a Christian, Thanks, I have sent off an email to COJ. --VM44
Babylonian Business Records
by VM44 96 Replies latest watchtower bible
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AlanF
I see that that unscholar has come out of hiding. In the thread http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/12/84135/3.ashx (page 3) he wrote:
"I will respond to your last post and to Alan F's shortly."
To date we have seen no response. Why? I let the reader conclude why from my comments on that thread with regard to unscholar's lack of response:
Unscholarrrr......
Unschoooooollllaaaaaaaarrrrr!!!!
Come out come out wherever you are!!
Is Rolfie taking a long time to get back to you?
I take it Rolfie never got back to you. Perhaps he's in the privy.
Unscholar lamented:
: The Society has stated its view on the corpus of business tablets relating to the Neo-Babylonian period in the Appendix to the publication, Let Your Kingdom Come published in 1981.
Yes indeed, and I understand your pain. Why do you not just let go and accept the inevitable?
: WT scholars
What? There are no such people.
: fully recognize and are excited about such a rich repository of historical and cultural information but we
"We"? How telling. It's good that you include yourself among these imaginary "scholars".
: also note the need fo temper any exuberance in such relative chronology presented in these tablets. The data presented in these tablets simply consists of regnal data which needs to be converted into an absolute chronology for the period in question. These tablets do not give any calender dates so such regnal data needs to be interpreted into a chronology schema.
The tablets do not themselves give dates, but taken together, they provide a continuous relative chronology from well before Nebuchadnezzar's acsension to Babylon's throne in 605 B.C. through long after Babylon's fall in 539 B.C. The point here is about the continuous nature of the chronology. There are no gaps more than a couple of years. Furthermore -- and here is where you dronish Watchtower apologists know to keep your critical mouths shut -- this continuous chronology jibes perfectly with the absolute chronology provided by various contemporary stelea like the Adda-Guppi stela, astronomical tablets like VAT 4951, and various synchronisms with Egyptian history. So these various absolutely dated tablets and synchronisms most certainly connect the relative chronology of the business tablets to an absolute chronology -- all of which contradicts Watchtower claims.
: Higher critics and apostates who adhere to the Jonsson hypothesis
Unscholar, you've been called to task for this lie dozens of times now. Have you no shame?
The point is that the entire world of good Bible scholars agree on Neo-Babylonian chronology. Jonsson is doing nothing more than publicizing their views that they've already published in various scholarly journals.
: believe that there is a twenty year gap between secular chronology and WT chronology
My, my, but you again demonstrate incomparable stupidity. There is no "belief" involved here. The fact that you're here arguing is proof enough.
: and thus disproving the validity and integrity of the calcuable date of 607 BCE.
Calculable? The date of 1874 for Jesus' invisible return was calculable. So what?
: WT chronology only accepts the validity and the integrity of the historical data presented in God's Word which presents 607 as the ONLY possible candidate for the Fall of Jerusalem.
Wrong. Watchtower apologists do NOT accept the historical data presented in the Bible. Furuli's ridiculous attempts to reinterpret Hebrew grammar and syntax so as to twist the Bible's clear statements into apparent accord with Watchtower tradition is proof enough. The fact that the Watchtower Society has never -- not even once -- presented a valid discussion about the most problematic texts (Jer. 25:11, 12; Jer. 29:10; 2 Chron. 36:20; Zech. 1; Zech. 7) is absolute proof.
What Watchtower apologists do -- and unscholar here is a poster boy example of -- is to lie about what they think they can get away with, ignore what they can't lie about, distort what's left over, and hope that no one notices.
: If such a methodology creates a twenty years gap between the sacred and the profane chronology then so be it.
Righto, And Watchtower apologists will continue to defend such idiotic notions until the very second they read "new light" in The Watchtower.
: Already, WT scholars are meeting the challenges
Really. Name them.
: offered by the mirage
Don't you mean barrage?
No matter, the secular evidence is no mirage, since you can see some of it for yourself by looking at pictures of the relevent cuneiform texts in scholarly journals -- and even a few in Furuli's book.
: of secular evidence in the form of the Oslo Chronology as presented by Rolf Furuli who will publish his research into Babylonian Chronology in the near future.
Yes, and Furuli's claims will just as surely be dismembered as they've already been, as Jonsson has done with Furuli's first book in the 4th edition of The Gentile Times Reconsidered.
Furthermore, the fact that Furuli has garnered no scholarly support from any secular or religious quarter, or even from the Watchtower Society itself, but only from the lunatic fringe of JW apologists such as unscholar here, proves that Furuli's books will quickly disappear from anyone's purvue.
: Furulu unlike Carl Jonsson, is fully competent in dealing with such primary evidence and is able to provide a fresh look at conventional wisdom.
Oh, please. Furuli is viewed as a crackpot by his peers, and the only reason he retains a job lecturing in Hebrew is because of the draconian European laws governing termination of poorly performing employees. You practically have to be an axe murderer to get sacked in Europe.
: In any event, Christians who loyally adhere to the superiority of God's Word are not disturbed by the interpretations of men and in faith believe that as time progresses God fully vindicates his faithful servants.
LOL! A general but meaningless statement. "God's Word" is one thing. The fallible claims of the leadership of Jehovah's Witnesses is quite another. The Watchtower Society had to eat crow about the dates 1874, 1904, 1910, 1914, 1915, 1918, 1920, 1925, 1941, the 1950s, 1975, 1984, 1994 and 2000. Such false claims -- all made by men who claimed divine direction of their writings -- proves that JW leaders are nothing more than false teachers, and therefore false prophets, who should be ignored by all true Christians and by anyone with an ounce of common sense.
AlanF
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scholar
Alleymom
Firstly, chronology is about methodology and interpretatation. When it comes to chronology of the Neo- Babyloian dynasty there are some problems. For example, there is a difference of opinion about the reign of Evil Mereodach, According to the Insight and Aid publications, Berossus assigns to him a reign of two years whereas Josephus assigns a reign of eighteen years.
WT scholars deal with Bible chronology based on the Biblical data primarily and are not dependent on outside secular evidence apart from determing a absolute or pivotal date. Such a methodology results in a twenty year shortfall between the sacred and profane chronologies. My response to this dilemna: Too bad!
scholar
BA MA Studies in Religion
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ozziepost
WT scholars deal with Bible chronology based on the Biblical data primarily and are not dependent on outside secular evidence
Scholar,
Please enlighten us, name one of the WT scholars you are speaking of? Come on, name just one!
"MA Studies in Religion" ???? Not terribly scholarly, matey.
Ozzie
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City Fan
Scholar,
Problems don't go away just by ignoring them. From this thread: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/12/84135/1.ashx
I will respond to your last post and to Alan F's shortly
We're still waiting. And as for this:
For example, there is a difference of opinion about the reign of Evil Mereodach, According to the Insight and Aid publications, Berossus assigns to him a reign of two years whereas Josephus assigns a reign of eighteen years.
Berossus was a contemporary scribe of the neo-Babylonian period whereas Josephus was a historian who collated information from various sources including Berossus. Furuli makes a big mistake in trying to discredit Berossus for including obviously mythological accounts and exagerated lengths of reign for the earliest Babylonian kings. This is an attempt to bias the reader against the writings of Berossus.
As a contemporary scribe it was his duty to copy these myths and legends as they were written. His lists of kings and lengths of reign in the neo-Babylonian period are no less accurate by including earlier myths.
In Against Apion 1:19 Josephus seems to be a bit confused as to when the temple was destroyed saying it was in 605 BC, when in fact it happened 18 years later. He then corrects himself after quoting from Berossus' third book of Chaldean history in Against Apion 1:20:
"Nebuchadnezzar, after he had begun to build the forementioned wall, fell sick, and departed his life, when he had reigned forty three years; whereupon his son Evilmerodach obtained the kingdom. He governed public affairs after an illegal and impure manner, and had a plot laid against him by Neriglissar, his sister's husband, and was slain by him when he had reigned but two years. After he was slain, Neriglissar, the person who plotted against him, succeeded him in the kingdom, and reigned four years; his son Laborosoarchod (Labashi-Marduk) obtained the kingdom, though he was but a child, and kept it nine months....After his death, the comspirators got together, and by common consent put the crown upon the head of Nabonidus, a man of Babylon...when he was come to the seventeenth year of his reign, Cyrus came out of Persia with a great army..."
Josephus then says (in 1:21) "These accounts agree with the true histories in our books, for in them it is written that Nebuchadnezzar, in the eighteenth year of his reign, laid our temple desolate, and so it lay in that state for fifty years; but in the second year of Cyrus its foundations were laid, and it was finished again in the second year of Darius."
So in his last discussions about the lengths of reigns of the neo-Babylonian kings Josephus agrees with Berossus.
CF.
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scholar
City Fan
Berossus was not a comtemporary scribe of the Neo-Babylonian scribe as you claim. The Aid book on page 328 states that Berossus in the third century BCE wrote a history of Babylon in the Greek language, evidently based on cunieform records. Further, this reference work states that Josephus of the first century BCE also claimed that he quotes from Berossus.
In fact, it is only in the Bible that we have comtemporary historical evidence for the Neo-Babylonian period, it was long after that period finished that historians including Ptolemy produced historical information.
scholar
BA MA Studies in Religion
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scholar
a Christain
You ask about the missing twenty years. This period of twenty years is a problem for secular chronologists and to date they cannot find them. WT scholars are not disturbed by this problem because Bible chronology pays scant attention to such materials in reconstructing a useful and validated chronology.Even though the business documents are impressive, the data presented therein still needs to be made useful so calender years are ascribed to them by interpretion. These tablets do not contain modern calender years.
scholar
BA MA Studies in Religion
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AlanF
Good points about Josephus and the length of reign of Evil-Merodach, City Fan.
Just goes to show how the Watchtower Society and its apologists will not hesitate to present incomplete -- and therefore deceptive -- information in order to deceive people into believing their nonsensical doctrines.
AlanF
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City Fan
Scholar,
Unfortunately I've lent most of my reference works to a JW friend of mine who is now on his way out of the religion! Maybe the point I remembered is that he worked from contemporary documents. But thanks for anwering all the other points as usual
this reference work states that Josephus of the first century BCE also claimed that he quotes from Berossus
Yeah, I just quoted some of it!!!
it is only in the Bible that we have comtemporary historical evidence for the Neo-Babylonian period
Why do you keep making up this crap?
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Leolaia
schooler...
Further, this reference work states that Josephus of the first century BCE also claimed that he quotes from Berossus.
Josephus wrote in the late first century AD, not a hundred years earlier. Berossus was not a contemporary as you point out, but he was 250 years removed from the N-B period and had direct access to historical records and knew Akkadian, whereas Josephus was about 600 years removed, had only indirect access through Berossus and other intermediate sources, and did not know Akkadian.
it is only in the Bible that we have comtemporary historical evidence for the Neo-Babylonian period
And how are the business/administrative records not "contemporary historical evidence"?
Even though the business documents are impressive, the data presented therein still needs to be made useful so calender years are ascribed to them by interpretion. These tablets do not contain modern calender years.
No problem. Take your pick.... 568 BC via VAT 4956, 517 BC via Strm Cambys, or any other means of anchoring the chronology to calendar years. It doesn't matter -- they all give the same results. What you so persistently fail to acknowledge is that the business/administrative data establishes the correct length of the N-B period beyond reasonable doubt, and that length is what is at issue concerning the 20-year discrepency between WT chronology and the historical record. If you argue that its value is undermined by the lack of absolute dates in the data itself, then you have no concept of how evidence is cumulative and must be looked at together -- as any "scholar" would know. Solve a "logic problem," and you'll see what I mean.