JW Insider

4 hours ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Have they disallowed some? I thought that was only @allensmith28 or allen of some other number. Gasp! Has it ever happened to me (beyond the one obvious one)?

I've had my own comments disallowed specifically for discussing moderation policy, which is often a sensitive subject for moderators. And some for engaging with a poster who appears bent on spamming his or her own blog address, and I'm inadvertently helping them out by discussing their blog.

And of course, that might mean that this very response won't last long. But I bring it up anyway because it was in this very thread where @allensmith28 (##?) was minding his own business and got an earful from @tromboneck. (I say, "earful" because it had somethng to do with a corn cob, if I remember correctly.) So, allen was actually the one being "protected" by the moderators. Not that allen needs protecting -- he can handle himself -- and not that tromboneck had really pushed the envelope as far as others have, either. Moderation can never be totally fair, and this is one of the reasons that I often wish it had never been used. When the topic of a discussion forum takes a turn toward the totally absurd, as this one nearly had, it often just means that some people are just too tired or too uncomfortable to deal with it seriously. Silliness sometimes sends a serious message.

16 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

In actuality, he is a mentally challenged man who has difficulty recalling the order of the seasons.

In this case, I happen to know that he is not slow as some people consider slowness. I happened to catch a glimpse of some of his more short-lived posts that the moderators disallowed. This particular one, slipped through the crack, as it were.

2 minutes ago, Ann O'Maly said:

On 12/21/2017 at 6:27 PM, tromboneck said:

I am surprised he numbered his BM's and could remember them.Did he keep a ledger?

The BM numbers will have already been written in the reference works he consulted. But this raises the issue of how the same tablet can be assigned different numbers depending on how they were catalogued and the publication they appeared in, and it can make research pretty challenging for somebody initially trying to find their way around this subject

I'm afraid that @tromboneck had his mind in the toilet with that particular comment. He was thinking of BM in another sense:

• (Song of Solomon 5:4, KJV) ". . . and my bowels were moved for him.."

27 minutes ago, Queen Esther said:

Why  men  often  have  fun  making  such  of  comparisons ??  ;-((   UGH.... 

If it makes you feel any better, I detest a lot of the memes that JTR posts, and he's a man. Can I get any credit for that?

1 hour ago, TrueTomHarley said:

egrets, I've had a few
But then again, too few to mention

Everyone can and will believe what they want, but I thought they looked especially fake for a man who was caught lying and cheating just months before he died. I looked up the first line of the speech in Google and got the following back on the first page. Of the first 6 items returned, 5 of them indicated it was fake on the blurb that is returned with the link. Only one, the Youtube, link didn't say anything about it being fake -- and it was leading people to watch a different speech not related to the one above.

• These aren't Steve Jobs's last words, but they still managed - BGR.com

• Virgin founder reposts fake final words of Steve Jobs - Digital Trends

• The Last Words Of Steve Jobs Are Inspirational As Hell, Even If They ...

A quick search will reveal that these particular words are not actually the Apple founder's final remarks.

• The last words of Steve Jobs - I have come to the pinnacle ... - YouTube

• These aren't Steve Jobs's last words, but they still managed to ... - Yahoo

-------------

Also, should note that it is extremely common for people to make use of a famous "respected" person and then make them give a speech that the person wants others to hear. It's been happening since Bible times.  A whole genre of apocrypha is named after it: pseudepigrapha, including, Assumption of Moses, Book(s) of Enoch, Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs, etc. 

It's just like Abraham Lincoln said:

• You can't believe everything you read on the Internet.

53 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Did he really say this?

You mean did he say "Oh Wow! Oh Wow! Oh Wow!" ?

That seems probable based on confirmation from those close to him. If your loved ones admit that your last words were something that sounds like the side effects of a morphine drip, then this is much more likely than a long, written speech that had no similarity to the kind of person he had been for most of his later life.

A quick search on the words of the longer speech on Google returns articles admitting that those close to him know that the speech is not from Steve Jobs.

45 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Bethel will never let go of 607, I don't think, because it enabled them to hit the nail on the head.

That's what a lot of people at Bethel must still think. Can't blame them, I guess. But this bit of history is rarely described as it actually happened. But even if it had been predicted, it wouldn't make the theory true. The biggest problem is that 1914 was to usher in an era of peace. Initially 1914 was predicted as a time when there would NOT be war. Here is the prediction as it stood just 20 years prior to 1914, in the Watch Tower, July 15, 1894 p.226:

• But bear in mind that the end of 1914 is not the date for the beginning, but for the end of the time of trouble.

How many times have you read that in the publications describing what was supposedly predicted "decades in advance"? Instead, because chronology usually accompanies dishonesty, unfortunately, we had this to say at a time when the Society was trying to bolster belief and speculation in 1975: (from the Awake! January 22, 1973, p.8

• "Jehovah's witnesses pointed to the year 1914, decades in advance, as marking the start of "the conclusion of the system of things."

One of the very reasons that Adventism became so popular in the early 1800's is that a Bible prophecy that had been predicted through chronology in the late 1600's had actually come true near the end of the 1700's. Russell was a strong believer that this prediction had come true, and was therefore also a believer in some of the same predicted prophetic phenomenon that was seen in the early decades of the 1800's. I've described this before, so perhaps I'll find a link to the post rather than describing it again here. It was that amazingly accurate prediction, however, that got so many religions caught up in this search for more dates.

1 hour ago, Foreigner said:

Perhaps. The last time I looked, it has been scrutinized by skeptics since writing became a form of communication. However, I don’t see anywhere in scripture that our *faith* in GOD should be equal to the “faith” in the Babylonian Chronicles. Then, the weight of evidence becomes more in the theories of men than that what is actually written in God’s INSPIRED word, scripture. Then we can agree that the Babylonian Chronicles tell a story, just NOT a COMPLETE story. It's all in the interpretation, then!

Don't know if this was intentionally offered as support for what I have been saying in recent posts, but I thank you for it anyway. Currently, our faith in the correctness of the year 539 (from which we derive 607) is based on faith in the Babylonian Chronicles and their secular equivalents. 539 and 607 are secular dates, of course, and the weight of evidence is more in the theories of men than what is actually written in God's inspired word, scripture. I agree 100% that the Babylonian Chronicles tell an incomplete story, that has been interpreted. Our faith should be in the Bible without so much reliance on interpretations that are based on theories of men.

Well said!

2 minutes ago, Ann O'Maly said:

The pdfs from other sites will give you a corrupted copy that has been edited and added to by a person called Tönis Tönisson (look at the copyright page and you'll see his name). He has even dishonestly inserted some comments in the body text that COJ didn't write.

Thanks. That's certainly good to know.

9 hours ago, scholar JW said:

  i can see that it has made a huge impact on your faith as a Witness and has certainly undermined your belief in our Chronology.

Looking into these facts can be very faith-strengthening. For example, the Bible says that:

• (1 Thessalonians 5:1)  Now as for the times and the seasons, brothers, you need nothing to be written to you.

However, if it's really true that we need to be able to trace the times and seasons to 539, but dismiss the same evidence that gave us 539 so that we can claim that Jerusalem was destroyed in 607, then obviously most of us don't have access to the evidence and the reasons why we do this. If we really need to have things written to identify the times and seasons when Jesus began his rule and his parousia, and if this is truly an important part of being on the watch for Jesus' parousia, then we make a mockery out of Paul's words and Jesus' words.

We say the opposite of what Paul said above, because I guess we just don't think that what he said has a "ring of truth." We prefer to contradict Paul.

So once we understand just a little bit more about the claim that is being made, our faith should be strengthened in the correctness of the Bible.

10 hours ago, scholar JW said:

The point I am making is that Jonsson does not consider 597 BCE to be a Absolute Date having similar status to 539 BCE which is the pivotal date for WT Chronology.

Now I really wonder again if you have read his book, or if you just see this as a chance to bluster the less informed. You could have just read the chapter titles and known better than to make the statement just quoted. The opening page of Chapter 4, The Absolute Chronology of the Neo-Babylonian Era, says the following:

• In this chapter it will be demonstrated that the whole Neo-Babylonian period, including the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, may be established as an absolute chronology by the aid of astronomical cuneiform documents found in Mesopotamia.

Jonsson goes on for the rest of chapter showing why he considers dates like 597 to have the same status as 539, because they are all part of the same pivotal era. Of course, this also means that one way to double-check that 539 is 'absolute' is to count forward through each king's reign from 597. This also provides an excellent double-check that the entire era is "absolute," using the language of scholars of chronology.

As to your claim that there is not enough evidence, there are evidently about 1,600 of these astronomical texts, and about 1,300 of them help us specifically with the timeline from the Babylonian region, with several of them going back to the very centuries we are discussing:

• The greater part of the remaining texts, however, about 1,300 in number, are non-mathematical and principally observational in nature. The observations date from about 750 B.C.E. to the first century of the Christian era. The great number of observational texts are of the utmost importance for establishing the absolute chronology of this whole period. (p.156)

Your claim that there is not enough evidence is wrong, because not only do ALL of these 1,000 plus astronomical-related texts fix the entire B.C.E. period back to about 750, but there are another 20,000+ commercial tablets, contacts and receipts, that also perfectly support the entire period. They are each dated to the reign of the king and some even have valuable additional information that doubly confirms the absolute chronology with an unambiguous relative chronology. Do you have an idea what would be considered enough evidence? Maybe just one more contract tablet and one more astronomial diary? LOL

9 hours ago, scholar JW said:

Where are those pages from pp.506 onwards from GTR. online ? I cannot locate such a section of 130 pages.

[Edited to add that Ann O'maly has added information below that indicates that the single, full pdf was not put together by Carl Jonsson and contains spurious text. Therefore, I am removing the 4 links that likely pointed to that version.]

• http://kristenfrihet.se/english/gtr4/contents.htm
  • http://kristenfrihet.se/english/epage.htm
    • http://kristenfrihet.se/english/gtr4/gt of luke 21.24 .pdf
    • http://kristenfrihet.se/english/artaxerxes.htm
    • http://kristenfrihet.se/english/furuli.htm

I searched Google for "Gentile Times Reconsidered 4 pdf" and the above pages came up. I couldn't find a complete single pdf on kristenfrihet.se but the pieces seem to be there. I tried a download from all the others except scribd and all of them returned the full 559 page pdf. I don't know if all of these sites are making it available legally with permission, btw. Use your own judgment.

2 hours ago, scholar JW said:

I cannot find it listed in the General Index which some mention in that place would have been expected.

It's there too, of course (in your 4th edition):

• Chronicles: Neo-Babylonian, 100-105, 148; nature of, 100; reliability of, 104, 105; BM 21946, 101 (picture), 102, 201-203, 207, 295, 296, 339,340, 342, 343; Nabonidus Chronicle, 102, 103 (with picture); BM 21901, 233; BM 22047, 346

But this sort of begs the whole question about what you have been doing for the last few decades. From what I can see on J-W Discussion, you have apparently made a kind of multi-decade career out of Jonsson-bashing, and yet you don't even know what's in his book? Have you ever read his book? I could quote a dozen other times from J-W Discussion where you talk about how Jonsson fails to do this or that, and now I have to wonder whether any of this has been honest.

2 hours ago, scholar JW said:

Perhaps what I meant to say is that Jonsson fails to discuss this tablet in connection with the date 597 BCE and Neb's 7/8th yr in connection with that date or his seventh years according to the Chronicle as to its elevation of status in Chronology.

That's not true either, of course. At the end of this post I'll add an image from page 254 which includes it among all the most important documented activities of Nebuchadnezzar's reign. A longer discussion of how BM 21946 relates to Nebuchadnezzar's 7/8th yr takes up several paragraphs on page 296. An even longer discussion of the importance of BM 21956 as it relates to his 7/8th yr is on page 342 and 343 of Jonsson's book. Here's a portion of pages 342-3:

• Nebuchadnezzar’s siege of Jerusalem during the reign of Jehoiachin is also described in the Babylonian chronicle B.M. 21946. For the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar this chronicle says: From Dec. 598 (or Jan. 597) to March 597 B.C.E.: ”The seventh year: In the month Kislev the king of Akkad mustered his army and marched to Hattu. He encamped against the city of Judah and on the second day of the month Adar he captured the city (and) seized (its) king. A king of his own choice he appointed in the city (and) taking the vast tribute he brought it into Babylon.”[68]
• NebuchadnezzarÂ’s army left Babylon “in the month of Kislev,” which was the ninth month, and seized Jehoiachin “on the second day of the month Adar,” that is, the twelfth month.[69] This means that even if the army left Babylon in the beginning of Kislev (which this year began on December 18, 598 B.C.E., Julian calendar), the interval between the day it left Babylon until the city was captured and its king (Jehoiachin) seized, on the second Adar (which corresponded to March 16, 597), was three months at the most.[70]
• Footnotes:
  • [67] It is interesting to note that in this first deportation Nebuchadnezzar brought only “some” of the vessels from the temple in Jerusalem to Babylon, and these were not even the “valuable” vessels. This strongly supports the conclusion that the siege of Jerusalem at this time did not end up in the capture of the city. If it did, why did he not take the valuable vessels from the temple? If, on the other hand, the siege was raised because Jehoiakim capitulated and paid a tribute to Nebuchadnezzar, it is quite understandable that Jehoiakim did not include the most valuable vessels in the tribute.
  • [68] A. K. Grayson, op. cit., p. 102. The chronicle is in complete agreement with the description of this siege given in the Bible. (2 Kings 24:8–17; 2 Chronicles 36:9–10.)
  • [69] The Babylonians had a second Ululu (an intercalary month) in the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar, thus making Kislev and Adar the tenth and thirteenth months respectively that year, although they were normally the ninth and twelfth calendar months . This fact does not affect the discussion above.
  • [70] If the Babylonian army left Babylon some time after Jehoiachin had ascended the throne, the siege was of very short duration, two months at most and probably less, as the time the army needed to march from Babylon to Jerusalem has to be subtracted from the three months from Kislev to Adar. Such a march took at least one month. It is possible, however, that a part of the army had left Babylon earlier, as 2 Kings 24:10–11 indicates that Nebuchadnezzar arrived at Jerusalem some time after the siege had begun. The reason for the short duration of the siege was JehoiachinÂ’s surrender to Nebuchadnezzar on Adar 2 or March 16, 597 B.C.E., Julian calendar. (2 Kings 24:12) For an excellent discussion of this siege, see William H. Shea, “NebuchadnezzarÂ’s Chronicle and the Date of the Destruction of Lachish III,” in Palestine Exploration Quarterly, No. 111 (1979), pp. 113f.

2 hours ago, scholar JW said:

What is puzzling is that Jonsson's treatment of this event and the date 597 BCE should warrant such to be considered to be a Pivotal or Absolute Date when in fact WT Chronology places the same features in 617 BCE

I suspect you are not truly puzzled in the least by his treatment of that point. If you really were you should certainly not try to pass yourself off as any kind of student of chronology. It's the entire Neo-Babylonian period that is now "pivotal" through "absolute" chronological dating. The entire period is known through established, chronometric (calendar) dating. The entire range from Nabopolassar through Cambyses and beyond is considered "absolute" in this sense by chronologists who study this historical period.

Yes, it's true that WT "chronology" places the events of 597 in 617. That's easy to understand though completely outside the context of chronology:

It's because the writers at the WTS created a never-ending problem for themselves by adding 20 years to 587 to get 607 to force it to fit 1914. So they are stuck adding it to every date prior to 607, too. They clearly haven't yet figured out how or when or if they are going to fix the problem. It's no more about real chronology than 1874 was really one of "God's dates, not ours" just because it was claimed to be such in the Watch Tower publications. But remember, the Watchtower kept 1874 on the books for 64 years, until finally it no longer was one of "God's dates, not ours."

That means that for  64 years, 1874 had come from God, and not from any private interpretation:

• (2 Peter 1:20,21) 20 For you know this first, that no prophecy of Scripture springs from any private interpretation. 21 For prophecy was at no time brought by manÂ’s will, but men spoke from God as they were moved by holy spirit.

The Watchtower didn't fix that particular date problem until 1943, just a year after Rutherford died. Now we know it wasn't about real chronology, but it was a private interpretation after all.  Perhaps a hint about why can be found in this quote referencing Rutherford and those who agreed with him.

• "We understand . . [a person]. . who like Judge Rutherford is permeated with the real Biblical and prophetic spirit. . . ."  (g1924, December 17, p.179)

Rutherford had a very similar outlook on Russell which kept him from overcoming all of those previously-labeled "God's dates" for many years. That's why the discussion in the May 1922 Watchtower is so interesting in that it points to what Rutherford thinks is at the heart of the chronology problem: it's coming from those who are falling away from the faith they once put in Russell, who had died in 1916. Apparently Fred Franz in 1943 showed he had fallen from the faith he once put in the late Rutherford, who had died in 1942. Apparently, by the late 1970's, many more had fallen away from the faith they had once put in Fred Franz.

The 4th edition of Jonsson's book has been further expanded online, by about 130 pages, and this moves the index, too, but the index is still the original one, and the rest of the book, through page 380 is still exactly the same as the printed 4th edition. The index does not reference the added material.

1 hour ago, scholar JW said:

Jonsson fails to discuss BM 21946.

Do you think people will just believe you without checking?

Jonsson even has pictures of it. This is from page 101 of Jonsson's book: (Gentile Times Reconsidered, 4 edition).

• The Babylonian Chronicle BM 21946
• This chronicle covers the period from Nabopolassar’s 21st year (605/04 B.C.E.) to Nebuchadnezzar’s 10th year (595/94 B.C.E.). Photo used courtesy of D. J. Wiseman (shown in his Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon, Plate VI).

Here is from page 102:

• The extant (actually existing) parts of Chronicles 2-7 cover the following regnal years: TABLE 2: EXTANT PARTS OF THE NEO-BABYLONIAN CHRONICLES 2–7
• CHRONICLE NO.         RULER                   REGNAL YEARS COVERED
• No.2 = B.M. 25127      Nabopolassar     acc.-year – 3
•       3 = B.M. 21901      Nabopolassar     10 – 17
•       4 = B.M. 22047      Nabopolassar     18 – 20
•       5 = B.M. 21946      Nabopolassar      21
•              ” ” ”                   Nebuchadnezzar  acc.-year – 10
•        6 = B.M. 25124    Neriglissar             3
•        7 = B.M. 35382    Nabonidus             1 – 11
•               ” ” ”                  Nabonidus             17
• In all, the Neo-Babylonian period (625–539 B.C.E.) includes a total of eighty-seven regnal years. As is seen in the preceding table, less than half of these years are covered by the preserved parts of the chronicles. Yet some important information may be gathered from them.
• Chronicle 5 (B.M. 21946) shows that Nabopolassar ruled Babylon for twenty-one years, and that he was succeeded by his son Nebuchadnezzar. That part of the text says: For twenty-one years Nabopolassar ruled Babylon. On the eighth day of the month Ab he died. In the month of Elul Nebuchadnezzar (II) returned to Babylon and on the first day of the month he ascended the royal throne in Babylon.

Jonsson also mentions it on page 199, 201, 207, 208, 209, 254 (7 times on that page), 296, 315, 338, 339, 342, 347, 349, 506, 512, 514 and 515.

59 minutes ago, scholar JW said:

The  acc. year of Cyrus is not in dispute for it is a date universally recognized dating the Fall of Babylon in 539 BCE.

And the accession year of Nebuchadnezzar is not in dispute, either, for it is a date universally recognized as 605 BCE.

2 minutes ago, Anna said:

1 hour ago, JW Insider said:

so I will explain from a different angle.

Bored today JWI ? 

As a rule, I am neither obtuse or acute, but that doesn't mean I am always right. By any measure, however, it's always good to try angles of all kinds. I can even try scalene new heights!

7 hours ago, scholar JW said:

You must not conflate the two dates 539 BCE and 587?BCE as to having the same accuracy. This would be a serious mistake.

What @scholar JW says is true @Anna, You could say that 539, the accession year of Cyrus over Babylon, has the same accuracy as 587, the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar. But you may still not be clear about whether the Bible means Jerusalem was destroyed in the 18th or 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar. Of course, we can know that Jerusalem was destroyed in either the 18th or 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar, and this is absolutely as certain as knowing that Babylon fell in the "1st" (accession) year of Cyrus.

I assume you can probably see through the magical sleight of hand that says that since you only know for certain that it was 586 or 587, then you must believe that that the new "wondrous" date is certainly .... wait for it.....607!  Tadaaaaah!

On 6/8/2017 at 12:25 PM, JW Insider said:

Most engineers I know have been married an average of 0.5 times. For reasons only an engineer would know, I cannot say that the average was 0.50 or 0.500, indicating the limited scope of my data.

Perhaps I was being obtuse when I was trying to be ...ah... cute, so I will explain from a different angle.

If I know 4 engineers and 2 were married and 2 have never been married, then the engineers I know have been married an average of 0.5 times. Although this also works out to 0.500 times, a scientist would say that this level of zeros implies that I have enough data to declare that level of accuracy, which should mean that I know, let's say, 4002 engineers and 2001 were married once, and 2001 have never been married. Only by using that scope of data would I have a right to say 0.500, instead of just 0.5.

A good explanation is also found here: http://www.tc3.edu/instruct/sbrown/stat/rounding.htm

• The significant digits in a number start at the first non-zero digit and end at the last digit. Examples: 1417 has four significant digits, and so do 1.417 and 0.00001417. What about 14.1700? It has six significant digits, not four, because only zeroes at the start of a number are non-significant. Finally, 14.07 has four significant digits.
• There can be some ambiguity with trailing zeroes in a large whole number. For instance, we quote the average distance from earth to sun as 93 million miles. In that form, the number has two significant digits. (Remember what significant digits mean: they mark the non-“slop” part of the measurement. All we’re saying is that the average distance is 92½ to 93½ million. But suppose we write the number as 93,000,000? Does it now have eight significant digits? Are we saying the average distance is between 92,999,999.5 and 93,000,000.5 miles? Surely not! . . .
• . .

  4800 has two to four significant digits. The 4 and 8 are definitely significant, but just by looking at the number we can’t tell whether it’s accurate to the nearest whole number (4800, four significant digits), to the nearest ten (480x, three significant digits), or to the nearest hundred (48xx, two significant digits).

  4800.0 has five significant digits. In the previous example (plain 4800), the two zeroes might indicate precision of measurement or be there simply as place holders. But with 4800.0 the last zero is obviously not needed as a place holder and therefore it must be significant.

3 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

If they had kept their insurance premiums up to date they wouldn't have been destroyed at all.

True. One big US insurance company calls itself The Rock. (and some actor does too)

They could have redeemed their policy.

• (Psalm 78:35) 35 Remembering that God was their Rock And that the Most High God was their Redeemer.

20 hours ago, Anna said:

I don’t think trying to discredit 1914 is the reason. Not among serious Bible students and seekers of truth anyway. As for secular historians and scholars, logically, why would they be interested in discrediting 1914? Why should they care? I would think it’s only ex witnesses who would be happy to throw 1914 under the bus.

I think these comments show a lot of insight. Out of every 100 scholars who have taken an interest in this time period prior to 1970, 99% of them have problem never heard of 1914, and yet all 100 of those scholars inadvertently discredited our theory about 1914. However, like @Gone Fishing said, I do think that for JWs and exJWs involved in this discussion, 1914 must be at the heart of the matter. How can it not be? The only reason that we, as JWs, take any interest at all in 607 is because of 1914. The only reason we take any interest in the 70 years itself is because of 1914. The only reason we discuss Daniel 4 is 1914. A year has never gone by since the 1900's, when the WTS did not mention 1914 several times.

We already have 68 years of searchable Watchtowers in the WT CD since 1950, and we can easily see the importance. No other "prophetic" date (BCE) is considered even a tenth as important to us as those which are said to support 1914. For example:

• We date Adam's creation to 4026 B.C.E. and Watchtowers since 1950 have mentioned this date only about 18 times in only 13 different Watchtower magazines. (10 of the 13 were in the period from 1966 to 1975).
• We date the beginning of the 70 weeks of years to 455 C.E. and this has been mentioned in about 45 different Watchtowers since 1950.
• We date the end of the 70 weeks of years to 36 C.E. and this has been mentioned in about 95 different Watchtowers.
• 1914 of course gets mentioned several times a year, often in most of the Watchtower magazine issues that are published in any particular year: nearly 4,024 mentions since 1950.
• 607 has been mentioned in at least one Watchtower per year (usually several times a year) in every year since 1950 (except 2010): over 850 times.
• 539, of course, is mentioned as the "evidence" for 607, but with only about 250 mentions since 1950.

So, you make a good point, Ann, about scholars, but the subtext among JWs and ex-JWs is always going to be related to 1914.

This was pretty obvious when members of the Writing Department and researchers at Bethel quickly realized that if they questioned 607, they would likely be questioned themselves with a view to being disfellowshipped for apostasy. If you questioned 607, it was considered obvious that you must also be questioning 1914. Anyone could connect the dots. In fact, when Carl Jonsson's manuscript arrived at Brooklyn Bethel, two of the writers told me it was called "the hot potato" by several others because no one wanted it to land on their desk. They knew it was a Lose-Lose situation. For months it just remained on a shelf. People made excuses why they didn't have the time to address it.

A lot of people who don't take the time to look into such things don't realize that there is always some "Biblical" method to take prophecy and find a way to interpret it to reach somewhere into every single century, perhaps every single decade. Russell and various adventist-minded predecessors had been able to single out every decade since the 1780's to the 1900's with time-based prophecies. There was so much repetition, intertwining, and "ring of truth" about such dates, under Russell, that they soon became "God's dates." (1874, etc.) After Rutherford dropped almost every one of those old time prophecies, the only ones remaining that could reach into his own century (to 1914) were the 7 times of Leviticus and Daniel. After the 7 times of Leviticus was dropped, Daniel 4 was all the WT had left to reach into the 20th century. But look around the Internet, and you'll see that there is still enough numerology waiting to be extracted from Bible prophecies to reach every decade in the 2000's too. A little bit of 2520 days here, and a little bit of 2300 days there, and I'm sure there would be fodder for the year 2333, 2553, 2370, 2590, if this system could last that long. And if those methods ran out, there's always the potential claim someone could make that it was only unreliable secular chronology that told us Jesus was born in 2 B.C.E., when reliable "Bible chronology" obviously puts his birth closer to 100 C.E., then 200 C.E. etc., etc., as needed. 

This is why, for myself, I'm not so concerned that 586 and 587 are the most reliable dates for the destruction of Jerusalem. It's only because of what the Christian Greek Scriptures say about chronology that I could still not have accepted the entire 1914 theory. I couldn't accept it for scriptural reasons, even if Jerusalem had actually been destroyed on June 28, 607 or July 28, 607 B.C.E. and it was proven to be 2520 years to the day before Archduke Ferdinand was shot or WWI started in 1914.

6 hours ago, Gone Fishing said:

9 hours ago, JW Insider said:

There is nothing wrong with the WT counting back 70 years

This is a simple statement and really answers @Anna's question.

The rest of the post should make it clearer however that "There is nothing wrong with the WT counting back 70 years from 539" as long as the WT admits that you can't honesty use the term "539" without also accepting that "587" is the 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar. I have no problem starting the 70 years in 609 or even 607, but I can't honestly use the term 609 or 607 unless I'm referring to a time more than 20 years before Jerusalem was destroyed.

But it would also be dishonest of me to make a claim that "Bible chronology" would place Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year in the year 607. If you have been told 1,000 times that this idea shows that we put "Bible" chronology over "secular" chronology then the whole idea will have a "ring of truth" -- but it's still dishonest.

2 hours ago, Anna said:

Definitely more women!

Dare I ask why you think this is?

2 hours ago, Anna said:

I have another question. What is wrong with WT counting back 70 years from 539 (537 as the start of the temple rebuilding) assuming the 70 years applied to the Jews, when 539/537 is a reliable date.

There is nothing wrong with the WT counting back 70 years from 539. I believe that the 70 years starts from 70 years prior to 539, too. And of course, there is a definite connection between the 70 years given to Babylon and the chance for Judea to pay off its sabbaths. So Judea also pays off its sabbaths during the desolation of the 70 years Jehovah gave authority to Babylon. To me the Bible seems pretty clear about ending the 70 years when the kingdom of Persia takes over and not one or two years later, as the Watchtower suggests. That's because of what the 70 years really are, 70 years for Babylon's dominion, not 70 years of total desolation of Judea. However, I am not a stickler for all Biblical numbers having to be exactly counted the way we immediately think we should count them. When the Bible says a man's years are 70 or 80 (lifespan) I don't think that this means no one has ever lived to be 82 or died naturally at age 68, or 75. When the Bible says Jesus was in the grave for 3 days, I don't think that we need be concerned that it was all of Saturday, but perhaps only a few short hours on Friday afternoon and Sunday early morning. So, if the WT has good reason to believe it ran from 607 to 537, I would be very happy with that.

But here is the snag. 539 is not a Biblical date. It's a secular date. The reasons we know that this secular date is accurate are here:

• because it's 66 years from Nebuchadnezzar's first year,
• because it's 9 years before Cambyses' first year,
• because it's 23 years after Evil Merodach's first year,
• because it's 21 years after Neriglissar's first year,
• because it's 17 years after Labasi-Marduk's short reign
• because it's 17 years after Nabonidus' first year
• because it's 87 years after Nabopolassar's first year

In other words the only reason we know 539 is accurate is because we know the lengths of the kings' reigns from Nabopolassar to Cambyses, and a bit beyond (in both directions). We should never speak of the year 539 unless we are accepting that it is a date 66 years after the first year of Nebuchadnezzar, for example. In other words, if we say that we believe we can use the date 539 for the accession year of Cyrus over Babylon, then we can only say this if we believe that the 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar was 587.

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Another reason we know that 587 and 539 are accurate is because there are not just one or two, but DOZENS of points throughout the reigns of the Neo-Babylonian kings where we have astronomical evidence that points to only one particular year. In every case there is no question or contradiction about all of them fitting perfectly with each other. Not all data is still readable, of course, but all that is fits the timeline without contradicting the other forms of evidence.

Another reason we know that the 587 and 539 dates are accurate is because there are literally tens of thousands of clay tablets that have no particular political or religious purpose that just happen to coincide with exactly the same lengths of each kings' reign as the later "king lists" that were copied and retained in much later years. Also, the clay tablets only match the same number of years of each king's reign that also coincidentally happens to fit all the other evidence.

Another reason we know that the 587 and 539 dates are accurate is because there is a second thread of information that runs through hundreds of the clay tablets which provides a second witness by giving us the names of another parallel "dynasty" of the generations of the house of Egibi, who were something like the CEO's or bank presidents. They also happen to confirm the exact lengths of all the kings in the same way that coincides with all other forms of evidence.

[This form of cross-checking in enormously helpful, especially when a loan is known to have started in a certain year of one king and one "bank president," and then end in a certain year of the next king. Also if a certain "bank president" is always active for every transaction that happens in the early part of a particular year of a particular king, but the son of that "bank president" is said to be the new "bank president" for the remainder of that king's year and even into the first few years of the next king, we have a whole new way to validate the order of the kings and the lengths of their reigns. It becomes similar to the way, in Egyptian chronology, when the records of special bulls were kept along with their ages and under which king's year they were born, and under which king's year they died.]

Another reason we know that the 587 and 539 dates are accurate is because of a couple of kings' lists that were discovered to be contemporary with almost the entire set of Neo-Babylonian kings. These are not late versions of kings' lists like those that survive through Ptolemy's works -- which also happen to confirm the Neo-Babylonian period of lengths of kings' reigns, with no contradictions to any of the other pieces of evidence.

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By the same token, if we don't believe that Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year was 587, then we have no right to speak of the first [accession] year of Cyrus over Babylon as 539. Simply put, using the date 539 means that we accept the same dating system that puts Neb's 19th year in 587. It would be dishonest to speak of 539, if we didn't believe that.

Also, because Jewish and Babylonian years don't start on January 1st and end on December 31st, it's a little more proper to say that Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year starts in 587 and ends in 586. Also since Nebuchadnezzar became king late in 605, this was only a partial year, or accession year, and his "official" first year was therefore 604. Therefore by that count, 587 started his 18th year official year, but the Bible often uses a method where the accession year is counted and with that method this would be called his 19th year. 

*Note: some of the years and lengths mentioned above are going to be one year off due to avoiding the lengthiness of precise language accounting for the difference in cardinal/ordinal - accession/non-accession.

41 minutes ago, DefenderOTT said:

Let's get things back to perspective. You're making several assertions that are NOT by my comments. I'm no longer looking at the author's reasoning, but rather the dates set before secular history, and how VAT4956 agrees with any post-ideology.

OK. Good. Glad to be back on track.