain.

REF And here I saw three portals of heaven open in the heaven: through each of them proceed north winds: when they blow there is cold, hail, frost, snow, dew, and rain.

1 Enoch 34:3

Ge'ez text per Charles/Knibb editions

From one gate they blow for good, but when they blow through the other two gates, it is with violence and affliction upon the earth — they blow with destructive force.

REF And out of one portal they blow for good: but when they blow through the other two portals, it is with violence and affliction on the earth, and they blow with violence.

Notes & Key Terms

Translator Notes

  1. The moral differentiation of winds — good from one gate, harmful from the other two — extends the theological framework to meteorology: even weather has a moral dimension under God's governance.