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Furuli's data has been taken on by another person or two, and just because it gets slightly adjusted and translated into other languages doesn't make it any more true than it was when he first published it. Everyone who has actually done the readings for themselves could tell you that almost none of them match 588 unless you fake the months by shifting them all over by one month, and even then you only get very matches on just a few of the less specific readings , and the rest don't match at all. If you do them yourself in Stellarium, or any other software that can give BCE readings, you will find these same results as shown below. There are actually 17 lunar readings: 4 readings do not match 568 and 14 do not match 588. Come up with your own criteria for accuracy thresholds, and it will still always show that 568 is MUCH, MUCH better fit, and 588 is very poor. If you get something else, please let me know. OK?

@xero, I mentioned that I would make an explanation for why 4 degrees equals 16 minutes. You probably already know but here it is. The Babylonians measured a full circle as 360 degrees. So when the sky makes a full "circle" from sunrise to sunrise (or sunset to sunset) that's 360 degrees, or 24 hours. 24 hours is 1,440 minutes and 4/360=90 so 1/90th of 1,440 minutes is 16 minutes. It's easier of course just to say 1 degree = 4 minutes.

@xero, So hopefully it's pretty clear that the 1st of the 13 lunar readings fits 568 and does not fit 588 at all. And you have already mentioned the 2nd of the 13 readings, which does not fit either 568 or 588 and has long been considered to be a copyist's error: a 9 for an 8. So I'll move onto the next one, but I won't skip around like Furuli did. The next measurable line indicates: Nisanu 14: On the 14th. one god was seen with the other Sunrise to moonset 4° This is shorthand for the sun and the moon are seen together for a period of 4 degrees or 16 minutes. (1 degree = 4 minutes and 4x4=16). (see below for the explanation of this.) The meaning is that the Moon god [Sin] was seen with the Sun god [Shamash]. As an aside, in the Bible, the Hebrew word for Sun is Shemesh. The Babylonian word for the Moon was Sin, and the Hebrew word was Yareakh, which was also the name of the Ugaritic and Amorite Moon god, Yarakh/Yerakh. So, let's look up Nisanu 14 and see how long the sun and moon were seen together. This time we need to take a picture all the way across the entire sky from one horizon to the other, because the sun will always be opposite the moon near the 14th of any lunar month. That's why there is always a full moon about the time of the Memorial, on Nisanu 14. Also, the 14th was one of the few days when you could have an eclipse. (An eclipse can't happen unless the moon is full, which is half-way between the new moons. 14.75 days from the last new moon and 14.75 days from the next one.) Here we start at about is 4:30am, and moon hasn't set yet. And the sun hasn't risen yet. So the two gods are not seen together. But if we speed up the time and let it run until 5:27 the moon will set in the west and we will have seen the sun in the east for something like 15 minutes. Also, you can check the sunrise for that day, and moonset on the left of the screen in Stellarium. Click on the moon and it says: Sets at 5:27am. Click on the sun and it says: Sunrise It says Rises at 5:12 am. Subtract 5:27 minus 5:12 and that's 15 minutes. 4 degrees is 16 minutes, almost a perfect match. Now let's check what happened in 588 BCE. on the date that Furuli wanted to claim was Nisanu 14. The gods were not seen together for any length of time because the moon had already set a half hour earlier!!. [you have to make the videos full screen to see much of anything.] Hmmm. I wonder why Furuli skipped this line? nisan14F-588.mp4

You are free to add whatever you'd like. I knew that when you saw I was right about the GT you would shift focus to Armageddon. I had left a note to myself in the previous post that I expected one more move of the goalposts, but I was not going to worry about any further diversions this weekend. I have company coming in 10 minutes and they are staying for the weekend. So maybe you could do us all a favor and put up the rest of the Armageddon evidence, and I will follow up with you after Armageddon. Thanks. Yes, that was also a "set-up." Enjoy!!

You'd think so, right? But originally Armageddon was going to end in 1914. When it no longer looked like that was going to happen on time, that "end" was later pushed to 1915. But that's why I said 1914 is "part of Armageddon." You should read "The Battle of Armageddon" which was also called "The Day of Vengeance" by C.T.Russell. I'm sure you can find the pieces and put it together yourself. ". . . the Day of Vengeance ... will end in October, 1914" -- The Battle of Armageddon / The Day of Vengeance, page 547. "Be not surprised, then, when in subsequent chapters we present proofs that the setting up of the Kingdom of God is already begun, that it is pointed out in prophecy as due to begin the exercise of power in A.D. 1878, and that the "battle of the great day of God Almighty" (Rev. 16:14), which will end in A.D. 1914 with the complete overthrow of earth's present rulership, is already commenced. The gathering of the armies is plainly visible from the standpoint of God's Word." The Time Is At Hand, page 101. And the Time is at Hand, on page 99, says: ... Note to self: One more move of the goal posts should be expected.

*** w56 12/15 p. 755 par. 11 Telling the Good News from Day to Day *** At the start of the great tribulation upon Satan’s organization in 1914 all such people felt merely the “beginning of pangs of distress,” *** w51 3/15 p. 164 Time Better than Money *** When Christ was enthroned, in 1914, great tribulation was started against Satan and his wicked world organization. If it had then proceeded to completion, no flesh would have been saved. But for the sake of human flesh that tribulation was shortened or cut short, to allow a period of time for men to take in and give out knowledge of the established heavenly kingdom, *** ws13 7/15 pp. 3-4 par. 3 “Tell Us, When Will These Things Be?” *** In the past, we thought that the great tribulation began in 1914 when World War I started. We thought that Jehovah “cut short” those days in 1918 when the war ended so that the remaining anointed ones on earth could preach the good news to all nations. (Matthew 24:21, 22) After that preaching work would be completed, we expected that Satan’s world would be destroyed. So we thought that there were three parts to the great tribulation. It would begin in 1914, it would be interrupted in 1918, . . . The "Armageddon" error was fixed many years before the "Great Tribulation" part was fixed. And for good measure, it should also be added that the 1914 doctrine was NOT to show the start of Christ's reign in Heaven. For about 40 years after the 1914 doctrine was "established," Christ's reign in Heaven had started in 1878. These ideas were repeated into the 1930's, and parts of it into the 1940's. 1878 was still considered a valid prophetic date during the first Tuesday night Book Studies I ever remember attending. We still studied "Let Your Name Be Sanctified" when I was 7 years old. All this was well after 1914. It was just a few years after the famous 1922 Cedar Point convention when the WTS dropped the first hints that the new date for Christ's reign might change to 1914. In 1878 God’s favor was withdrawn from the nominal systems. From that time on . . . . Do you believe it? Do you believe that the King of glory is present, and has been since 1874? Do you believe that during that time he has conducted his harvest work? Do you believe that he has had during that time a faithful and wise servant through whom he directed his work and the feeding of the household of faith? Do you believe that the Lord is now in his temple, judging the nations of earth? Do you believe that the King of glory has begun his reign? Then back to the field, . . . This is the day of all days. Behold, the King reigns! You are his publicity agents. Therefore advertise, advertise, advertise, the King and his kingdom.

I'd still prefer a separate topic about the astronomy evidence for the 13 lunar observations, for example, that would not allow any of the ad hominem stuff and desperate attempts to divert and distract.

You keep implying that the 1914 doctrine is there to prove that the GT, Big A had begun then, and God's Kingdom has already been "established" -- that the doctrine claims all this has already occurred. Originally, the doctrine was there to prove that 1914 was part of Armageddon and the start of the Great Tribulation. But that part was dropped many years ago. <bloviation> ** begins However, I'll give you the part of about God's Kingdom: *** w22 July p. 3 The Kingdom Is in Place! *** . . . a prophecy that helps us discern when the Kingdom was established, . . . Read Daniel 4:10-17. The “seven times” represent a period of 2,520 years. That time period began in 607 B.C.E. when the Babylonians removed the last king from Jehovah’s throne in Jerusalem. It ended in 1914 C.E. when Jehovah enthroned Jesus—“the one who has the legal right”—as King of God’s Kingdom.—Ezek. 21:25-27. Even here, the Watchtower plays with some nuanced semantics between the expression "established" and "fully established." There is even a sense given that the old Russellites were wrong for believing that the kingdom would be "fully established' in 1914, although it's a bit ambiguous as to whether they were right or not: *** w84 4/15 p. 3 1914—A Focal Point *** The March 1880 issue of Zion’s Watch Tower and Herald of Christ’s Presence described two events of earthshaking importance that were looked forward to as due to happen in 1914: “‘The Times of the Gentiles’ extend to 1914, and the heavenly kingdom will not have full sway till then.” Hence, many Bible Students expected God’s Kingdom to be fully established in that year. *** w84 12/1 p. 16 par. 7 Keep Ready! *** Thus, although he would be ‘present’ and his Kingdom would already have been established, both he and his Kingdom would still have to “come” Up until about 1975, the Watchtower always made the bold claim that the Kingdom had already been "fully established." It was about then, that the phrase was only used ambiguously, which I remember once caused a minor problem in the translation departments when they were translating a booklet. I think it was called "One World, One Government Under God's Kingdom," or something like that. The publications started saying "established" in 1914 but only "fully established" when the new heavens and new earth were here, and that became the explanation for the "Lord's prayer" question that came up fairly often: "Should we still pray for God's kingdom to come since it came in 1914?" That issue was sort of resolved in the awkward wording of a new song that came out in 2014: *** sjj song 22 The Kingdom Is in Place—Let It Come! *** The Kingdom Is in Place—Let It Come! BTW, I couldn't find the wording of that particular 1975 booklet in the Watchtower Library, but I found something quite similar which shows the kind of verb tense ambiguity they were going for. It's similar to the 1984 quote above: *** w70 10/15 p. 629 par. 17 The Kingdom of Salvation Available Today *** Former kings, emperors, presidents, governors and dictators on being resurrected may not expect to take over automatically and resume ruling over their onetime subjects or fellow citizens. The old system of things under the Satanic “god of this system of things” is no longer in operation. God’s new system of things under his Messianic kingdom of the heavens is fully established over all the earth. Of necessity, it will have organization of all those on earth . . . Note that it looks like (1970) the Watchtower was still saying it was already "fully established" but it's couched in a discussion of the near future, because the previous sentence says: "The old system of things . . . is no longer in operation." In previous decades, it was just claimed outright that it was already "fully established" in 1914: *** w60 1/1 p. 29 par. 9 Part 29—“Your Will Be Done on Earth” *** . . . In that year [1914] the kingdom of God was to be fully established in the heavens to see that His will should be done on earth. *** w51 10/1 p. 583 “Happy Are the Eyes That Behold” *** Our eyes are far more blessed than even theirs, because we can see by the fulfillment of Bible prophecy that Jehovah’s royal government by his Christ is now fully established </bloviation> ** ends

@xero No rush, but when you get a chance, you should look into these eclipses of the type that George provided above. Not those ones in particular since they are the wrong ones for VAT 4956, but check out the ones right after that. You probably know that you can calculate lunar and solar eclipses in Stellarium with the icon and when you select the eclipse from the list, you can have Stellarium "watch" the eclipse with the sky, place, direction, and time already set for you: When you compare the LBAT eclipse to VAT 4956 you will have yet another reason to see why 588 is impossible, and 568 BCE is the best fit.

From the time the tablet was discovered this error has been known and discussed for 100 years now. It was considered to be one of at least two copyist's errors that don't work for the conventional 568 date although the vast majority of other readings work perfectly well for the 568 date. Only a very few of the readings also work for other years. When a copyists mistake is made, there is always a good possibility that the mistaken numbers might work for another year, just as certain positions of the moon will be very nearly repeated year after year. (Meaning the same position relative to the "background" stars which stay in the same place, but not relative to the planets which may not come into that same position again for a hundred years or more.) So, it's true that this error might coincidentally fit another year, but 588 is not one of those years. For one thing Furuli had to fake the month, shift the calendar, and rename the month Ayyaru and pretend it was Nisanu. Without evidence, Furuli had to pretend that the Babylonians made their largest known leap year mistake ever! -- the extent of which had never happened before, and would never happen again, in all known Neo-Babylonian history. I can explain evidence against it in another post if you like. If Furuli hadn't faked the month, he couldn't claim anything for this year 588. But then he also found that he had to fake, not only the month, but also the day. He started the new Spring month, Nisanu (our March/April) in May for this particular year, which is unprecedented. But he also then claims that the first day of Nisanu corresponds with May 2nd. But for a new month to start then, the new moon would have to be visible. It's hard enough to see a new moon that is only half a day old, most sightings take place when the moon is at about 1.5 to 2 days old. That's because it's the sighting at sunset when the sliver of a new moon is so hard to see. Here's why it can't be seen on May 2nd: see first video. The moon is the blinking thing if it shows up at all just to the left of the sun. It also sets at almost the exact time as the sun. But the next video shows it on May 3rd which would have been the actual start of the new month. But not the month Nisanu as required. It would actually Ayyaru the 1st, 588 BCE: see second video. Neugebauer and others have done experiments and measurements on the first sightings of the new moon, and you can do them yourself by going outside and looking at the beginning of every lunar month. It's based on the actual "waxed" age of the moon and how close it is to the sun. Especially if you live in a dry desert environment you can check for yourself under the very best conditions and see that the formula works well. Also, of course, the dozens of eclipse examples in the tablets tell us the day it was seen, and therefore counting back we can double-check the conditions available on the 1st of each of those months. sundown-may-2-587A.mp4 sundown-may-3-587A.mp4

I believe you were under the same misconception in the past, perhaps under a different name. As I recall O'maly saying on this forum, she claimed NOT to have done the actual translation herself, but was involved in getting the professional translation published. Sorry I didn't correct you earlier.

These are taken from Ann O'maly's fact-check against a claim by someone who tried a slightly different method than Furuli's interpretations. This is why a few of the other readings were included below. The 13 referred to in the Watchtower are matched to Furuli's original list, numbered in red. Only the astronomically relevant info is summarized/paraphrased. 1. Line 1: Nisanu 1 = May 2, 588 BCE/ April 22, 568 BCE Moon visible behind Bull of Heaven (Taurus) 2. Line 3: Nisanu 9 = May 10, 588 BCE / April 30, 568 BCE Beginning of the night, Moon 1 cubit in front of β Virginis x. Line 4: Nisanu 14 = May 16, 588 BCE / May 6, 568 BCE Sunrise to moonset 4° 3. Line 8: Ayyaru 1 = June 1, 588 BCE / May 22, 568 BCE Moon crescent ‘thick,’ visible ‘while the sun stood there’ … … 4 cubits below β Geminorum ... Moonrise to sunrise, 23°, not observed x. Line 11: Ayyaru 26 = June 27, 588 BCE / June 17, 568 BCE Moonrise to sunrise, 23°, not observed 4. Line 12: Simanu 1 = June 30, 588 BCE / June 20, 568 BCE Moon visible behind Cancer, ‘thick’ crescent …… Sunset to moonset 20° 5. Line 14: Simanu 5 = July 4, 588 BCE / June 24, 568 BCE Beginning of the night, Moon passed east 1 cubit β Virginis 6. Line 15: Simanu 8 = July 7, 588 BCE / June 27, 568 BCE First part of night, Moon 2½ cubits below β Librae 7. Line 16: Simanu 10 = July 9, 588 BCE / June 29, 568 BCE First part of the night, Moon balanced 3½ cubits above α Scorpii x. Line 17: Simanu 15 = July 15, 588 BCE / July 5, 568 BCE Sunrise to moonset: 7°30', ‘omitted’ lunar eclipse reverse: 8. Line 5’: Šabatu 1 = February 22, 587 BCE / February 12, 567 BCE Moon visible in the Swallow (southern Pisces) …… Sunset to moonset: 14°30' 9. Line 6’: Šabatu 6 = Feb. 27, [587 BCE / February 17, 567 BCE] First part of the night, Moon surrounded by halo; Pleiades, the Bull of Heaven, and the Chariot [stood in it .... ] 10. Line 7’: Šabatu ? = March 4, 587 BCE / February 22, 567 BCE α Leonis balanced 1 cubit below Moon x. Line 8’: Šabatu 13 or 14 = March 8 or 9, 587 BCE / February 25 or 26, 567 BCE Sunrise to moonset, 17° (text: 7), not watched 11. Line 12’: Addaru 1 = March 24, 587 BCE / March 14, 567 BCE Moon visible behind Aries ‘while the sun stood there’ … … measured sunset to moonset 25° 12. Line 13’: Addaru 2 = March 25, 587 BCE / March 15, 567 BCE First part of the night,41 Moon balanced 4 cubits below η Tauri (Alcyone) x. Line 14’: Addaru 7 = March 30, 587 BCE/ March 20, 567 BCE Moon surrounded by halo. Praesepe and α Leonis [stood] in [it ....] 13. Line 16’: Addaru 12 = April 5, 587 BCE / March 26, 567 BCE Sunrise to moonset, 1°30’.

Sure! In the next post I will point out which items from both the front and the back were cherry-picked to see if they could fit 588 instead of 568. The pictures, and translation below are taken from the following site: https://www.lavia.org/english/Archivo/VAT4956en.htm [After this post I will copy a simpler translation for reference that also includes the theorized Julian dates if you are comparing between 568 and 588 BCE] A typical translation is here, for the obverse side. You will see 18 lines, although the last two, as you can see from the picture, are mostly missing.

For anyone interested in the entire Neo-Babylonian chronology and the support from tablets, the following site looks to be fairly comprehensive. Just looking at one page here might help demolish the misconception that VAT 4956 is somehow important, and that somehow finding errors on it hurts the accepted chronology: Here's the primary page I am referring to: https://www.jhalsey.com/jerusalem-book/standard/timeline.html available as a pdf, too: For those afraid to look, I will provide some snippets:

Of course they do provide such evidence that discredits the Watchtower's claims concerning these dates. Why do you think the Watchtower Society is the biggest opposer of all Neo-Babylonian tablets? Why do you think every article about them is written to sow seeds of doubt? You can interpret it however you like. Or you can throw the whole thing out. It changes nothing. It's just another line of independent evidence that helps people put a BCE date on all the years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign. But it's hardly the only one. In another post I'll provide the list that "J Halsey" added to the Internet. I don't know who he is and I never saw this until today. It seems fairly complete. I have never heard anyone use 18 year cycles or 19 year cycles to validate any related conjectures. But if you are saying that if we follow that pattern it intersects with 607/6, then it sounds like you might be saying that you are the example of the lengths some people are eager to go to since you are the one claiming that these patterns intersect with 607/6 BC. I do agree that it's a stretch though, because NONE of these patterns have anything to do with 607/6 BC or 587/6 or 568/7 or 588/7.

True. As long as you believe in 1914, it doesn't matter whether you know how it was calculated. *** w86 4/1 p. 31 Questions From Readers *** Obviously, a basis for approved fellowship with Jehovah’s Witnesses cannot rest merely on a belief in God, in the Bible, in Jesus Christ, and so forth. . . . Approved association with Jehovah’s Witnesses requires accepting the entire range of the true teachings of the Bible, including those Scriptural beliefs that are unique to Jehovah’s Witnesses. What do such beliefs include? . . . That 1914 marked the end of the Gentile Times and the establishment of the Kingdom of God in the heavens, as well as the time for Christ’s foretold presence. (Luke 21:7-24; Revelation 11:15–12:10) Technically, I have no problem with the approved association requirement, because it says it only includes "those Scriptural beliefs that are unique to Jehovah's Witnesses." The list included more than just the 1914 doctrine, and one of those other items in the list is already partly obsolete; it included a phrase that is no longer considered Scriptural. I highlighted Revelation 11 because this is the very chapter that associates only 1260, not 2520, with the Gentile Times.

I expect that this is true of 99% of all Witnesses. Certainly any that I speak with in the congregation would advocate for 607 BC, but the topic hardly comes up any more, and I'm certainly not going to bring it up. It's barely been mentioned in the publications since 2018, although it's been added to the extra material in the new NWT (simplified). The Witnesses who no longer believe the Barbour/Russell version of 607 (606) are the ones who discuss the evidence in private email groups and closed forums. Not much danger of anyone changing their mind on a forum like this one. Yes. I think that's about right. I think a lot of Witnesses believe that it's simply a matter of trusting the old Barbour/Russell 2,520, and they don't even give a thought to the fact that our doctrines have completely divorced it from the 1,260. Yet, several years ago, the very last mention of the 1,260 in the Watchtower was with the very verse in Revelation 11 that ties the 1,260 directly to the Gentile Times of Luke 21:24, and yet the Watchtower doesn't even mention that fact, only that the 1,260 "Gentile Times' number, should be measured in "days" (from December 1914 to early 1919) as opposed to the 2,520 which gets measured in years from 607 BCE to 1914 CE. I think it's a shame that so many of us actually believe it's a "Bible calculation." That's the power of indoctrination and tradition.

Thank you for mentioning the MUL.APIN. This is what I was referring to when I said the following to @xero, and highlighted "the Babylonian's own explanation in their own documents." It's interesting, too, how many constellations have kept similar star groupings and even similar names. I had wondered early on especially, if we really had all the star names mapped correctly between the Babylonian system and our current identification of those same stars. This document provides the support. I never knew much of anything about Egyptian astronomy, but just noticed last night that the Egyptians, too, have writings and inscriptions that document their "mapping" of the stars, constellations, etc. Steele has been involved in several projects related to mapping the Babylonian "fixed" stars, and related papers. I have not looked at this first one, but I was suprised to read in the "blurb" that astronomy texts may go as far back as the Old Babylonian Empire (Hammurapi), not just Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian. JOURNAL ARTICLE Babylonian Astronomy. II. The Thirty-Six Stars B. L. van der Waerden Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. 8, No. 1 (Jan., 1949), pp. 6-26 ...BABYLONIAN ASTRONOMY . II. THE THIRTY-SIX STARS B. L. VAN DER WAERDEN OUR knowledge of Old Babylonian astronomy is rather scanty. The only text which can with certainty be dated as far back as the Hammurapi Dynasty is represented by the Venus tablets of Ammisaduqa, discussed else... And it's more than just the MUL.APIN texts, too, of course: The Cuneiform Uranology Texts: Drawing the Constellations JOURNAL ARTICLE The Cuneiform Uranology Texts: Drawing the Constellations Paul-Alain Beaulieu, Eckart Frahm, Wayne Horowitz, John Steele Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, New Series, Vol. 107, No. 2, The Cuneiform Uranology Texts: Drawing the Constellations (2017), pp. i-iii, v, vii, ix, 1-33, 35-65, 67-69, 71-83, 85-115, 117-119, 121 .../ Paul-Alain Beaulieu, Eckart Frahm, Wayne Horowitz, John Steele. Description: Philadelphia : the American Philosophical Society, [2018] | Series: Transactions series, ISSN 0065-9746 | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018015145 | ISBN 9781606180723 Subjects: LCSH: Astronomy , Assyro- Babylonian . | Astronomy...

It's a point I find disconcerting too. Every Witness or ex-Witness that I know of who has ever reported their findings after looking into the actual observations on the Babylonian tablets, is now in one of the following categories: Is still a Witness, but no longer believes that Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year was anywhere close to 607 BCE Or, they are disfellowshipped. Or, potentially both. There seems to have been two exceptions still out there, but one has been equivocating. And the other has had their theory embarrassingly demolished (not by me), and hasn't responded since then that I know about. No one I know who has reported their findings still believes in the 607 doctrine. That might be scary, even for @xero. So, I can think of only a couple solutions: The WTS can forbid anyone from trying to confirm the observations on the tablets themselves. Or, the WTS can address the problem openly and without obfuscation and conjecture. Naturally, I prefer the latter, because I think the first method won't work, and will ultimately backfire. @xero will likely delay his own findings as long as possible and overemphasize the potential for error and the "just don't know for sure" factor.

I haven't read this book, only the preview pages on Google Books, and a review on an academic site, and the very similar information in some of his other works that I downloaded (and only partly read), including: A LATE BABYLONIAN COMPENDIUM OF CALENDRICAL AND STELLAR ASTROLOGY J. M. Steele Journal of Cuneiform Studies, Vol. 67 (2015), pp. 187-215 ...LATE BABYLONIAN COMPENDIUM OF CALENDRICAL AND STELLAR ASTROLOGY J. M. Steele (Brown University) Abstract BM 36303+36326, BM 36628+36786+36817+37178+37197, and BM 36988 are three fragments of what was once a large, almost square tablet containing a compendium of astrological texts. The compendium, which dates to some- time after the invention of the... Download Save Studies on Babylonian goal-year astronomy I: a comparison between planetary data in Goal-Year Texts, Almanacs and Normal Star Almanacs J. M. K. Gray, J. M. Steele Archive for History of Exact Sciences, Vol. 62, No. 5 (September 2008), pp. 553-600 ...62:553-600 DOI 10.1007/S00407-008-0027-9 Studies on Babylonian goal-year astronomy I: a comparison between planetary data in Goal-Year Texts, Almanacs and Normal Star Almanacs J. M. K. Gray • J. M. Steele Received: 20 May 2008 / Published online: 1 July 2008 © Springer- Verlag 2008 1 Introduction A large body of astronomical... Download Save A Late Babylonian Normal and Ziqpu Star Text N. A. Roughton, J. M. Steele, C. B. F. Walker Archive for History of Exact Sciences, Vol. 58, No. 6 (September 2004), pp. 537-572 ...A Late Babylonian Normal and Ziqpu Star Text N. A. Roughton, J. M. Steele , C. B. F. Walker Communicated by A. JONES Introduction The Late Babylonian tablet BM 36609+ is a substantial rejoined fragment of an important and previously unknown compendium of short texts dealing with the use of stars... Download Save ---------------- I find it amazing how it's now becoming more and more possible to understand the Babylonian math and its influence on Greek math including Ptolemy and Hypsicles. This is something I just said above to @xero this morning. At first, a couple years ago, when I read Ann O'maly's paper stating that the Babylonians were actually calculating ecliptic, I thought it was an exaggeration, and figured that the Babylonians were probably were just approximating differences from the same amateur "horizon-based" methods that I personally find to be exact enough for my purposes. The book, unfortunately for your claims, does NOT revise any Neo-Babylonian dates. If anything it makes scholars put even more confidence in Babylonian records because it showed that the Babylonians had been able to manage some of these calculations even though they had to "calculate around" the 23 degree tilt of the earth, and the early use of the Metonic cycle hadn't been standardized yet. Their "manual" use of the 19-year Metonic cycle, didn't likely become standardized for them before 400 BCE. Here is that point I made to xero earlier, that I find just amazing, because we usually give most of the credit to Ptolemy for putting the formulas on top of Babylonian estimations:

Very true. LOL. Besides, I already know the explanation of why you do what you do. You have inadvertently admitted it several times over the last 10+ years. It hasn't changed. I don't need to read COJ's book. I read Furuli's book to draw my own conclusions. I wrote my own critique after checking my own Sky5 screenshots but didn't put it anywhere but in my own notebooks. (Small parts made it to another topic on this forum.) Later I also read COJ's critique, and the critiques from a few others. The order wasn't so important, but I just didn't want to be dependent on COJ. Truth is I don't need VAT 4956. No one does in order to put accurate BCE dates on the Neo-Babylonian chronology or Nebuchadnezzar's reign. All it does is point to the exact same years that a couple dozen other astronomical observations on other tablets already point to. If you threw out or rejected VAT 4956 you'd get the same answer from several other tablets. And for my own purposes I have no reason to worry about what secular BCE date gets applied to any of these Neo-Babylonian reigns, or the Biblical dates in BCE either, for that matter. If the Bible didn't see fit to provide information about the BCE dates, it's clearly not part of what's necessary to keep us fully equipped for every good work. Just because something is obvious doesn't mean it's all that important. I've read most of COJ's GTR4 book by now, and don't see much of anything important or new. It's all been done by people before him and after him. It's impressive for an amateur to have been so careful and put it all into words that the rest of us amateurs can easily understand. I like Steele though. He is not so easy to understand, but I am impressed with his math skills and his carefulness, and that he admits clearly what we know and what we don't know. And Steele, like all the others, agrees with COJ, and indicates that Nebuchadnezzar's 37th year must be 568, not 588 BCE. No. Of course not. I only questioned what I deliberately questioned. Not everything you said was wrong. It was the misinformation I specified that was wrong, and a couple other points too trivial to bother with. If this is what you're going to falsely manipulate @JW Insider Twisting my words is a way to manipulate it, but it's a false equivalency when taken out of its proper context. Nope. That's why I would never falsely manipulate it or take it out of context. All I asked you is where he criticized Furuli's assertion on the earth's rotation. [I said: "What was that criticism? Where is it found?"] I suspect you might even be right, that perhaps Furuli tried to make a big deal out of Delta-T and COJ might have recognized that this is pretty meaningless if Furuli needs the same Delta-T calculations for his own theories about 588. If Furuli needed Delta-T to be so far off not to work for 568, then he would need to throw away EVERYTHING in his whole book. You don't need scholarly expertise to address minor errors that those with scholarly expertise already addressed. Besides, he made them easy to understand so that you could see why they were minor when you consider the overall set of points. There may easily be 3 or 4 easily recognized errors on VAT 4956. The WTS Insight book claims that another tablet is helpful and reliable for Cambyses' 7th year, when that tablet apparently has many more known errors on it that scholars have corrected. I'm sure that's true. That was also Stephenson's intention. Steele's intention. Sachs' and Hunger's intention. To make it unreliable you'd have to find more than just a couple of copyist's errors. The various manuscripts of the Bible show us that there have been THOUSANDS of copyists' errors just in the first early centuries in the Bible manuscripts. That doesn't make the Bible unreliable. Most of those errors are minor. Now you're talking!! Steele, of course, agrees exactly with the dates COJ presents for the entire Neo-Babylonian period, including Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year, and Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year, and Nebuchadnezzar's 37th year.

Now looking at -587 (588 BCE) for the other possible choice people have claimed for VAT 4956: I get nothing close in January, or February, but March has a slim possiblity for a Nisannu on March 5 which is no where near the Bull, though. At least it's a new moon. April is still in front of the Bull at the new moon, so that's not the one in the tablet, although April 3rd or especially the 4th looks like a good start for Nisannu. It matches the closest to the spring equinox, too. May 2, has a possibility, but not likely visible until May 3rd, at which point it's actually nearly in the next constellation so calling it "behind the Bull" might be a possibility but doesn't seem likely. May is outside the range for any known start of Nisan, just as the March possibility was also outside the range making April the most likely candidate. April is indeed the candidate shown by P&D. The rest of the months in 588 BCE are too far off and out of the question. So the upshot here is that Nisan 1 started in April 3rd or 4th in 588 BCE, but that doesn't match the tablet. We can still keep checking both dates though, because it's only one reading. We should compare all of them.

I think everyone here is now convinced that this is no more than a big game of obfuscation with you. You responded to absolutely zero of the issues I brought up about the misinformation you provided. Just a lot of false claims from you and then you dodging wildly when they are pointed out. It's almost as if you just made it all up, then took some screenshots of some books to make it look there was some legitimacy to what you claim. It seems like you are willing to make up falsehoods about COJ, in the hopes that someone I defend him against your misinformation so that you can then say, "See, JWI just defended COJ, so now we don't have to look at any of the evidence from Stellarium, or Steele, or Sachs, or Dubberstein that JWI looked at. We're off the hook!!!"

Not to get into this again with you, but VAT 4956 refers to about 30 very specific events. They are astronomical events which the same tablet itself says are tied to the 37th year of Nebuchadnezzar. No critics link it to "the Saros cycle of 19 years" because there is no such thing as a Saros cycle of 19 years. If you ever are able to locate such a reference I'd love to see it. The WTS doesn't propose an 18-year-cycle. Nor did they ever mention an intention to propose one. Nor do the publications ever mention "saros" or 18 years in any context about lunar or solar or planetary or astronomical events. Trying to tie overwhelming evidence from person's who have no interest in the Watchtower (Steele, Sachs, Hunger, Ptolemy, Stephenson, Parker, Dubberstein, etc.) to persons who are critics of the Watchtower is just an old trick sometimes called "poisoning the well." It's just another logical fallacy people still fall for to avoid looking at the evidence for themselves. In this case it is the Watchtower that is the opposer of the tablets, plain and simple. But it has become necessary to grasp at almost anything to sow doubt about the tablets What was that criticism? Where is it found? Are you able to explain why scholars praised him for being so thorough? There you go!! Something we can agree on.

I agree. You can easily collect about 5 different translations all from various sites, but they all say the same thing. The sheer number of tablets with the same terms used over and over again, and then translated into Greek, and Latin over the years, and now German and English, etc., and backed up by similar readings in Egyptian documents, and the Babylonian's own explanations in their own documents allows for a pretty good understanding. The snapshots of the skies are the most fun part of this, I hope you will be adding a few. I don't want to just push mine on here in case people think I'm biased, LOL. (Although if you have seen past topics I put here, you will see I have already posted dozens of "Babylonian" screen shots.)