I want to demonstrate for readers how grossly a JW apologist will lie to defend the Watchtower Society.
Scholar pretendus wrote:
: Indeed, WT scholars have thoughtfully and carefully examined all of the evidence and produced a chronology that is simple, Bible based and in conformity with secular evidence.
This is a completely false claim. First let's take a quick look at the history of the 1914 doctrine.
In 1869, a marginal Second Adventist named Nelson Barbour predicted that the world would be burned up when Jesus returned in 1873. When that prediction failed, he revised it to 1874. When that failed, he quit publishing his magazine, and lost most of his followers. By 1875 he had discovered a new New Testament translation, The Emphatic Diaglott, by the Christadelphian Benjamin Wilson. This translation rendered the passage in Matthew 24:3 differently from all others, which have something like what is in the NIV, where the disciples ask Jesus: "what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?" Wilson translated this something like: "what will be the sign of your presence and of the end of the age?" One of Barbour's followers pointed this out to Barbour, who seized on the word "presence" and used it to claim that his predictions for 1874 had not failed after all, but had been fulfilled invisibly. In other words, Jesus had returned invisibly in 1874, and was biding his time for some reason. Barbour then tried to find prophecies in the Bible to explain why Jesus had not done anything when he returned in 1874. He hit on the notion that there was going to be a 40-year "harvest period" between 1874 and 1914, and that when 1914 rolled around, Jesus would destroy all the nations. He also came up with a new interpretation of a general idea that had been rolling around for decades among men who published all sorts of prophetic speculations: that the "Gentile times" of Luke 21:24 would be a period of 2,520 years ending some time in the 20th century. Barbour used a complicated and totally unjustified mishmosh of Bible passages to decide that this period began in 606 B.C. and would end in 1914 A.D. He published his ideas, along with a good deal of other prophetic speculations and his own Bible chronology, in 1875 in a new magazine called Herald of the Morning.
In early 1876, Charles Taze Russell was introduced to Barbour's ideas, and quickly adopted them all. They published a booklet in 1877 called Three Worlds, and the Harvest of this World, which contained all of their prophetic speculations up to this point. In 1879 they split, and Russell began publishing Zion's Watch Tower. In 1884, Russell incorporated the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania.
Now, Barbour's and Russell's calculation of 1914 contained a serious error: they forgot that there was no "zero year" between 1 B.C. and 1 A.D. So, since they started the "Gentile times" calculation with 606 B.C., they should have ended up with 1915 as the end point. Russell knew about this problem as early as 1904, but did nothing. He was informed several times about this over the years, and even substituted 1915 for 1914 in the 2nd volume of Studies in the Scriptures, in some editions between 1912 and 1916. Other responsible men in the Watchtower Society also knew of this "zero year" problem, but they did almost nothing. Not until after J. F. Rutherford died in 1942 was this problem addressed. In a 1943 book, the Society changed the date for the beginning of the "Gentile times" to 607 B.C. and in a 1944 book changed the date for Jerusalem's destruction to 607 B.C.
It should be obvious that a chronology that was based on a flawed understanding of the basics of calculating dates is shaky indeed. And when the wrong start date is changed, based not on good evidence but on the necessity of retaining an end date (1914) that has become doctrinally significant, you should know something is seriously wrong.
Now, has the Watchtower Society examined all the evidence and dealt with it objectively? No. It has completely ignored the most basic scriptural evidence, and deliberately misinterpreted a great deal of other scriptural evidence. It rejects almost all secular evidence for the period when Babylon ruled Mesopotamia, only accepting it for dates after 539 B.C. The Watchtower chronology is wrong by 20 years when you get back to the time of Jerusalem's destruction.
As one example, 2 Chronicles 36:20 clearly states that the Jews would be servants to Nebuchadnezzar's dynasty only until the royalty of Persia began to reign. Obviously, the royalty of Persia began to reign in 539 B.C. when Cyrus the Persian conquered Babylon. Therefore, the 70 years of supremacy that Jeremiah foretold for Babylon over the Jews and other nations must have ended in 539 B.C. But the Society teaches that the 70 years did not end for another two years, in 537 B.C. The Watchtower Society has never dealt with this problem, preferring simply to not comment on it in any of its publications.
For a much more thorough discussion of how the Society ignores these scriptural problems, see this link: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/87714/13.ashx . If you read that entire thread, you'll also get a good idea of how a rabid JW apologist, scholar pretendus, repeatedly ignores evidence, ignores or contradicts what the Bible says, and often tells out and out lies, to defend Watchtower chronology. When someone has to resort to such tactics, you know something is very wrong.
Scholar pretendus claimed that Watchtower chronology is "in conformity with secular evidence", but that's true of only a single date in the Babylonian period in question: 539 B.C. The Society disagrees with all dates earlier than that. In particular, secular evidence proves that Nebuchadnezzar ascended the throne of Babylon in 605 B.C. and died in 562 B.C. The Society has those dates 20 years earlier. Ditto for the capture of Jehoichin in 597 B.C. and the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 B.C.
: That does not mean that secular evidence entirely supports 607
That's the understatement of the year.
: but in fact is used to determine other alternative dates as well.
Not at all. The Society rejects all secular evidence for dates earlier than 539 B.C. It uses its own, false timetable for such dates.
: So the secular evidence can be manipulated or interpreted any number of candidates for the Fall of Jerusalem. Therein lies the beauty of the secular evidence that it is susceptible to methodology and interpretation.
You can see the kind of thoroughly dishonest mindset of JW apologists at work here. While they themselves manipulate and interpret evidence almost willy nilly, with their only goal to justify Watchtower doctrine, good scholars examine all the evidence and let the chips fall where they may.
: It probably is the case that in general terms that 607 is the date only championed by Jehovah's Witnesses, but in sense this is not absolutely correct because there are many Bible Student organaizations today who accept the traditional chronology including 607.
Partially true, but they're all coming from the same tradition: that introduced by C. T. Russell. But today, a great many Bible Students no longer accept Russell's chronology.
: In fact there is clearly a need to address this matter fully and research these matters by way of a research project.
This is an extremely misleading statement. Scholar pretendus wants to give the impression that up to now, no one has fully researched "this matter". But many scholars have made it their life's work to do so, and have done so, and have published their results for more than a hundred years.
A good summary of what these scholars have come up with can be found in the book The Gentile Times Reconsidered, by Carl Olof Jonsson. You can order it here: http://www.commentarypress.com
: It cannot be said that there are no scholars who support 607
Yes it can. The Watchtower Society has no real scholars, nor do the Bible Students.
: but rather that the majority of Christendom's scholars do not accept the date but in so doing they are deeply confused.
This is yet another lie. Non-JW scholars are in no way confused about these topics. What they are is undogmatic about issues that have no easy resolution. This is in contrast with the Watchtower Society, where matters of biblical and secular interpretation are settled, not by an objective evaluation of evidence, but by decree. Decrees where the prime motivation is that the JW Governing Body hold on to its delusion that God is guiding them and the Watchtower organization.
AlanF
