Babylonian Business Records

by VM44 96 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  kwintestal

  Just thinking what if you "hence counted back 70 years of desolation from the date that the temple was completed 516 which is stated in older WT then you would arrive at 586 B.C.E. Since the jews did not all immediately return and start building, in fact it was quite the opposite, to me the completion of the temple for full service and worship would mean more than the return of some. Just a thought.

  Sheri,

  I agree with this thought as a good explaination for the 70 years, if it was in fact taken as a literal 70 years. Thank you for sharing and welcome to the board!

  Kwin
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  AlanF

  Unscholar said:

  : I am not the sharpest knife in the draw by any means

  That is a wild understatement, and explains why:

  : so I will not be intimidated by anyone and will defend our wondrous chronology at all costs.

  It's completely obvious that unscholar, like so many of his fellow Jehovah's Witnesses, believes in certain JW teachings not because of the evidence, but because they've committed themselves to believing that God directs the Watchtower Society. This is clearly evident in the ignorance displayed in unscholar's earlier statement:

  : I firmly believe that Holy Spirit has revealed to His people a correct chronology

  Unscholar appears to be unaware of the fact that the "Gentile times chronology" was originated, not by C. T. Russell, but by the Second Adventist Nelson Barbour in 1875. Russell merely adopted Barbour's ideas and ran with them. The Society itself finally admitted this clearly in the 1993 Proclaimers book (pp. 135-6). Obviously, if "Holy Spirit" revealed this chronology, it revealed it to Barbour, not Russell. Therefore Barbour must have been the specific member of "the faithful and discreet slave" through whom God was providing "spiritual food in due season" to people like Russell, and, according to Watchtower reasoning, his organization must have been "God's organization". So, when Russell broke with Barbour in 1879, he committed apostasy by "running ahead" of "God's organization", whose "Governing Body" included Nelson Barbour.

  Simple logic like the above is way above the heads of dull knives like unscholar, and most other JWs. It's not so much that they can't understand it, but that they refuse to acknowledge simple truths and obvious contradictions in the teachings of their cult. This is illustrated by unscholar's repeated refusal to even comment about contradictions such as Alleymom and I have pointed out. By commenting, he would be acknowledging that the contradictions exist, and so, like a stupid and petulant child, he does the intellectual equivalent of sticking his fingers in his ears.

  Keep up the good work, unscholar! You're doing a wonderful job of showing fence-sitting readers why being a JW is dangerous to one's intellect.

  AlanF
• 

  pepheuga

  "Soteriology is in the province of Jehovah ....."

  point 1. '....is jehovah's province.....' is what you mean, the "in" is redundant.

  point 2. the use of the suffix "-ology" is well judged if you happen to hold that the almighty consults the writings of men in order to find out what his own doctrine is.

  point 3. (and far more important than the above) stop using stupid-arsed words like "soteriology"!

  pepheuga
• 

  Alleymom

  Alleymom is adorable

  Awwwww!

  But ... I am not the sharpest knife in the draw by any means

  Hmmmmm!

  I believe she is a sincere Christian ...

  Um-hmmm!

  ... but not a true Christian

  Ohhhhhhhh!
• 

  Alleymom

  Sheri ---

  Welcome to the board!

  Marjorie
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  VM44

  I received an email from Carl Olof Jonsson!

  I had asked him if he knew of any Neo-Babylonian records (tablets) containing interest loan computations crossing two reigns of Kings. I contended that such tablets would be proof conclusive of the relative chronology of the king list from Nebuchadnezzar to Cyrus.

  COJ said that he has for many years been looking for tablets that can be used to connect two or more reigns in the Neo-Babylonian periodl. He mentioned that on pages 129-139 of the 4-th edition of his book, The Gentile Times Reconsidered (GTR4), eleven such tablets are presented, and that these tablets connect all the reigns in such a a way that prevents the addition of extra years between any two King's reigns.

  As for tablets of the type I specified, he knew of no such loan records spanning the reign of two kings. He mentioned, however, that there are tens of thousands of clay tablets for which translations have yet to be published. COJ stated that he is sure that many of these unpublished texts record events that in one way or another span two or more reigns and therefore can be used as "chronological interlocking joints." It is just a matter of time before more texts of this type will be published.

  COJ went on to say that the most decisive evidence against a prolongation of the Neo-Babylonian period are the astronomical tablets, ten of which are presented in GTR4.

  --VM44
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  VM44

  Hi Alleymom,

  Do you know where one might find a translation of a Babylonian interest-loan calculation? Even it it does not cross the reigns of two kings, it would be interesting to see just how they did the computations. I have read that they did both simple and compound interest computations, which is quite a feat, considering they used a base 60 number system.

  Can you recommend any books or articles that cover ancient babylonian business (or astronomical) calculations?

  --VM44
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  VM44

  This came up at Amazon, not about business calculations, but about planets, so this might tie in with the astronomical calculations, at least theories, of the Babylonians.

  The Babylonian Theory of the Planets

  http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0691011966/ About the Author
  N. M. Swerdlow is Professor in the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics at The University of Chicago. He is the coauthor, with O. Neugebauer, of Mathematical Astronomy in Copernicus's De Revolutionibus.
  
  Product Description:
  In the second millennium b.c., Babylonian scribes assembled a vast collection of astrological omens, believed to be signs from the gods concerning the kingdom's political, military, and agricultural fortunes. The importance of these omens was such that from the eighth or seventh until the first century, the scribes observed the heavens nightly and recorded the dates and locations of ominous phenomena of the moon and planets in relation to stars and constellations. The observations were arranged in monthly reports along with notable events and prices of agricultural commodities, the object being to find correlations between phenomena in the heavens and conditions on earth. These collections of omens and observations form the first empirical science of antiquity and were the basis of the first mathematical science, astronomy. For it was discovered that planetary phenomena, although irregular and sometimes concealed by bad weather, recur in limited periods within cycles in which they are repeated on nearly the same dates and in nearly the same locations.

  N. M. Swerdlow's book is a study of the collection and observation of ominous celestial phenomena and of how intervals of time, locations by zodiacal sign, and cycles in which the phenomena recur were used to reduce them to purely arithmetical computation, thereby surmounting the greatest obstacle to observation, bad weather. The work marks a striking advance in our understanding of both the origin of scientific astronomy and the astrological divination through which the kingdoms of ancient Mesopotamia were governed.
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  AlanF

  Good points, VM44!

  It'll be interesting to see if Furuli addresses all of these problems for WTS chronology in his 2nd book. I seriously doubt that he will.

  AlanF
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  VM44

  Hi AlanF,

  Thank you, but the credit goes to COJ for these arguments.

  Hopefully soon, I will receive my copy of GTR4 in the mail.

  --VM44