slimboyfat
Carl Olaf Jonsson despite having produced scholarly research into WT chronology, more specifically the validity of 607 BCE for the Fall of Jerusalem was not a scholar in the sense that he did not undergo learning at a University or received a Degree. COJ attempted to disprove 607 BCE by means of 17 lines of evidence from NB Chronology accompanied by his own interpretation consistent with the current scholarship of Jeremiah's '70 years' and an interpretation of the 'Gentile Times ' in Luke 21:24.
He published his original treatise submitted to Brooklyn Headquarters in 1977 titled The Gentile Times Reconsidered in four editions with a Fourth Edition reprinted as a First Edition 2021 subtitled Have Jehovah's Witnesses been wrong all along about 607 BCE? I had corresponded with COJ expressing my criticisms of his original thesis and he kindly sent me an autographed copy of his Third Edition, 1998.
One of my earlier criticisms was that he incorrectly accused the WT authors of the Proclaimers book of misrepresenting the connection of the Gentile Times with Luke 21:24 made by John Aquila Brown in his published Eventide, 1823.
Further, COJ failed to make any discussion of the Jewish/Babylonian Exile of 70 years in its theological and historical significance with the Fall of Jerusalem and failed to recognise that the 70 was a period not only of Babylonian servitude but a period of Exile with a desolated land of Judah. Further, he overstated the case of VAT 4956 as providing solid evidence for the date of 587 BCE as an Absolute Date for the Fall of Jerusalem rather than the preferred date of 539 BCE for the Fall of Babylon advocated by WT scholars since 1963. A Semitic scholar and former Winess, Dr. Rolf Furuli has since published scholarship that shows that VAT 4956 can also be interpreted to prove a 20 year gap in the NB Chronology which supports 607 BCE rather than 586BCE or 587 BCE.
Jonsson has never publicly produced his original treatise despite publishing online the correspondence between himself and the WT Society during the period when his treatise was being evaluated and it is hoped that this treatise will become publicly available.
Further, in terms of scholarly criticism of WT Chronology particularly 607 BCE and 1914 CE, COJ's research followed on the heels of earlier research made by SDA scholars and others in Australia from the fifites onto the sixties which was very similar in content to what COJ later published under the above title. Thus, his research impressive as it may be to some it was simply a replication of others' research'
Carl Olaf Jonsson Vale - May he rest in peace
scholar JW emeritus