The most important day of the year. Sometimes. Sort of.

by Jeffro 22 Replies latest watchtower bible

• 

  Jeffro

  For Jehovah's Witnesses, the "most important day of the year" is supposed to be the 'Memorial'. This 'sacred' event is to be held after sunset on Nisan 14. Except most of the time, it isn't.

  As 'explained' in The Watchtower, 1 February 1976, page 73, the "governing body" (not capitalised at the time) takes it upon itself to 'determine' the 'actual' date of Nisan 14. They claimed in the article that the 'modern' date for the start of Nisan in the Hebrew calendar is calculated differently to the ancient calculation. However, that's not actually the case.

  The actual calendation for determining the start of Nisan was (since at least the Neo-Babylonian period) and is based on the Metonic cycle - a sequence that repeats every 19 years.

  In the Metonic cycle, the 3rd, 6th, 8th, 11th, 14th, 17th and 19th years have an extra (thirteenth) month (Adar II, or Veadar). This is added because the standard years only have either 353, 354 or 355 days (there are specific rules for this that I won't go into), so they lose about 11 days each year. Without the extra month, the subsequent years would start earlier and earlier compared to the solar year. The extra month is only added when the new year would otherwise start too early in what we call March, and the new year then starts in April.

  Consider the chart below, showing two full Metonic cycles. The light yellow shading shows the years with an additional month. Green text indicates a correct Memorial date; blue text indicates Memorial date out by one day (either early or late); red text indicates Memorial out by a whole month. (Note that the Memorial date for 2015 hasn't been announced yet, but the JW date will be within a day of that shown.)

  There are a few important things to note:

  • Nisan 1 only ever occurs in April after a Metonic leap-year, otherwise it's always in March.
  • Nisan 1 is never later than early April.
  • When the cycle repeats, Nisan 1 for any particular year in the cycle is within a day of the same date in the Gregorian calendar (e.g. compare Nisan 1 of 1978 with 1997; 1979 with 1998, etc).
  • The Memorial is always a month early following the 8th, 11th and 19th years of a Metonic cycle.

  

  But it gets worse. Remember that year when the Memorial was in May? Yeah, me neither...

  In The Watchtower of 15 November 2011, in attempting to defend their foolish 607 BCE dogma, the Watch Tower Society claims that Nisan of 588 BCE began on "May 2/3". Their dishonest footnote claims:

  Therefore, the first Babylonian month (Nisanu) would have started the new year two months earlier, on May 2/3. While normally the year of this eclipse would have begun on April 3/4, VAT 4956 states on line 6 that an extra month (intercalary) was added after the twelfth (last) month (Addaru) of the preceding year. (The tablet reads: “8th of month XII2.”) Therefore, this made the new year actually not start until May 2/3. Thus, the date of this eclipse in 588 B.C.E. well fits the data on the tablet.

  This isn't just an innocent mistake, because Nisan is the month of their most important day of the year, and they know that Nisan never begins in May. Their article claims that Nisan would "normally ... have begun on April 3/4", but they know that Nisan never normally begins in April. Nisan only begins in April after the extra month has already been added. (Specifically, the last day of Adar in 588 BCE was March 6, then there was the "extra month", which ended on April 4, and Nisan began that evening.)

  So they're not just wrong. They're desperate enough to outright lie, because most good little JWs won't research anything, and many of them probably won't even read the footnote.
• 

  Oubliette

  Excellent research. I suggest you send this right over to the "Faithful Slave," aka the Governing Body (note the capitalization), for their prayerful consideration. I'm sure they'll humbly appreciate you pointing out their mistakes and make the necessary corrections immediately if not sooner.

  Nah, just kidding! Can you say "Carl Olof Jonsson"? I knew you could!

  
• 

  Londo111

  The Governing Body reserves the right not only to determine the calendar for the Memorial, but to determine the calendar 25 centuries in the past. They’ve also peered into the future and told Jesus how he will judge them: Faithful and Discreet, of course! Holy retrocausality, Batman!
• 

  adamah

  Stand behind me Satan, with your high-minded mortal concepts, one of which you call "arithmetic" (based on the pagan beliefs of ancient Egyptians and Babylonians)!

  Adam
• 

  Phizzy

  Thanks for the research Jeffro, so in 38 years they appear to have hit the right date only twelve times, still that is a better average than there stabs at when the "End" will come.

  There have been a number of threads on this on JWD/N , some casting doubt upon the start of the 14th itself (6pm or thereabouts)as being when the "Lord's Evening Meal" took place.

  In the end I have come to firmly believe that a once a year "celebration" has no basis in what Jesus was up to on that night, or was it the practice of early Christians, I think they celebrated far more often, so the actual date in the calendar is not important, only to the WT and JW's , who cannot see the wood for the trees.
• 

  Jeffro

  Phizzy:

  In the end I have come to firmly believe that a once a year "celebration" has no basis in what Jesus was up to on that night, or was it the practice of early Christians, I think they celebrated far more often, so the actual date in the calendar is not important, only to the WT and JW's , who cannot see the wood for the trees.

  If the accounts are to be accepted, Jesus initiated it as an event in place of the Passover, which implies that it was intended to be observed annually. It was later implied by 'Paul' (1 Corinthians 11:25-26), with the phrase "as often as", that it might be observed more often (as in Catholic tradition).

  There's no evidence that it was Jesus who initiated 'the Lord's evening meal', and it may have been an invention by 'Paul'. The concept of 'consuming' a magical god-man is certainly a much older pagan rite.
• 

  1009

  The 'brothers' simply do not use the 'Metonic cycle'. According to Insight that system started about 500 B.C.

  Therefore they use the date of the equinox (14th day after a visible new moon that is closest to the equinox). They probably reason that the moon that God created is more important than a human calender.

  What I always considered a weird practice. Imagen that the sunset is about 7:30 pm. So the elders gather and choose 7:00 to start the Memorial. But Jesus probably started his Last Supper a lot later, they finished after midnight. And the next morning or so he died. And that day is hardly marked in a JW-calendar...
• 

  Jeffro

  1009:

  The 'brothers' simply do not use the 'Metonic cycle'. According to Insight that system started about 500 B.C.

  Insight is wrong. No surprises there.

  But apart from that, they know very well that Nisan never begins in May. Ever.

  Note the following from the December 1976 Kingdom Ministry (page 3):

  For future reference, you may wish to keep a record of local sunset times for the period of March 22 through April 19, 1977, since Memorial always falls within this period.

  So they 'know' that, on the Gregorian calendar, Nisan never starts any later than April 6*. (For Julian dates during the early sixth century BCE, add 6 days.)
  *Nisan can actually begin as late as April 11, but JWs use the wrong dates for the three relevant years in the Metonic cycle.

  Their claim in the November 2011 Watchtower that "this made the new year actually not start until May 2/3" is nothing but a lie.
• 

  Jeffro

  1009:

  What I always considered a weird practice. Imagen that the sunset is about 7:30 pm. So the elders gather and choose 7:00 to start the Memorial.

  They're not supposed to pass the 'emblems' any earlier than sunset. They are allowed to start the meeting earlier than that though. Apparently the magic still works, so long as the wine and crackers don't circulate too early.
• 

  losingit

  Ugh, belief system falling apart. Do they get anything right? :-(