2 Chron 22:2...what the heck?

by doogie 11 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  doogie

  ok, hopefully someone with a handle on the original biblical languages can help me out here. i was reading some information another poster on the board sent me, and in it, he mentions an odd situation shown in 2 Chronicles 21:20 - 22:2

  He was thirty-two years old when he began to reign, and he reigned eight years in Jerusalem; and he departed with no one's regret. They buried him in the city of David, but not in the tombs of the kings. And the inhabitants of Jerusalem made Ahaziah hi youngest son king in his stead; for the band of men that came with the Arabs to the camp had slain all the older sons. So Ahaziah the son of Jehoram king of Judah reigned. Ahaziah was forty-two years old when he began to reign, and he reigned one year in Jerusalem.

  so, obviously this present some problems, because Jehoram had to have fathered Ahaziah 2 years before he (Jehoram) was born.

  here's the problem:

  i went and checked the NWT and 2 Chr 22:2 says that Ahaziah was 22 year old...not 42! this resolves the discrepancy because Jehoram would've been 18 when he fathered Ahaziah (which is definitely a bit more plausible than -2).

  EVERY OTHER BIBLE I'VE CHECKED SAYS AHAZIAH WAS 42 YEARS OLD, NOT 22...

  is the original text ambiguous so that 22 years can be acceptable, or is this blatant dishonesty on the part of the NWT?
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  doogie

  2 Kings 8:26 says that Ahaziah was 22 years old when he began to reign. all bibles that i've checked are in agreement with that.

  i assume that Fred just doctored up the 2 Chr verse to resolve any discrepancy.

  am i right? huh? huh?
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  Leolaia

  Actually, the NIV, NLT, CEV, NASB, etc. are all in agreement with the NWT.

  This is a textual problem. The Hebrew MT and the Latin Vulgate have "forty-two", the LXX has "twenty" (eikosi) and in some manuscripts "twenty and two" (eikosi kai duo), and the Syriac has "twenty-two". There is a footnote to this effect as well in the 1984 Reference Ed. of the NWT, p. 576.
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  doogie

  thank leo.

  i had checked the KJ, Amplified and one other one. i'm glad i checked before i emailed my mom...
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  A Paduan

  Spiritual son He also walked in the ways of the house of Ahab Being ignorant and "of the flesh", the wts bends to alter it for their own ideas - and missed the point.
  
  Jeho'ram would act as the Pharisees of Jesus' time (as the wts in this day), that the laws spoken by Moses were literally about food - he underwent a disease of the bowels (believing a lie), and as with Judas his bowels come out - wine skins that can't hold new wine - and as with jws, even though Christ exampled about "eating" and what it meant, they cannot get past the idea that it's about the flesh.
  
  their god is their belly -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  
  The watchtower bible people say - "We'd better change the 'mistakes' in this - lucky for people that we're so onto it"
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  the_classicist

  I don't know how letters are done in Hebrew, but in Greek numbers are represented by letters, and, as Leolaia said, there are usually textual problems. I believe there are 2 manuscripts of the Revelation to St. John; some read 666, others read 616 as the mark of the beast.
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  Narkissos

  TC,

  In Hebrew mss the numbers are generally written in full spelling.

  (According to the BHS there is still another variant by the Vetus Latina, "16 years").
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  doogie

  (According to the BHS there is still another variant by the Vetus Latina, "16 years").

  kind of hurts the whole concept of an 'intact' bible surviving to our time. who knows what other portions are copyist errors.

  i saw an apologetic's site that said that any discrepancies or errors in the bible are obviously copyist errors because of course, we know that the original manuscript could not possibly have included any errors (since it was from God)...
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  Narkissos

  i saw an apologetic's site that said that any discrepancies or errors in the bible are obviously copyist errors because of course, we know that the original manuscript could not possibly have included any errors (since it was from God)...

  LOL... circular reasoning in small circles, isn't it?
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  hamsterbait

  Peak's Commentary says:

  "Forty and two: this should be twenty and two (see 1K 8.26). The contradiction between this account and that of 2K 9.27ff is sufficiently striking to suggest that the chronicler utilised an entirely different source; it is not improbable that more than one account of the occurrence existed, and that the chronicler, for some reason of his own, followed the one different from that of 2K. There would have been no sufficient reason for the chronicler to have altered the account in 2K, which is the only alternative to that of postulating a different source."

  Makes me wonder how many other obvious contradictions and absurdities were edited out of the Bible by the Great Synagogue and the Early Church... NWT has just followed their example.

  HB