This is so silly.
The VAT4956 contains 511 BCE references in Line 3 and 14. 511 BCE is not a "random date" for year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar. It's the Biblical date when you have Cyrus fulfill the 70 weeks prophecy in 455 BCE. You add 70 years to 455 BCE to get year 23 of Nebuchadnezzar which is 525 BCE. That means year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar, if this is the true original chronology, would fall in 511 BCE.
The only reason you have double dating in an astronomical diary is to point back to the original chronology. The SK400 does the same thing. The astronomy points to 541 BCE for "year 7" of some king. It doesn't fit Kambyses, but it does fit Nebuchadnezzar. You see, year 541 BCE for year 7 of Nebuchadnezzar is the SAME CHRONOLOGY of year 37 in 511 BCE per the VAT4956.
So at this point, it's like, an I.Q. issue. People should be catching on at this point but it's too complex for them.
Now the other thing is that removing 82 years of Persian history seems daunting to them and it is if you don't do it specifically. They usually think these 82 years will impact on history all the way down to Jesus and they can't accept that. But in fact, all the 82 years are removed by the time of 358 BCE and the rule of Artaxerxes III! The Bible REQUIRES the removal of 30 years from the rule of Darius I because Ezra 6:14,15 limits the rule of Darius I to 6 years. That's 30 years right there. Since it also identifies Artaxerxes as the successor to Darius whom is also known as Xerxes, it means Xerxes faked his own death and claimed he was his own son and thus his separate rule of 21 years is removed from the timeline as well. That is just based on Biblical reference. That's 51 years! That means you only have to find another 31 years to remove. The very long 47-year rule of Artaxerxes II stands out like a sore thumb and since 30 years is the common expansion, we remove 30 years from his rule to get a rule of 17 years and we're basically done! One co-ruler year by Kambyses rounds out the 82 years. SIMPLE.
So what all these 587BCE believers need to see is how fast the Persian Period collapses! They need to be looking at something like this:
Unfortunately comparison with the dating formulae of the Astronomical Diaries does not help very much. In these formulae the name of the father of the reigning king is never mentioned. The formula used here is: PN ša PN2 (LUGAL) MU-šú na-bu-ú, "PN, who is called king PN2." See for example AD I, p. 152, no. -346, left edge: MU 12.KAM mÚ-ma-kuš šá mÁr-tak-šat-su LUGAL MU-šú na-bu-ú, "year 12 of Ochos, who is called king Artaxerxes (III)"; MU 38.KAM mÁr-šú LUGAL šá mÁr-tak-šat-su LUGAL MU-šú [na-bu-ú], "year 38 of king Arses, who is called king Artaxerxes (II)" (AD I, p. 136, no. -366 B lower edge; on tablet A left edge the title LUGAL, "king," added to both names, has been omitted in both cases); mÚ-ma-kuš šá mDa-a-ri-muš MU-šú SA 4, "Ochos, who is called Darius (II)" (AD I, p. 66, no. -391 B obv. 1).
This relates a text dated to year 38 of a king "Arses called Artaxerxes" which they can't figure out who it belongs to! Of course, it belongs to Xerxes (Arses)/Artaxerxes. You need to be focussing on this:
Thucydides and Charon of Lampsacus say that Xerxes was dead, and that Themistocles had an interview with his son; but Ephorus, Dinon, Clitarchus, Heraclides, and many others, write that he came to Xerxes. The chronological tables better agree with the account of Thucydides, and yet neither can their statements be said to be quite set at rest.
See? Historians know Xerxes was ruling when Themistocles fled there. The only reason for the rumor that Artaxerxes was ruling was because of a letter leaked into Persia by Themistocles. It was a copy of his letter to the king of Persia asking for asylum and defecting to him. Hot news in Greece. Only it was addressed to "Artaxerxes" as the son of Xerxes. This was the first the Greeks had heard that Xerxes had died. But historians complained because even if Xerxes had died recently he wasn't ruling when Themistocles fled there. There is even a detailed account of how Themistocles kept his identity secret until he was actually before the king to reveal who he was. Completely contradicting his sending a letter ahead of his flight that anybody could open and then have him killed since there was a high bounty on his head.
The 587-ers want to pretend "all is well" and "said and done" and you have this clear-cut conspiracy from the Persian records going on that needs to be resolved. It explains why the Bible's NB timeline is 26 years longer than the current Babylonian records, which we know were revised. The Nabonidus Chronicle, the Babylonian Chronicle and the Cyrus Cylinder are all dated to as late as the end of the Persian Period!
So the 587-ers are pretending they have no I.Q. for understanding anything about any conspiracy or revisionism.
So all I can do, at this point, besides laugh out loud, is just to be thankful I don't have to be deceived by this narrow focus on what works for the 587 BCE chronology. The entire timeline is connected.
As I said, it didn't take long to reduce the NB Period nor to find out who adjusted the Greek Period, where you find some astounding chronology contradictions such as THE DELIAN PROBLEM. This is what you need to be concerned about:
THE DELIAN PROBLEM
....the most famous of the collection, is often referred to as the Delian problem due to a legend that the Delians had consulted Plato on the subject. In another form, the story asserts that the Athenians in 430 B.C. consulted the oracle at Delos in the hope to stop the plague ravaging their country. They were advised by Apollo to double his altar that had the form of a cube. As a result of several failed attempts to satisfy the god, the pestilence only worsened and at the end they turned to Plato for advice.
See the problem? Plato was born in 428 BCE, two years after he allegedly was being consulted. If we try to resolve this we have to move the timing of the Peloponnesian War down by at least 25 years, which we can do because of an eclipse that occurs the first year of the Peloponnesian War. We can redate it to 403 BCE when Plato would have been 25 years of age. This and many, many more examples proves the Greek Period was revised along with the Persian Period by Xenophon who added 56 years to the Greek timeline, creating discrepancies such as these.
So as I said, it's STRANGE to me to see so many allegedly educated and intelligent people,so convinced they can use a few Babylonian texts to confirm their own deating and ignore so much in place now that clearly explains why the Bible and the NB records are askew by these 26 years, while conveniently not noting that Josephus himself inserts these 70 years from the last deportation. There is no alternative to to consider that either the Bible was revised and manipulated and the Jews added years to the NB Period, or the NB timeline was revised. Only we know now exactly who revised those records and when! It's not a mystery WHY the years were removed.
That's why it will always boil down to the VAT4956. Once you realize the timeline has been comprimised and the Babylonian records revised then you look for some reference for an ABSOLUTE DATE, hopefully for the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, and you find it in the VAT4956. It gives you the absolute date for year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar from the original chronology, which is 511 BCE. That solves everything. 511 BCE for year 37 dates year 23 to 525 BCE, subtract 70 years and you get 455BCE for the 1st of Cyrus which fulfills easily the 70 weeks prophecy. Plus there is NO CHOICE about that prophecy. He was prophesied to rebuild both the temple and the city and there is no way the Jews would build a new temple in the middle of an open city, which is what JWs want us to believe. That the walls were not repaired and rebuilt until the time of Nehemiah in the 20th of Artaxerxes. Thus the "city" was left unbuilt until then and that fuilfills that prophecy. Even though the temple is also part of the "city" they want to separate the two. Besides being ridiculous, of course, the Jews would rebuild their wall, the Bible itself says the "city" and the walls were FINISHED during the reign of "Artaxerxes" who was Bardiya-Smerdis. So you NEED to see this scripture:
EZRA 4:12 "They are building the rebellious and bad city, and they proceed to FINISH the walls and to repair the foundations.
So how can JWs and others make the prophecy fulfilled in the 20th of Artaxerxes if the city and the new walls had begun to be rebuilt and were finished already? It's a LIE. They have to imply the lie that the walls were not finished or were left unbuilt. Now JWs get there because 1914 is such a blinding light like 587 BCE is a blinding light for everybody else. But it doesn't work.
So funny to me, when Martin Anstey figured out there were 82 years too many in the Persian Period and figured out that Cyrus must fulfill this prophecy, which dates his rule to 455 BCE, and we calculate when the last deportation was in year 23 70 years earlier, suddenly we have an astronomical text, the VAT4956, hiding 511 secret references in a text otherwise dated to 568 BCE.
So I don't know if people need a class in revisionism or what? But the debate as to what happened and why you have these discrepancies is OVER. 587 BCE is a farce.
Now there are TWO SIDES to this:
1) One is me convincing you, everybody here and the academic world who are suppressing this and have for centuries that 511 BCE is truly the original 37th of Nebuchadnezzar. And
2) Realizing I have the PERSONAL TRUTH about the matter and need not bother anyone who insists on convincing themselves of the facts by not looking at all the evidence involved or considering themselves too noble or sophisticated to consider revisionism.
#2 works for me. I'm satisfied with my findings as a Christian as a Bible student. I'm perfectly content to follow Martin Anstey and side with the Bible for assigning the 70 weeks to Cyrus, while the WTS pretends the Jews lived without houses or a wall around Jerusalem for the first 82 years after their return and then suddenly needing one, Nehemiah throws up a double wall around the entire city in just 52 days with the handfull of people in the city. Even though clearly there were homes on top of the wall when he got there ane even a "castle" belonging to his family.
So at some point, you do just let poeple have their own fantasy if that's all they have. DENIAL WORKS WONDERS!
JC
...OUTLAW