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The Gentile Times Reconsidered (607 B.C.E.) -Part A1 - Jeremiah 25:10-12 Reviewed
by FaceTheFacts 259 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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Crisis of Conscience
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Crisis of Conscience
Sorry I have nothing better to offer FTF.
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FaceTheFacts
AnnOMaly...
A specific page reference this time! But it's actually page 195. So yours IS the unauthorized, tampered-with internet version! Hoffnung has shown that your following quote cuts out the part where Jonsson outlines the problems with the view some modern scholars have about Jer-LXX, and goes on to suggest Jer-MT is the original and superior text (p. 196, ftn. 8 continued).
You pulled the same stunts in your last incarnation - dishonestly quote-mined your sources in an attempt to get scholarly support for your position, completely diregarding the authors' intent and their surrounding comments. Now you're at it again.
There was nothing dishonest about my quotations. There is nothing dishonest with combining multiple references to the same argument, even if they are presented on different pages. Did it anyway change Jonnson's viewpoint or make it appear as if he is saying something he isn't? No. The silly quotation arguments are elementary at best and shows you have no answer for the arguments presented and that you would rather cherrypick something to complain about.
You were saying he was taking it in isolation and superficially without regard for the fact that the WTS takes into account other Scriptures. That is patently and laughably false. You've read the book. You know this.
He is only discussing one scripture, Jeremiah 25:11. I did not say he does not discuss the other scriptures (i.e. Daniel 9:2, 2 Chronicles 36:21) I am saying in this specific instance it makes little sense to belittle the Watchtower's interpretation of the seventy years by showing what Jeremiah 25 says, if their understanding of what Jeremiah 25 means, is CONTINGENT upon other scriptures. A ridiculous circular argument about if it's a fallacy or not...which shows you have nothing to say about the REAL ARGUMENTS.
Why it should be portrayed as a fault to carefully examine a Scripture's wording in its context to dispel false assumptions is beyond me
It is a fault to attack an interpretation based upon what a specific text does not literally say, when the understanding of that text is contingent upon several other intertextual references, and not the text itself. I don't know how many times I've had to explain this to you.
Far from being strawman argumentation (!), the correct understanding of Jer. 25 is key.
Now you're being ridiculous. I did not say that argumentation regarding Jeremiah 25 is a strawman. And if you believe a proper understanding of Jeremiah is key, then why (after 5 pages and counting) have you failed to address the main thrust of my argument (namely, the perfect mood of the Hebrew morphology) and would instead, like to pedantically go back and forth over things like "improper quotation" when NONE of that is key to the argument at hand?
The passages in Dan. 9 and 2 Chron 36 relating to the 70 years are based on Jeremiah's prophecy. Correctly understand the primary texts first; interpret the later texts based on them in light of those primary texts. (I see Hoffnung has explained this to you as well.)
That is not standard Biblical exegesis at all. It makes little sense to say "correctly understand the primary texts first" IF the primary text is later re-interpreted and re-explained. To arrive at a proper understanding of what the primary text is saying you would have to examine the other texts FIRST and then after examining a preponderance of evidence, arrive at a conclusion which would then be CONTINGENT on (i.e. dependent) the other texts. But again, what difference does this make with regard to my main arguments?
You didn't provide ANY page reference and gave the impression the comments were all one paragraph. I have zero respect and little patience for those who persist in being deceptive with their sources.
I didn't think page references were necessary as the OP already stated the book, the title, the edition, and the title of thread itself tells us what section the information is taken from (A-1 - Jeremiah 25:10-12). There is nothing deceptive as I provided a good deal of reference material to a familiar audience and if this is all you can come up what difference does this make with regard to my main arguments?
That was done on your previous thread (as Ethos).
The argument I presented was NOT presented in a previous thread and continues to go unaddressed. I can't help but wonder why?
Oh now there's a strawman if ever I saw one LOL.
Well if Jonnson says the "servitude" meant "vassalage" and proposes that the servitude began in 609 B.C., the burden of proof requires he substantiate that with a tribute of vassalage to Babylon in that year. Strawman? Hardly. An argument you can't address? Quite so.
They have. You choose to ignore or sidestep those arguments.
The only thing people have come up with is that the LXX is defective and here's the irony: they had to use a Watchtower reference to do it. Not a single scholar, commentary, or respected source was presented that shows that Jeremiah 25:11 specifically is defective in the LXX. Jeffro tried to say it means "with the other nations" but could not raise to the challenge of showing us a single translation that rendered it as "with the nations".
So far you've delivered a rehash of what we all have debated to death
There has never been a debate about the inflective verb moods in Jeremiah 25:11 to my knowledge. There has never been a debate about LXX rendering showing Jonnson's understanding of the servitude as "vassalage" to my knowledge. If these have been debated to death, SURELY you can provide the plethora of threads that cover these subjects, no?
And again.....no refutation of any of my arguments which shows she has nothing left but semantic gymnastics.
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FaceTheFacts
Jeffro...
This is some very basic fallacious reasoning (equivocation fallacy).
The verses Ethos FaceTheFacts here compares with (the Septuagint's rendering of) Jeremiah 25:11 all have other words that refer to people going somewhere. It is not a factor of "among the nations" that means they went anywhere, but the other phrases, I will scatter them, I shall certainly disperse, I have scattered you, I have dispersed you, had to dwell, I shall disperse them. Jeremiah 25:11 does not do this, in either the LXX or MT. FtF also doesn't mention Jeremiah 49:15, 50:23, 50:46, 51:41 where the phrase among the nations has nothing to do with going to a particular place.
I specifically said the usage of "among the nations" in accord with the context of Jeremiah 25 is always in reference to Judaic banishment. Not that every single rendering of "among the nations" means exile for the Jews or a particular nation. You obviously didn't understand my argument was dependent on context, not universal usage.
And Jeffro: you still have not risen to the challenge. If "among the nations" should really mean "with the other nations" surely you can provide for us a single translation of the LXX that supports this. Can you or can you not? It really is as simple as cutting and pasting to support your argument. If you cannot do so, your argument is just pure speculation and does not in any way disprove my argument about the LXX.
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Jeffro
The troll said on page 4:
4 pages and the most basic argument about the perfect mood has not even been addressed.
But it's just another redundant argument that was undone by the troll himself:
The verb used here (aw-bad') uses the verb pattern "Qal" here and is inflective of the perfect mood. The perfect mood is used to state completed actions in the past (i.e. "He studied, He talked, He served) which is commonly used in prophetic oracles to demonstrate that the events are so certain to happen that it is if they already have and this is done by using this tense.
Specifically, where he acknowledged that such phrasing is "commonly used in prophetic oracles to demonstrate that the events are so certain to happen that it is if they already have".
If someone says something as if it has already finished, it makes no difference whether it has actually started or not.
If I say, "I spent a week in New York" - as if it had already happened - it makes no difference whether I uttered the 'propecy' before I left for New York or while I was actually there.
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Jeffro
in accord with the context of Jeremiah 25 is always in reference to Judaic banishment
Jeremiah 25 says nothing about 'banishment' (and the other verses FtF cited say nothing about '70 years'). On the other hand, Jeremiah 27 quite clearly indicates that 'banishment' was only a punishment for those nations that 'rebelled' against serving Babylon.
And Jeffro: you still have not risen to the challenge.
Ok moron. Listen carefully. There is no challenge. Judah (or modern Israel) is among the nations. Look at a map.
I don't have to attest to a version of "the cat is among the pigeons" with some other 'translation' that "the cat is with the pigeons", in order to 'prove' that the cat wasn't actually consumed by one or more of the pigeons.
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FaceTheFacts
In response to Jeffro's latest ad hominem attack..:
Specifically, where he acknowledged that such phrasing is "commonly used in prophetic oracles to demonstrate that the events are so certain to happen that it is if they already have".
If someone says something as if it has already finished, it makes no difference whether it has actually started or not.
ROTFL!!!! Here you show a gross misunderstanding of how Hebraic usage of moods determines how a text should be understood, as otherwise I don't see how anyone who has even a rudimentary understanding of how verbs are used in Hebrew could say something so laughably ridiculous. Let me re-explain it for you.
New part just for Jeffro: There are two ways to express past actions in ancient Hebrew. The perfect mood and the imperfect mood. Now a perfect mood would be inflective of a COMPLETED action with regarded to a specific time period. In English some examples of this would be: He walked for forty minutes. He sat down for an hour. A past action inflective of the imperfect mood would indicate habitual, CONTINUAL, ongoing, repeated action, without regard to a specific time period. In English examples of this would be: He was walking. He was sitting down. Now since prophetic statements are often written in past tense to give a textual effect of certainty, whether a statement was written in the imperfect or the perfect mood would allow us to understanding precisely what time frame the author had at the time of the writing. At the time of Jeremiah's writing (dated 605 B.C.) the author does not use language reflective of an imperfect mood, i.e. that the event has already started and is continual into the future.Since the author uses language inflective of a past, completed action and dates the words to 605 B.C. it indicates that when the action is to take place it is not continuing from an undefined past date (prior to 605 B.C.), but has not yet started at the time of writing. This is why I referenced Genesis 15:13, which is virtually identical to Jeremiah 25:11."Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there". What's translated "will be servants" is "and·they-serve·them" (u-obdu-m) and as it stated in the perfect mood, i.e. not indicative of a continuation from the PAST into the future, and in agreement with the context, showing the servitude there had not yet begun, it shows this usage indicates that the "past action" (prophetic reference) has not yet begun at the time of writing. The Egyptians had not begun serving the Egyptians at the time of the story of Genesis 15:13 just as the nations had not begun serving Babylon at the time of the story in Jeremiah 25:11. I'm embarassed I had to explain that to you.
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Jeffro
I don't care about your speculative pseudo-intellectualism.
To reiterate: Jeremiah 25 says nothing about 'banishment' (and the other verses FtF cited say nothing about '70 years'). On the other hand, Jeremiah 27 quite clearly indicates that 'banishment' was only a punishment for those nations that 'rebelled' against serving Babylon.
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FaceTheFacts
Jeffro...
Ok moron. Listen carefully. There is no challenge. Judah (or modern Israel) is among the nations. Look at a map.
What a ludicrous attempt to dissuade the argument. The argument is about the LXX and how its rendering completely disintegrates Jonnson's chronology. Since you postulated that the word translated "among" also means "with" and therefore based upon this specific rendering of "with the nations", Judah served as a vassal with the other nations, you must provide us with proof that this rendering is correct. Showing how a word can also be rendered a different one, does not solidify your counterargument. You can't show us a single translation of the LXX that renders it: "with the nations" instead of "among the nations". Therefore, your argument has no merit. It's like arguing that the Greek word used in the LXX at Jeremiah 25:11 can also be rendered "destroy" and therefore, the nations destroyed Babylon for seventy years, without providing a single translation that supports that rendering.
I don't know what's funnier: a): your nonsensical and earlier statements about the Hebrew verbs that show a gross lack of understanding or b): your ridiculous defense that you cannot solidly provide proof for.
