by AnnOMaly 13 Replies latest watchtower bible
Have you sent this information to the Society to get a response.
Back in 2004 when I first starting researching 607, I wrote to the Watch Tower Society. As anticipated, a witchhunt ensued. They already know they're lying, so writing to them doesn't really do much good. The only benefit in writing to them is to let them know that people don't believe their lies.
Have you sent this information to the Society to get a response.
"Has your mind been melded?" ;-) I've learned from others' experiences.
They don't care. The Society has known about the problems with their chronological scheme since the beginning of the 20th century, since Russell's time. People within the Org. and outside of it have been telling them for over a century now. JWs who write will given stock arguments that were rebutted long ago or be silenced by threat of expulsion. Non-JWs who write will be given stock arguments that were rebutted long ago or will be ignored. Two-way (anonymous) email communication isn't the Society's 'thing.'
These two articles were a desperate attempt to quell the continued unease about this issue and they didn't realize that, particularly with regard to claims of cuneiform support for 607 BCE, they've gone and backed a lemon.
Anyway, the information is on the internet for anybody who wants to look and give a response to it.
Thank you so much Ann for posting this info and for your work over the years, I appreciate so much you passing on the fruits of your labours to us.
Any honest person reading your words will see that the WT are a bunch of liars simply bent on retaining their membership so that they can manipulate them and bleed them dry of their money and their lives.
It really shocked me when, still nominally a JW, I realised that they actually knew about the 1914 doctrine beimg total hogwash, now nothing shocks me about them, I am just sad that I did not wake up earlier, had I come across your work earlier I would have.
Please keep posting here, you are a diamond !
In our public talk today, the speaker mentioned how the Bible was "vindicated" by archaeology with regards to the 607 date in the recent articles. He mentioned That the ancient "tablets [sic]" in these articles proved this date. This inspired me to look up info about VAT 4956 on the CD rom. This is related to a question I posed earlier on this thread. According to the 5/8/72 Awake:
" Nevertheless, someone may ask, Is there not an ancient astronomical tablet, “VAT 4956,” that places the thirty-seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign exactly in the same year as does Ptolemy’s Canon?
It should not be overlooked that the source of corroborative evidence should bear the earmarks of dependability. Can this be said about “VAT 4956”? Not really. The text is not an original and it contains numerous gaps. Certain terms found therein cannot even be understood now. Twice in the text the notation hi-bi (meaning “broken off, obliterated”) appears. Thereby the scribe acknowledged that he was working from a defective copy.
Even if, despite these problems, the astronomical information presents a true picture of the original, this would not establish the correctness of the historical data. As Ptolemy used the reigns of ancient kings (as he understood them) simply as a framework in which to place astronomical data, so the copyist of “VAT 4956” may, in line with the chronology accepted in his time, have inserted the ‘thirty-seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar.’ As admitted by the German scholars Neugebauer and Weidner (the translators of this text), the scribe evidently changed words to conform with the abbreviated terminology common in his day. But he was both inconsistent and inaccurate. So he could just as easily have inserted other information to suit his purposes. Hence both Ptolemy’s Canon and “VAT 4956” might even have been derived from the same basic source. They could share mutual errors.
Opposed to Ptolemy’s Canon and “VAT 4956” stands the unanimous testimony of Jeremiah, Zechariah, Daniel and the writer of 2 Chronicles, that Judah and Jerusalem lay desolate for seventy years. Thousands of ancient manuscripts of these writings contain the identical testimony. So, because of the problems inherent in Ptolemy’s Canon and “VAT 4956,” it takes more faith to accept them than it does to accept the Bible’s testimony, which would place the desolation of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 607 B.C.E"
To me, this begs the question, What happened to "the problems inherent in. . .VAT 4956"? Unfortunately, few would even bother to search VAT 4956 on their cd rom. What a snow job.
