Ann O'Maly

2 minutes ago, scholar JW said:

Seeing that you such an expert on all matters pertaining to the astronomical tablets would you or can you assist with the following question:

Regarding the 1st Regnal of full year of Cyrus, How is the beginning and end of that year expressed in terms of the Jewish, Julian and Gregorian calenders?

Oh, Neil. I would love to help you. I really would. But I just can't be bothered.

22 minutes ago, César Chávez said:

That reading #59 is for 585 BC.

VAT 4956 doesn't include observations from 585 BCE. There wasn't a July eclipse in 585 BCE. The eclipses in 585 BCE are not from Saros 59.

Here, I've labeled more pictures for you. Remember that -584 is 585 BCE.

Remember that -567 is 568 BCE. 

You're again welcome.

9 hours ago, César Chávez said:

Keeping Watch in Babylon: The Astronomical Diaries in Context 2019

Try reading and understand Chapter 5, page 49, paragraph 2, lines 9-15

You can also see the chart in page 45

How does this help you? What point are you making with this reference?

3 hours ago, César Chávez said:

I don't need confusion to govern my life.

Really? You seem to thrive on it.

3 hours ago, César Chávez said:

Therefore, if VAT4956 suggests #49, then it would be for 586 BC, not 587 BC and 604 BC

Then what would be for 586 BC, etc.? 

Anyway, the eclipse on VAT 4956 belongs to Saros 59.

10 hours ago, Arauna said:

 The stars were used for superstitious purposes...... It was not used for dating. 

Let me try to lay this out for you (although this is more for any interested readers' benefit than for yours). The stars, planets, and Moon are components in a giant sky-clock that keeps perfect time. The 'fixed' stars are like the numbers spaced out on the clock's face. The planets and Moon are like the hands on the clock. Through their cyclical alignments with each other and against the 'fixed' starry backdrop, we can tell the time - the year, the month, the day.

Now, to be a 'competent' astrologer in ancient times, you had to be a competent astronomer. You had to interpret what you saw rather than what you wished you had seen. A bad astrologer would lose his job (or his life) if he faked his observations and his report to the court. It was a serious business involving years of rigorous training from childhood (remember Daniel?).

Not only that, but the Babylonians depended on genuinely dated observations over centuries to develop their mathematical astronomy/'science' that was eventually passed on to the Greeks and built upon by others. How were those observations dated? They used their calendar, i.e. the name and regnal year of the current ruler, the month, the day, even the time of night the observation took place. Any astrological interpretations coming from those observations have no bearing on the veracity of the celestial phenomena they witnessed.

So, when there is a dated astronomical text, we can check those observations, pin them to a BCE date, and hey presto! we can know in modern calendar terms when a king ruled. Thus, the 'stars' are reliable tools for dating kings' reigns.

4 minutes ago, César Chávez said:

Stick to typing in your normal job. Leave the intelligence to those that understand, and are trying very hard to accept what's before them by secular evidence. Can't have it both ways, girly!! 

Do you understand the distinction between astronomical dating and BCE dating now, CC? Did the diagram help?

28 minutes ago, César Chávez said:

Try intelligence by using the "Delta-T" methodology which is better for the TT-UT

🤣 Delta-T now. Oh please. 

4 minutes ago, Arauna said:

He is a bible student not a star gazer.

Don't insult the guy! CC considers himself a veritable polymath.

7 minutes ago, Arauna said:

He should accept bible chronological dates before he accepts the dates of people who were not historians...... but had other pagan occupations.

So, getting back to your easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy method for obtaining the year of Cyrus' death without stars and calendars, are you going to enlighten us at all about what that method is? I have my Insight book handy.

52 minutes ago, Arauna said:

Ptolemy wrote about the stars 600 years after events in Babylon  and cannot be verified as historically accurate because there is no other documents to verify it.

...other than the vast wealth of cuneiform astronomical texts direct from the period, thus a reliance on Ptolemy is unnecessary (which has been the case for well over 100 years).

57 minutes ago, Arauna said:

and its chronology creates great confusion with Asurbanipals reign.

Irrelevant. Assurbanipal was an Assyrian who lived before the neo-Babylonian period. 

1 hour ago, Arauna said:

Interestingly the Cyrus cylinder was found in Babylon - not in any capital of Persia. ... [Etc., etc.]

Irrelevant.

1 hour ago, Arauna said:

But interestingly the cyrus cylinder has an event on it which happened after he brought order to the city - some time after 539 bce

Do you have an easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy method for obtaining the year of Babylon's conquest without the use of stars and calendars? My fingers are poised to work those Insight book pages! 😉

10 hours ago, César Chávez said:

This is your personal opinion NOT based on astronomical evidence. Your position is for #47 not #57. Don't try to wiggle your way out of being incompetent all this time by criticizing the Watchtower. Now you're trying to manipulate the calendar year, 608/7 BC and 626/5 BC, your assumption is wrong. There are 2 points for 625 BC and 2 points for 607 BC. 3 points for 606 BC.

This cycle doesn't include 599/8/7 BC. Where is your precious Babylonian Chronicles?

 🤦‍♀️ CC, if you still can't understand something so basic as the astronomical dating convention for BCE dates, what are you doing here? 

@JW Insider is correct. You are wrong. And what is '599/8/7 BC' about? Are you aware that lunar eclipses can only occur at full moon and that only lunar eclipses can be included in a lunar eclipse cycle?

Here, I've drawn a diagram for you:

You're welcome.

36 minutes ago, César Chávez said:

[Some jumble of words that sounded like a rant.]

You confirmed that your post and screenshot had no point to make other than to somehow show me up for not knowing (or agreeing with) ... um ...something. What that something is is anyone's guess as you haven't tied it in with anything we've been discussing. 

29 minutes ago, Arauna said:

I only peek in now and then. I really do not have the time or the will to read through all of the half-baked information presented here. I have a life!  

Same here. But I was interested in your 'much easier method' for obtaining the year of Cyrus' death without stars and calendars. Maybe your method was restricted to flipping open the Insight book and it telling you? 

11 hours ago, César Chávez said:

No...

I thought so. A scatter-gun approach to pasting or screenshotting quotes from random works, which barely have even a marginal relevance to the subjects under discussion, doesn't make you appear as informed or as half-intelligent as you imagine, sadly. Try forming a meaningful argument in your own words instead?

10 hours ago, AlanF said:

Arauna will NOT answer you in any coherent way.

It's OK. I'm not expecting her to. 

25 minutes ago, César Chávez said:

To what extent in secular chronology?

To what extent what in secular chronology? Do your post and included screenshot have a point to make?

2 hours ago, Arauna said:

Please explain how I trash the methods?  

Aren't you?

When you say ...

... you are being dismissive of the methods used to get to dates like 530 BCE for the year of Cyrus' death and 539 BCE for the year of Babylon's conquest. How do you think one gets to those BCE dates without the ancient sky-clock and calendars? What are your 'easier methods' of getting to the correct dates?

1 hour ago, Arauna said:

That is why I stick to a date which can be proven beyond reasonable doubt:  530 BCE. Death of Cyrus.

How is it proven beyond reasonable doubt in your mind if you trash the very methods used to obtain that date?

1 hour ago, César Chávez said:

[Quoting Gershon Galil]

"It is clear that most of Parker and Dubberstein’s findings are still valid; two points, however, require emendation: 1) Following Goetze, Parker and Dubberstein supposed that the nineteenth year of Nabopolassar was intercalated. However, in the sole document on which their supposition is based (NCBT 1156), the king's name is not specified. It is more likely that this document is from the time of Kandalanu, the nineteenth year of whose reign was definitely intercalated. 2) It can be established that the first year of Nabopolassar was intercalated (BM 54209). Consequently, the number of intercalated years in the cycle beginning in 633 was at least six."

These two problems were resolved.

1) P&D recognized there was an issue with NCBT 1156 being unnamed (see P&D, p. 4, n. 9). So, the intercalary Ululu doesn't belong in Nabopolassar's 19th year. In fact, the intercalary Ululu belongs in Nabopolassar's 18th year as attested in economic tablets from that year (see D.A. Kennedy, JCS 38/2 (1986), p. 207).

2) It cannot be established that Nabopolassar's Year 1 was intercalated. C.B.F Walker collated BM 54209 in the early 1990s. He said the royal name was actually Nabonidus and published the correction in 1996. This was around the same time Galil's book was published, so Galil may not have known about it.

Consequently, the number of intercalated years in the cycle beginning 633 BCE is no more than five and in agreement with P&D's placement of intercalary months for Nabopolassar's first 11 years.

15 minutes ago, Arauna said:

I recheck my knowledge - always rechecking.

Yet you missed that the Babylonians' calendar was lunar-based.

And a lunar eclipse can only occur once in a lunar month. That's why lunar eclipses tend to show up in different months. 😆

1 hour ago, César Chávez said:

By Pekka Mansikka 2019

Isn't he a Finnish elder?

24 minutes ago, scholar JW said:

That is simply your opinion on the matter. Furuli's research differs from yours and that remains the problem.

Only a problem for you (and Watchtower). The matter is settled in academia.

25 minutes ago, scholar JW said:

2 hours ago, Ann O'Maly said:

Learn how to - like everyone else. 🙄

I cannot be bothered.

Haha, and there it is. OK, fine. In that case, methinks you should let go of the "heavy world of chronology" and stick to the more sedate world of the retired: golf, sudoku, or maybe enroll on a basket-weaving course. Hooroo.

2 minutes ago, scholar JW said:

I would test if I was competent so until i become competent i must rely on those who are competent such as yourself, Alan F, JW Insider, COJ and of course Rolf Furuli and his colleagues.

I, AlanF, JW Insider and COJ are competent after all, are we? Then what are you objecting to? We keep telling you, showing you, that Ex-Celebrated WT scholar Furuli, and followers of his work, are mistaken in their conclusions about VAT 4956 and other astronomical tablets, but you keep kicking against the evidence and you are still too scared (or lazy) to verify it for yourself. Come on, Neil. Less blah-blah and more action. 

35 minutes ago, scholar JW said:

That is the problem how does a person unfamiliar with astro programs or with ancient astronomy able to make sense of it all ...

Learn how to - like everyone else. 🙄

37 minutes ago, scholar JW said:

...for this really is the terrain of experts and certainly Furuli because of his expertise in the language of these clay tablets must surely be allowed to have an opinion.

"My disadvantage is that I am neither a professional archaeoastronomer nor a historian. ... With the help of modern astro-programs, a person who is not an astronomer can find the positions of the heavenly bodies in the past and, on this basis, test the correctness of the observations found in cuneiform tablets." - Furuli, Persian Chronology (2012 ed.), p.11.

So, what's stopping you, Neil? 

1 hour ago, JW Insider said:

I love that they break down each and every line the way they do. They put a picture of the line, a transliteration, and the official Neugebauer-Weidner/Hunger translation.

When he sticks to that, yes, it's a great idea and works well. Unfortunately, he doesn't stick to that.

1 hour ago, JW Insider said:

I assumed there would be more clarity here

His idea is to make the reader believe that cuneiform writing is open to interpretation - except when it conforms to his conclusions. If it doesn't conform to his conclusions, he changes the reading/meaning of the logograms. 

5 hours ago, scholar JW said:

5 hours ago, JW Insider said:

A very similar attempt to Furuli's was referenced above. The link is here: https://www.academia.edu/44227088/Fact_checking_VAT4956_com

This is simply the position of Ann O Maly and again she has an agenda or bias and her research needs to be tested as with all others.

You test it then, Neil. Ever since Furuli's books came out 13 years or so ago, I've wanted you to compare the astronomical data for yourself. You have always refused or made silly excuses so you stay on the same loop-de-loop of non-arguments.

1 hour ago, JW Insider said:

and the translation information is excellent there

It's pretty sloppy, actually. Some of it is sound, and some is confusing, misleading, or made up. 

1 hour ago, 4Jah2me said:

Unless we know Ann's motives then we would be judging her without true knowledge.

Yup.

OK. I learned about it on another very public forum, was shocked, came here to see what people were saying about it (y'all must have heard, surely? but no), found this thread with JTR's last post and Tom's comments about JTR's estrangement from his family ("He made it all public previously," said Tom in answer to some criticism about publicizing this private matter) and Witness's link to JTR's discussion about his being disfellowshipped and reinstated a while back and, as people were already openly talking about JTR's personal life and were wondering about where he'd abruptly disappeared to (all pretty intriguing), I decided to share a link which would shed some light on what had happened to him, thereby making his post a little less mysterious. I thought you guys would like to know, even if it was unpleasant news. At least we know he's not dead.

So there it is, and here we are.

1 hour ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Is there shame in an arrest? Not on the part of the one arrested until he/she is found guilty.

See my response to Thinking below.

2 hours ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Is it not slander ...?

It's not slander if it's true.

2 hours ago, TrueTomHarley said:

She can’t possibly have missed the point of the reference to the French Revolution in which a denouncement was enough to send one to the guillotine—she is not stupid.

Tom's point was misdirected as it was based on a faulty assumption, so naturally it didn't reach home. I did detect some scattered debris from a fallen straw man, however. 

1 hour ago, Thinking said:

False that the info was true....yet to be proved

What do you mean? What did I post that was untrue?

2 hours ago, Thinking said:

True I have come in some way to the defence of someone I was a bit fond off.

I think many of us had a soft spot for him - me included.

1 hour ago, Thinking said:

False a person should not be made to feel shamed if they are innocent of such charges...how on earth did you come to such a conclusion?

I didn't claim a person should be made to feel shamed if they are innocent so I couldn't have come to the conclusion you say I did. 

I said, "The shame is in being arrested for that crime," and asked: "Guilty or innocent, do you not think it shameful to be arrested for sexual offenses?"

If you were falsely accused, arrested, and charged with a sexual crime, how would you feel? If it were me, I would feel outraged, shocked, and acutely embarrassed (or shamed). Wouldn't you feel similarly?

1 hour ago, Thinking said:

You are In my opinion a shameful trouble maker with very little sense

It seems to me you like to shoot the messenger.

Quote

... again you say the shame is being arrested for that crime .. again you have presumed he is guilty of that crime...more personal speculation on your part ...

... Many people have been arrested for crimes....the shame comes when one is guilty of that crime.

Guilty or innocent, do you not think it shameful to be arrested for sexual offenses?

1 hour ago, Thinking said:

The shame comes when one rushes with information that may or may not be true...And places it on a public forum ......a fool does that Anne

1. Do you not know this site at all?

2. The information I posted was true and already public.

1 hour ago, Thinking said:

you started this whole saga and now you hope his family will be okay...you didn’t care a fig about his family when you posted up his mug shot and allegations ..

I didn't post his mugshot and allegations. I posted an embedded link to the inmate page that only signed-in members of the forum could access. 

1 hour ago, Thinking said:

..so don’t pretend to now.

Now look who's speculating.

1 hour ago, Thinking said:

I am not participating in this public debacle because of the reasons I have clearly stated.

And yet you are and have been participating.

Edit to add: I was referring to JTR's cryptic message and sudden absence. I think you may have read too quickly, @Thinking.