by coldfish 290 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Frank,
So, according to you, when a "theory" does not immediately gain wide acceptance, and instead initially meets with much skeptisism and critisism, it should be dropped "as quickly as possible." It's a good thing men like Nicolaus Copernicus and Charles Darwin didn't listen to "wise" advise like yours, which by the way they got plenty of.
Mike,
Don't you see this theory has caused your mind to stop thinking clearly simply because it is a pet of yours,,you like it and so you are trying to protect it against any harm. That's not good.
Frank,
Did you ever post here under the name "Fred Hall"?
Mike,
Talk about hitting below the belt,,..No I never did,,what next you gonna ask me if I'm You Know?
Achristian,
Following a fairly traditional understanding of Bible chronology (the same basic study published by Archbishop James Ussher nearly 400 years ago), JWs' date God's creation of Adam to 4026 BC. However, JWs begin their count back in time 20-21 years too early. For they do so beginning with a 607 BC date for Babylon's destruction of Jerusalem. But we now know the JW date for Jerusalem's destruction by Babylon is 20 years too early. We now know that Jerusalem fell in 587/6BC, not in 607 BC. So if we simply correct JW Bible chronology, using the correct date for Jerusalem's destruction, we arrive at the year 4006/4005 BC for Adam's creation. JWs also assign a 2 BC date to the birth of Christ. However, nearly all New Testament historians tell us that Christ was born in about the year 5 BC, some three years earlier than JWs say. With these things in mind, once we have corrected the JWs' Bible chronology in these two areas, it certainly appears that Jesus Christ was born into this world exactly 4,000 years after God's creation of Adam.
"If" from the bible it could be proven that Adam was born in 4000 BC and Christ in the year Zero then you might have something. Given the fact you have to use secular numbers along with biblical data and the two dont seem to mix well, I would not put much credence to it. Rounding the numbers of doesnt help either.
It would be rather illogical for God to actutally have intended for the the numeral 400 to mean something that he would be off a few years here and there and then like I said, use secular and biblical dating mixed in as well. Esp when he would expect us think the numbers mean something and then for him to be off.
Just curious, do you think Jesus will not return again for another 2000 years since he waited 4000 years from Adam to appear the first time and we are 2000 years appx forward from there so we could in your logic maybe have to wait another 2000 to keep the numbers at 4000?
Toreador
Toreador,
You wrote: "If" from the bible it could be proven that Adam was born in 4000 BC and Christ in the year Zero then you might have something.
I have done extensive studies on this subject matter. My studies date the creation of Adam as taking place in 4004 BC, the same date Archbishop Ussher arrived at, and which is published in the margins of Genesis chapter 3 in many very old King James Bibles. My studies date the birth of Jesus in the year 5 BC, which is the year 4000 counting the year of Adam's creation as year # 1. These studies are much too long and involved to post here, at least my study of Old Testament chronology which dates Adam's creation. My study dating the time of Christ's birth was not nearly as difficult.
You wrote: Given the fact you have to use secular numbers along with biblical data and the two don't seem to mix well, I would not put much credence to it.
I found that the two actually mix very well. JWs say they do not mix well because secular dates prove their understandings of scripture to be false. However, I have no problem with secular dates. In fact without relying heavily upon them I would not have been able to confidently assign dates to any events in Old or New Testament history.
Toreador,
You asked: Just curious, do you think Jesus will not return again for another 2000 years since he waited 4000 years from Adam to appear the first time and we are 2000 years appx forward from there so we could in your logic maybe have to wait another 2000 to keep the numbers at 4000?
I don't believe we are going to be waiting another 2,000 years for Christ's return. But I am certainly not foolish enough to speculate any further on that subject matter. At least not on this forum. : )
Yes but can you date Adam and Jesus from just the bible?
You asked: Yes but can you date Adam and Jesus from just the bible?
Of course not.
The following comments are those made on this subject by Carl Olof Jonsson, the author of The Gentile Times Reconsidered.
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There are no absolute dates in the Bible. It is nowhere stated, for instance, that Jesus was baptized in 29 A.D., that Cyrus captured Babylon in 539 B.C., or that Jerusalem was desolated in 607 B.C. as the Witnesses claim. The Bible gives relative datings only.
Thus, when we read about the desolation of Jerusalem in 2 Kings 25:1-12, we find only the information that this event took place in the "eleventh year of King Zedekiah" (verse 2), which corresponded to the "nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon" (verse 8). But when was that? How far from our own time was it? How many years before the Christian Era did it happen? The fact is that the Bible itself gives no information whatsoever that links up this dating with our Christian era.
The books of Kings and Chronicles tell about the kings who ruled in Israel and Judah from Saul, the first king, to Zedekiah, the last one. We are told who succeeded whom and for how many years they ruled. By summing up the lengths of reign from Saul to Zedekiah we can measure the approximate space of time (there are many uncertain points) between these two kings. In this way we find that the period of the Hebrew monarchies covered roughly about 500 years. But still we have found no answer to the question, When on the stream of time did this period start and end?
If the Bible had gone on to give a continous and unbroken series of regnal years from Zedekiah all the way up to the beginning of the Christian Era, the question would have been answered. But Zedekiah was the last king. Nor does the Bible give any other information that helps us calculate the length of the period from Zedekiah's "eleventh year" to the beginning of the Christian Era. Thus we have a period of roughly 500 years, the period of the Hebrew monarchies, but we are not told how far from our time this period was and how it can be fixed to our Christian Era.
If the Bible had preserved dated and detailed descriptions of astronomical events, such as solar and lunar eclipses, or the positions of the planets in relation to different stars and constellations, this would have helped us. Modern astronomers, with their knowledge of the regular movements of the moon and the planets, are able to calculate the positions these heavenly bodies held on the starry sky thousands of years ago. But unfortunately, the Bible provides no information of this kind.
The Bible itself, then, does not show how its chronological datings may be connected with our own era. A chronology that in this manner is "hanging in the air" is only a relative chronology. Only if the Bible had given us the exact distance from the time of Zedekiah up to our own era, either by the aid of a complete and coherent line of lengths of reign, or by detailed and dated astronomical observations, we would have had an absolute chronology, that is, a chronology that gives us the exact distance from the last year of Zedekiah to our own time.
The relative nature of the Biblical dates does not make it impossible to date events mentioned in the Bible. If it were possible to synchronize the chronology of the Bible with the chronology of another country, which in turn can be fixed to our Christian era, then it would be possible to change the relative chronology of the Bible into an absolute chronology. This means, however, that we would have to rely on extra Biblical, that is, secular historical sources, in order to date events in the Bible.
And we have no other choice. If we want to know when an event mentioned in the Bible took place, be it the date for the fall of Babylon, the date for the desolation of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, the date for the rebuilding of the temple in the reign of Darius I, or any other date whatever, then we have to go to the secular historical sources. This is the grim fact every Bible believer has to accept, whether he or she likes it or not. The simple truth is that without secular sources there is no Bible chronology, no datings of Biblical events.
Yes, that I know. But Why would God require us to sift through mountains of secular data to extrapolate when such and such happened. If you consider the bible to be the inspired word of God, should we need other material to figure out God's dates? After All they ARE God's dates.
I have yet to get a reasonable answer to that question from anyone I have asked.
Thanks,
Toreador
