Interesting Find with Chronology

by Kelley959 178 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  Rocketman123

  A little more insightful information.......

  The siege of Jerusalem was a military campaign carried out by Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon, in 597 BC. In 605 BC, he defeated Pharaoh Necho at the Battle of Carchemish, and subsequently invaded Judah. According to the Nebuchadnezzar Chronicle, King Jehoiakim of Judah rebelled against Babylonian rule, but Nebuchadnezzar captured the city and installed Zedekiah as ruler.

  Contents

  • 1Siege
  • 2Chronological note
  • 3Biblical account
  • 4References
  • 5External links

  Siege[edit]

  To avoid the destruction of Jerusalem, King Jehoiakim of Judah, in his third year, changed his allegiance from Egypt to Babylon. He paid tribute from the treasury in Jerusalem, some temple artifacts and some of the royal family and nobility as hostages.[1] In 601 BC, during the fourth year of his reign, Nebuchadnezzar unsuccessfully attempted to invade Egypt and was repulsed with heavy losses. The failure led to numerous rebellions among the states of the Levant which owed allegiance to Babylon, including Judah, where King Jehoiakim stopped paying tribute to Nebuchadnezzar[2] and took a pro-Egyptian position.

  Nebuchadnezzar soon dealt with these rebellions. According to the Nebuchadnezzar Chronicle,[3] he laid siege to Jerusalem, which eventually fell in 597 BC. The Chronicle states:

  In the seventh year [of Nebuchadnezzar, 598 BC] in the month Chislev [November/December] the king of Babylon assembled his army, and after he had invaded the land of Hatti (Syria/Palestine) he laid siege to the city of Judah. On the second day of the month of Adar [16 March] he conquered the city and took the king [Jeconiah] prisoner. He installed in his place a king [Zedekiah] of his own choice, and after he had received rich tribute, he sent forth to Babylon.[4]

  Jehoiakim died during the siege, possibly on December 10, 598 BC,[5] or during the months of Kislev,[6] or Tevet.[7] Nebuchadnezzar pillaged the city and its Temple, and the new king Jeconiah, who was either 8 or 18, and his court and other prominent citizens and craftsmen, were deported to Babylon.[8] The deportation occurred prior to Nisan of 597 BC, and dates in the Book of Ezekiel are counted from that event.[9]
• 

  Rocketman123

  There is a lot of useful and interesting information about King Zedekiah
  

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zedekiah
  
• 

  Rocketman123

  Secular historians date the event of Jerusalem's destruction to within a year of 587 BC. The Witnesses' alternative chronology produces a 20-year gap between the reigns of Neo-Babylonian Kings Amel-Marduk (rule ended 560 BC) and Nabonidus (rule began 555 BC) in addition to the intervening reigns of Neriglissar and Labashi-Marduk, despite the availability of contiguous cuneiform records.[3
• 

  scholar

  Jeffro

  Not quite. 2 Kings 23:36 gives Jehoiakim's reign as 11 years (counting his accession year), and we know his last year was 598 BCE. So his 3rd year using Nisan-based dating (not counting his accession year per the Babylonian and subsequent custom) was 605 BCE (up until early 604 BCE prior to Nisan), which is when Nebuchadnezzar returned to the area to demand tribute after he claimed the throne.

  Jehoiakim's last year of his 11th reign ended in 618 BCE so that means that his 1st year began in 628 BCE.His vassalage/kingship cf.Dan 1:1 of three years to Neb. began from his 8th ending at the 11th year of his total reign.

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  he 70 years (of nations serving Babylon, not Jewish exile) ran from Babylon's conquest of Assyria in 609 BCE (conquest of Haran following the earlier conquest of Nineveh in 612) until Cyrus' conquest of Babylon in 539 BCE.

  This statement is problematic because nowhere in the Bible is the Fall of Assyria associated with the 70 years and that is why many scholars date the 70 years from Neb's reign which began according to their reckoning in 605/604 BCE so this latter date would be a better fit than 609 BCE which historically is a 'fuzzy date. The difficulty is that scholars cannot agree as to the 'beginning' of the 70 years as no definitive date can be assigned. The date 609 BCE meets the arithmetic; 609 BCE - 70 years = 539 BCE or alternatively, 605 BCE - 70 years=535 BCE not the posited date of 539 BCE. BIG POBLEM HERE !!!!!!

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  The Jews returned in 538 BCE, not 537. This was during the first year of Cyrus with temple construction beginning in 537, as confirmed by Josephus.

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  Incorrect: The jews could not have returned in 538 BCE because they were still travelling or had not then left so it must have been in 537 BCE having already resettled in their cities by the seventh month in 537 BCE.- Ezra 3:1. Josephus agrees with WT scholars that the 70 years ended with the Decree of Cyrus which led to the end of the Exile and the 70 years and not the fall of Babylon previously..

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  Entirely wrong. 1914 is based on superstitious nonsense and nothing more (and the fact that something was 'supposed' to happen suddenly in or after October of 1914 is generally ignored by JWs and they just focus on the fact that 'something' significant happened in that year). The context of Luke 21:24 refers to a period that had not started in Jesus' time, and the duration of the 'appointed times of the nations' (when Jerusalem was 'trampled') is identified in Revelation as 3.5 times, 42 months and 1260 days, all being 3.5 years, and refers to the period from the Roman response to the Jewish revolt in 66 CE culminating in Jerusalem's destruction in 70 CE.

  --

  Entirely wrong: October 1914 CE marked the end of the Gentile Times a definite historical/ prophetic/eschatological period of a calculable 2520 years based on Dan. 4, Luke 21:24 and the relevant texts in Revelation. There is nothing in or about Luke 21:24 that can be interpreted to a 'trampling' by Rome but by the 'nations' which is plural until the appointed time. So, Jesus' words are quite explicit that the trampling of Jerusalem would be continuative long into the future and beyond the events of 70 CE In short, the wording of this verse takes us beyond the events between 66 CE to 70 CE.

  
  
• 

  HowTheBibleWasCreated

  On what basis does the OP place the dead sea scrolls before164 bce? I can find none
• 

  Rocketman123

  Scholar must be a delusional mentally off balanced idiot to not accept the overwhelming evidence of what happened in the region through archeological findings.

  The bible itself supports these findings in many cases.
  

  To him and his JWS brethren ancient prophecies hold more accuracy than all other forms of evidence
  

  Oh wait a second he's god's personally chosen scholar so that makes him right and everyone else in the world all wrong, I got now.
  
• 

  TruthMatters

  I have seen some goofy GB spin of the prophecies, but it looks like that is legit.

  The "one day for a year" fits; especially when it fits in to the Messiahs appearance.

  The Last Days most appear to recognize- and it all started in 1914.

  The "over-lapping" nonsense is just that.

  The generation spoken of is during the Great Tribulation.
• 

  Jeffro

  The ‘generation’ in question (being the typical definition of a ‘generation’) was indeed from Jesus’ time until the ‘great tribulation’. The ‘great tribulation’ was the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE which immediately followed the ‘trampling of Jerusalem’ from 66 CE to 70 CE (3.5 times, 42 months, 1260 days)
  
• 

  TD

  I agree

  ἡ γενεὰ αὕτη doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room. The generation was clearly something that existed at the time the words were spoken.

  It's only through typology that JW's and kindred groups have given it a secondary meaning.
• 

  Jeffro

  scholar:

  Nonsense: If this is really the case then you should be able to tabulate historically when each of those nations served Babylon.

  Yes, you're right - that is nonsense. Ironically, the Watch Tower Society actually put it best on this one in Isaiah's Prophecy, volume 1, page 253:
  

  True, the island-city of Tyre is not subject to Babylon for a full 70 years, since the Babylonian Empire falls in 539 B.C.E. Evidently, the 70 years represents the period of Babylonia’s greatest domination—when the Babylonian royal dynasty boasts of having lifted its throne even above “the stars of God.” (Isaiah 14:13) Different nations come under that domination at different times. But at the end of 70 years, that domination will crumble.

  Of course, it would be a fallactious argument from silence to assert that 70 years can only be applied to Judah because specific periods of desolation are not known for every nation (or any particular subset) that was subject to Babylon.