JW Insider

True, Nebuchadnezzar's years are only slightly better, not equal. LOL. But putting faith in the secular date 539, although it isn't necessary for Bible students, doesn't cause any real trouble because it is validated by the same evidence that validates Nisan 1, 586 BCE as the first day of the first year of Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year of reign. And this also perfectly fits the words of Jeremiah about Nebuchadnezzar being there at the start of the 70 years of Babylonian domination because it puts his accession year back in 605.

And the problem with that is that you are putting faith in 539, then adjusting it as necessary to 537, and pretending that it is somehow better attested than 537 for the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar. I don't mind starting a Jewish Exile beginning around 607, because we know that Daniel claimed to be one of several exiles as early as Nebuchadnezzar's first or accession year, which is evidenced to be 605/4. So a period of Exile could well have matched the period of greatest domination of the Babylonian Empire. The Watchtower publications tell us that this period was the 70 years ending 539 and that different nations came under that yoke at different times. Same could be said for different parts of Judea and Jerusalem which also came under that domination and exile at different times during the 70 year period of their domination. So clearly, according to the Watchtower's own publications, this particular 70 year period can remain intact without proposing that an event for Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year (which you call "607") actually happened BEFORE his own accession year, which all evidence shows was exactly in 605 BCE.

There you go again with that specious argument that goes: So it must be either 586 or 587 so since we don't know which of those two years is certain, we must dismiss them both and go with a year that's 20 years off, which forces us to pretend there must be an unidentified 20 year gap. And we don't even know where that gap might fit correctly. We can't put it in Nebuchadnezzar's reign. And we make use of a 17-year Nabonidus reign. That leaves only a place where we have mundane business documents for a total of 4 years. So we must think that this period was actually 24 years and even though business documents have shown up for EVERY SINGLE known year of every king's reign, including those 4 years, but now we suddenly have 20 extra years in that "4-year" period where no business was transacted, and every single Babylonian lost their memory for those 20 years, and all the astronomical lunar and metonic cycles stopped, and the stars and planets also stopped moving, yet caught up instantly after the 20-year "gap" was completed. We must sound like complete idiots to the same people we treat as experts when we quote from them about anything else in the "Insight" book.

OK. Now we might be getting somewhere. Yes, the regnal years are better documented in the Babylonian record than the Biblical record. But you can still trust the Bible when it says that the 18-20-month+ events surrounding the city of Jerusalem happened in the 18th and 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar. It doesn't matter whether the Bible used Spring-to-Spring counting of new years or Fall-to-Fall counting of each newly counted year. We know we are in the right time period (within just a few months) if we use the well-documented Babylonian record for the way THEY calculated each year, which was consistent based on all their records, and supported by astronomical records, and their exact Nisan-to-Nisan method, and accession year method is supported by literally tens of thousands of always-consistent mundane business records. Furthermore, mundane business records have no religious agendas. The regnal years of Cyrus are not so well documented in the Biblical record and not quite as well documented in the secular record as Nebuchadnezzar's. But they are perfectly consistent with the method used by the Babylonians.

You just keep making up the same false statement. Yet you contradict yourself because you have already admitted that "most if not all" reference works give the same years for EVERY year of Nebuchadnezzar's reign. Turned out that even your own Professor (Oded Lipschits) used the same years for Nebuchadnezzar, in spite of your original claim that he didn't. .

The fall of Babylon is not described with a regnal year associated with it. The fall of of Jerusalem is -- and, not only that, it's synchronized as you just showed with a Babylonian king and a Judean king.

False. That's like saying that the first year or seventh year is contentious. You are only talking about the attempts to calculate the fall of Jerusalem with the Bible's data, NOT the 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar. There is no question at all that the 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar fell exactly on Nisanu 1, 586 BCE. There is no question at all that the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar fell exactly on Nisanu 1, 587 BCE.

Haven't you read the WT explanation for it's computation? It is NOT immediate and NOT simple. Yet, the computation of any year within Nebuchadnezzar's reign is much more immediate and simple, however. And just like 539, 587 BCE also has universal acceptance as the date for the 18th year of Nebuchadnezzar. As you said in your first sentence "Correct, most if not all past and current reference books on Bible Chronology most support 586 BCE and 587 BCE as a contender for the Fall of Jerusalem." And the Bible is the primary source of the question about which one to choose, because the Bible gives both year 18 and year 19. The Bible, by the way, does NOT say it was the first year of Cyrus, or the accession year of Cyrus when Babylon fell in 539. As you are aware, of course, Cyrus had already been ruling for the past 20 years before 539 BCE, as the ruler of the Persian Empire since c. 559 BCE, and the ruler of the Medes since 549 BCE, and the ruler of Lydia since 547 BCE. In fact, didn't I recall you conjecturing on this very forum about whether a certain Darius the Mede had either an interregnum rule before Cyrus or a co-rule with Cyrus starting immediately after the 539 capture of Babylon? The Bible does say that the decree went out to release the Jews in the first year of Cyrus, and yet the Watchtower puts that within a few weeks of his SECOND year starting in Nisan 537 instead of his first year 538 as the book of Ezra says. This additional stretch of what Ezra simply calls the "first year of Cyrus" allows the Watchtower to minimize the adjustment from 606 to 536, which were Russell's (Barbour's) original assumptions about the fall of Jerusalem and the first year of Cyrus. At the time, most of the reference books already had the two events correctly dated at 587/6 and 538, respetively, but Russell and Barbour misread the Cyrus date, and used a reference that had already confused the first years of Nebuchadnezzar's domination (and taking of exiles) with the destruction of Jerusalem. If one looks at the fine print footnote about it in Bishop Elliott's Horae Apocalypticae (a huge standard work for Bible chronologist study) it becomes understandable how such a mistake could be made. Instead of admitting a two to three year adjustment to the original dates, they were able to keep 1914 by making a one year adjustment at each end of the incorrect range they started with. But the main thing that makes the Cyrus' years less simple and less direct is the fact that the Watchtower admits they are not using a dated tablet that mentions Cyrus. Instead, they are using one for Cambyses, and then trusting a King's List (exactly like the one Ptolemy used) to count backwards from Cambyses, and assuming the secular information is correct about the length of Cyrus' rule, and assuming there was no additional ruler between Cyrus and Cambyses. We don't have to do any of that nonsense for Nebuchadnezzar's chronology. To be clear, here is the Watchtower's "simple and direct" methodology for assuming Cyrus 1st year as 538 BCE. *** it-1 p. 453 Chronology *** A Babylonian clay tablet is helpful for connecting Babylonian chronology with Biblical chronology. This tablet contains the following astronomical information for the seventh year of Cambyses II son of Cyrus II: “Year 7, Tammuz, night of the 14th, 1 2⁄3 double hours [three hours and twenty minutes] after night came, a lunar eclipse; visible in its full course; it reached over the northern half disc [of the moon]. Tebet, night of the 14th, two and a half double hours [five hours] at night before morning [in the latter part of the night], the disc of the moon was eclipsed; the whole course visible; over the southern and northern part the eclipse reached.” (Inschriften von Cambyses, König von Babylon, by J. N. Strassmaier, Leipzig, 1890, No. 400, lines 45-48; Sternkunde und Sterndienst in Babel, by F. X. Kugler, Münster, 1907, Vol. I, pp. 70, 71) These two lunar eclipses can evidently be identified with the lunar eclipses that were visible at Babylon on July 16, 523 B.C.E., and on January 10, 522 B.C.E. (Oppolzer’s Canon of Eclipses, translated by O. Gingerich, 1962, p. 335) Thus, this tablet points to the spring of 523 B.C.E. as the beginning of the seventh year of Cambyses II. Since the seventh year of Cambyses II began in spring of 523 B.C.E., his first year of rule was 529 B.C.E. and his accession year, and the last year of Cyrus II as king of Babylon, was 530 B.C.E. The latest tablet dated in the reign of Cyrus II is from the 5th month, 23rd day of his 9th year. (Babylonian Chronology, 626 B.C.–A.D. 75, by R. Parker and W. Dubberstein, 1971, p. 14) As the ninth year of Cyrus II as king of Babylon was 530 B.C.E., his first year according to that reckoning was 538 B.C.E. and his accession year was 539 B.C.E. Also note these comments in Insight about Cyrus: *** it-1 p. 566 Cyrus *** The early history of Cyrus II is somewhat obscure, depending largely upon rather fanciful accounts by Herodotus (Greek historian of the fifth century B.C.E.) and Xenophon (another Greek writer of about a half century later). However, both present Cyrus as the son of the Persian ruler Cambyses by his wife Mandane, the daughter of Astyages, king of the Medes. (Herodotus, I, 107, 108; Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, I, ii, 1) This blood relationship of Cyrus with the Medes is denied by Ctesias, another Greek historian of the same period, who claims instead that Cyrus became Astyages’ son-in-law by marrying his daughter Amytis. So basically, the Watchtower is dependent, not on a tablet about Cyrus, but a clay tablet about the 7th year of a different king and the measurement and interpretation of a couple of lunar eclipses, to give a BCE date for that other king, which is then tied to Cyrus through a separate traditional "Kings List" that matched the one that Ptolemy used. Problem is, this would be the exact same Kings List as the one that gives us all the information about Nebuchadnezzar and all the other Neo-Babylonian kings. In fact, Cyrus' dates were originally considered accurate by Russell because he praised how good and reliable Ptolemy was -- that is until Russell realized that this was the same evidence that would demolished 606 (and 607). Then he trashed Ptolemy, but didn't have a good replacement for it and kept Cyrus' dates anyway. If we can have faith in this data for 539 then it's the same data that gives us 587 for the 19th year of King Nebuchadnezzar. And the Watchtower publications also admit that trying to use the Nabonidus Chronicle is not helpful, not only because it doesn't contain any information that would supply a BCE date, but that the year is cut off anyway: *** it-2 p. 459 Nabonidus *** In spite of the brevity of the Nabonidus Chronicle—the tablet measures about 14 cm (5.5 in.) in breadth at the widest point and about the same in length—it remains the most complete cuneiform record of the fall of Babylon available. In the third of its four columns, beginning with line 5, pertinent sections read: “[Seventeenth year:] . . . In the month of Tashritu, when Cyrus attacked the army of Akkad in Opis on the Tigris, the inhabitants of Akkad revolted, but he (Nabonidus) massacred the confused inhabitants. The 14th day, Sippar was seized without battle. Nabonidus fled. The 16th day, Gobryas (Ugbaru), the governor of Gutium and the army of Cyrus entered Babylon without battle. Afterwards Nabonidus was arrested in Babylon when he returned (there). . . . In the month of Arahshamnu, the 3rd day, Cyrus entered Babylon, green twigs were spread in front of him—the state of ‘Peace’ (sulmu) was imposed upon the city.”—Ancient Near Eastern Texts, p. 306. It may be noted that the phrase “Seventeenth year” does not appear on the tablet, that portion of the text being damaged. This phrase is inserted by the translators because they believe that Nabonidus’ 17th regnal year was his last. So they assume that the fall of Babylon came in that year of his reign and that, if the tablet were not damaged, those words would appear in the space now damaged. So, although we have some convolutions to go through to get the regnal years of Cyrus, we have no such issues with the regnal years of Nebuchadnezzar because much of the tablet evidence goes directly and simply to his regnal years. No assumptions necessary.

I think it's important to be able to see the fallacy of relying so much on secular chronology and pretending it's Bible chronology. It's important to see that it's a mistake for Christians to think they have pretentious insight to know about the "times and seasons." If we can see that our supposed Biblical chronology is actually a man-made idol -- a pseudo-chronology -- then we wouldn't keep using it as a means for "bragging rights" about having supposedly predicted something the Watchtower never actually predicted. We wouldn't keep using it as a way to brag about how our special insight into the "times and seasons" proves we have Jehovah's spirit and backing and have had it for over 100 to 150 years. For me, I think we need to shift our "bragging rights" away from having made Palestine-Zionist-Times-Rulership vs Gentile-Times-Rulership predictions in advance of 1914, and focus on our real Christian progress in terms of teaching and promoting conduct in response to Jehovah's love, the ransom, and the good news of the kingdom: (2 Corinthians 1:12) . . .For the thing we boast of is this, our conscience bears witness that we have conducted ourselves in the world, and especially toward you, with holiness and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but with God’s undeserved kindness. (2 Corinthians 10:3-5) . . .For though we walk in the flesh, we do not wage warfare according to what we are in the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not fleshly, but powerful by God for overturning strongly entrenched things. For we are overturning reasonings and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, . .

It's curious to me that this is not the first time you have mentioned "counting backward from 568 BC." You should know that ZERO of the dates you listed are discovered by calculating backward from 568. For readers who wonder what this question is all about it comes from the mistaken idea that a certain tablet called VAT 4956 is somehow all-important to those who argue for Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year as 586 BCE. That particular tablet refers to Nebuchadnezzar's 37th year, and even Rolf Furuli says that all the planetary references on this tablet definitely refer to 568/7 and no other year as NEB 37- which puts Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year (NEB 18) in 587 BCE, which would destroy the WT claim of 607. Rolf Furuli is confident that the tablet contains information that MUST refer to 568 and NO OTHER possible year, which is what scholars have been saying all along. He goes so far as to say that the correct information must have been spliced onto the incorrect information and that someone might have forged parts of it, but not all of it, or faked some of the markings on it, or even potentially used saws and sanders to create it -- all things that are obviously impossible when you look at it. But he also (inexplicably) claims that the LUNAR positions on that tablet refer to a different year, 20 years later, in support of the WT Chronology. Furuli spent so much time on this ridiculous SPLIT theory that it makes VAT 4956 seem more important than it is. He attempts to create confusion over the LUNAR positions (and makes embarrassingly amateur errors in doing so.) But no one seems to remember that he could NOT create any confusion about the PLANETARY positions. He admits that the planetary positions ultimately support 587/586 as Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year, invalidating the WT claim. All this craziness about 568 can make some less-informed Witnesses believe that this particular tablet must be so important that those who still support 586 for Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year must have used this "NEB 37" tablet and simply counted backwards to "NEB 19". Those who think that way probably don't realize that you can actually just toss out this particular tablet VAT 4956 that Furuli focused on, and still find that other independent evidence supports ALL those other years mentioned in the list. Counting backward from 568 was not done for ANY of them.

I also think this is much bigger than most people know. On a recent trip to California I visited a brother who had been involved in many of the scholarly efforts with people like Greg Stafford and many of the names that Juan Rivera mentioned some time ago. In fact, I had to double-check that this brother was not using the name "Juan Rivera" here on this forum. Years ago, a few of these names had contacts going up to HQ (Bethel), although HQ began cracking down (again) on any further scholarly groups, and finally was able to effectively get rid of them. This crackdown had also been tried in the early 1980's for obvious reasons too. Maybe the WTS was right to crack down because, when I met with this brother in California, he listed so many of the names of all these brothers who had finally left the Witnesses, including more famous names like Rolf Furuli and Greg Stafford, and even a scholarly member of the late 1980's Writing Dept, kicked out of Writing, but possibly still a JW as far as he knew. I might be wrong, but I think sunlight is still the best disinfectant. People who are curious enough to go venture online "on their own" are going to hear all these things sooner or later anyway, so why not prepare them. Even when someone mentions Ray Franz' books, we can say: "Imagine, Ray Franz already knew firsthand about all of that stuff he reports and yet he still did his best to stay within the brotherhood, the organization. Even after he resigned from the Governing Body, and was no longer allowed to be an elder, he STILL tried his best to remain a member in good standing with his congregation in Alabama." Going around saying these things never happened, or that they are all lies doesn't help. In fact, it makes things worse for those who end up believing that and trying to defend the WTS against what turns out to be true. We end up looking uninformed, or haughty, naive, or worse yet, like liars ourselves.

Sure. It's not just one tablet. Several different tablets independently validate different years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign with the moon, planets, and/or star positions we can now identify with the particular BCE years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign. Rather than redo all the work again, as I get time I'll probably copy some of my old posts over to here which identify the tablets I used for the calculations. As I've pointed out before, there are no extant tablets that we know of explicitly mentioning Jerusalem's destruction in the 18th/19th year of Nebuchadnezzar. Rather, I am relying on another source of information: It's the Bible that speaks of the destruction of Jerusalem occurring in the 18th and 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar. (Jeremiah 32:1, 2) . . .that is, the 18th year of Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar.  At that time the armies of the king of Babylon were besieging Jerusalem. . . (2 Kings 25:8-10) . . .in the 19th year of King Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar the king of Babylon, Neb·uʹzar·adʹan . . . came to Jerusalem. He burned down the house of Jehovah, the king’s house, and all the houses of Jerusalem; he also burned down the house of every prominent man. And the walls surrounding Jerusalem were pulled down . . . If you believe the Bible, then you don't need an explicit mention on a Babylonian tablet. You merely need to believe this happened around the 18th and/or 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar. I believe the Bible's information is sufficient, and I'm happy with it. However, if you wish to also put a BCE date on those years, then you would just need evidence from recorded sun, moon, planet or star positions for ANY particular year of Nebuchadnezzar's reign. If you can discover the BCE year for any ONE year of his reign this way, then you also know his 18th year and his 19th year.

By reading such explanations in WT publications which are in turn based on scholarship. That's my point. Most of us (Witnesses) in my experience have never personally arrived at a conclusion about 539 except by simply READING the explanation in WT publications. In your case you also have a lot of books by current scholars on the subject but I think you've already admitted before that EVERY one of them puts the 18th and 19th years of Nebuchadnezzar within a few months of 587 and 586 BCE. And most Witnesses if you ask them will THINK that the explanation about 539 is somehow better and more direct than the ways in which the years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign are associated with BCE dates. The reason I asked how you personally arrived at it was because I figured you might have checked it out for yourself and realized that more recently even the WT publications themselves now ADMIT that the method for figuring out CYRUS' regnal years are indirect and makes use of additional assumptions -- assumptions which are not necessary with much of the evidence for Nebuchadnezzar's regnal years. I'm sure you already know exactly what I'm talking about since you have read the explanations in WT publications. I would be very surprised if you didn't know this already. Also, almost NO Witnesses I have ever spoken to, with only a very few current exceptions have ever admitted going to the trouble to use an astronomy program to check it out for themselves. As simple as this is to do, and with all the importance so many Witnesses attach to chronology. I do think it's an indication that there is a real FEAR of what they might find out. In fact, it's pretty obvious that it's FEAR because if we thought we might find out something that might bolster our teaching about 607 we'd be anxious to see for ourselves. We'd be thrilled to see if those claims by Furuli were really true: that the evidence is questionable. Instead, it's easier to have faith in someone who claims that the evidence for all of these dates is open to question. Yet they forget that that this includes 539 which somehow still remains "pivotal." Deep down, I'm starting to believe that NO ONE really looks at the evidence, and if anyone knows ANYTHING about the evidence they don't really believe the evidence is going to go our way and that's why we avoid it.

And it's also a fact that Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year as 586 BCE also enjoys universal acceptance within scholarship. And although the event of the fall of Babylon by Cyrus was NOT a fully described in the context of the fall of Jerusalem and the end of the Davidic monarchy, Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year absolutely WAS described in pretty much exactly those terms. So, again, I'd have to ask why . . . 539 is surely no less open to interpretation than the years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign. According to your listed criteria, that would make Nebuchadnezzar's reign much more pivotal. Besides the fact that we can double-check the evidence for MANY MORE years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign than for Cyrus, and each year strengthens the evidence for all the other years. If a three-fold cord cannot easily be broken, then an eight-fold cord ought to be even stronger than that. Since currently we are asked to reject the evidence for all the years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign which are MUCH better documented, why don't you just use the Bible's date of Nebuchadnezzar 19th year, and reject the secular date of 539 for Cyrus? Just make the claim that since we KNOW Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year is a PIVOTAL year, and that it's even more pivotal than 539 for Cyrus, then just start claiming that Cyrus captured Babylon in 519. You get to keep the 70 year period intact, just as you do now. It's EXACTLY what's being done at the OTHER end. Why does it matter so much which secular date we put faith in and which secular date we dismiss? We'd be doing exactly the same thing we are doing now except that we would then be saying that 539 is just a secular date but that Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year is a Bible date, and that we'll choose the Bible's dates over Secular dates every time. I'm surprised you even admitted that one. It's an even better criteria for using Nebuchadnezzar's pivotal Bible dates instead of the secular Cyrus 1 date. Several of Nebuchadnezzar's years actually ARE synchronized to the Judean monarchy, yet ZERO of Cyrus' dates are.

No. As we've already established NONE of them are, not as BCE dates. We are ONLY talking about how you might determine that a certain reference to a specific year of Nebuchadnezzar (in this case) has been assigned a valid BCE date. After you assign any ONE of them to a regnal year of Nebuchadnezzar, you have just assigned BCE dates to ALL the known years of his reign, even ones I didn't mention. (I only focused on ones where I had already personally checked astronomical data that was related to major events of interest or referenced on Babylonian tablets.) To be clear, if you tell me how old you were on April 1, 1999, then I can tell you how old you were on April 1st every year from when you turned ONE all the way up to the most recent April 1st.

Thanks. A couple of your posts above regarding these apps were moved to here where these types of apps were being discussed.

He does not. He gives 586 BCE and not 587 BCE as do most historians and archaeologists following the tradition of Edwin Thiele. You have that wrong. He absolutely does! Oded Lipschits believes Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year was 587/6 BCE. Just as he believes his 19th year was 586/5 BCE, his 23rd year was 582/1, etc. Note, for example, page 40 of the following work by him. Ammon in Transition from Vassal Kingdom to Babylonian Province Oded Lipschits Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, No. 335 (Aug., 2004), pp. 37-52 (16 pages) https://doi.org/10.2307/4150068•https://www.jstor.org/stable/4150068 Also note the comment later on the same page: Perhaps you thought I was referring to the date for the more complete destruction of Jerusalem and its temple. I also would put this more complete destruction of the city and temple almost as likely in 586, and we should recall not just the two different "new year" dates that are six months apart, and the difference in counting even a partial accession year as a full year with some Bible writers, but also the fact that the siege lasted about a year and a half. (Yes, I have read Rodger Young and Edwin Thiele on the matter of regnal year counting.) I was asking, not about the destruction itself, but what was the BCE YEAR that Oded Lipschits identifies as Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year. So the answer is definitely 587 BCE. (Using the usual Spring/Nisan start of the new year, 587 starts in the spring, and therefore will contain about 3 months of 586. This is one of the main reasons we'll often see a BCE date written, for example, as 587/6 instead of just 587. We also know from several of his papers, books and articles, that Lipschits begins the period of Babylonian domination over other nations with the accession year of Nebuchadnezzar, starting with the campaigns of 605, and then his 1st year, 604. It might be worth the reminder that whenever you find a reference to any year in Nebuchadnezzar's reign, such as when Lipschits says: "in the 23rd year of Nebuchadrezzar's reign (582/581 B.C.E.)" this is the same as saying his 22nd year was 583/2, his 21st year was 584/3, his 20th was 585/4, his 19th was 586/5 and his 18th was 587/6, etc. Also, you seemed to miss the point of the question. Even if you thought that Lipschits used a different year-to-year schema, my question means the same thing as if I had asked: Why do you think that your Professor Oded Lipschits believes Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year was 587 [586] BCE? If the Neo-Babylonian regnal years of the NB kings were open to interpretation, why does he not admit that anywhere? Do you think that all these professors and historians and archaeologists of the period are just going along with what they've heard the way most Witnesses do? Or do you think they do a little research before making such definitive use of the NB chronology?

Do nothing. The astronomical evidence is also open to interpretation If the astronomical evidence is open to interpretation why do you put faith in 539 as a "pivotal" year? Since there is even more direct astronomical evidence for: 604 as Nebuchadnezzar's 1st year, and 598 as Nebuchadnezzar's 7th year, and 591 as Nebuchadnezzar's 14th year, and 589 as Nebuchadnezzar's 16th year, and 588 as Nebuchadnezzar's 17th year, and 580 as Nebuchadnezzar's 25th year, and 579 as Nebuchadnezzar's 26th year, and 578 as Nebuchadnezzar's 27th year, and 577 as Nebuchadnezzar's 28th year, and 571 as Nebuchadnezzar's 32nd year, and 568 as Nebuchadnezzar's 37th year, and therefore 587 as Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year . . . . . . then why not use the years of Nebuchadnezzar's reign as even more pivotal? In other words, why do you have faith that all those years are wrong and have faith that 539 for Cyrus accession is right? How did you personally arrive at the conclusion that 539 was indeed the year of Cyrus conquering Babylon? Do you think that most Witnesses even know how one arrives at 539 for Cyrus Accession, or 538 for Cyrus 1st year, and 537 for Cyrus 2nd (including the last few months of Cyrus 1st)? Was it through your own research or was it faith in the tradition of our WT publications? If it was through your own research, then again I ask very seriously, how did you arrive at it yourself? And lastly, I think it's great that you had Professor Obed Lipschits -- although you should know that his name is NOT Obed, but Oded Lipschits. My question is: Why do you think that your Professor Oded Lipschits believes Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year was 587 BCE?

Again, that's a valid proposition for an interpretation. But then what do you do with the fact that you can independently calculate Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year, "six ways from Sunday" and discover that each independent way brings you to the year 586 BCE. Everything might have looked like a proper interpretation up to that point, but if you look at the exile and consider it to be 70 years long, you end up with a contradiction. The 70 years takes you all the way to 516 BCE. Yet, the same exact set of calculations that show Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year as 586 BCE show the first year of Cyrus over Babylon as 538 BCE. So, you end up with a 70-year period that looks a lot more like the one in Zechariah, which was closer to 516 BCE, as admitted by the "Insight" book: (Zechariah 1:12) . . .So the angel of Jehovah said: “O Jehovah of armies, how long will you withhold your mercy from Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, with whom you have been indignant these 70 years?” *** it-2 p. 1225 Zechariah, Book of *** The last time indicator found in the book of Zechariah is the fourth day of Chislev in the fourth year of Darius’ reign (about December 1, 518 B.C.E.). (7:1) Accordingly, this book could not have been committed to writing before the close of 518 B.C.E. So that' s the big question for me. What do you do when you discover that the same astronomical evidence that gives you 538 BCE for Cyrus 1st year over Babylon also gives you 587 BCE for Nebuchadnezzar's 19th year? It seems to me you'd have to make another adjustment to your theory, or else you would be forced to keep sowing seeds of doubt about the Neo-Babylonian chronology. But it's the same chronology that gave you 539 and 538! So you'd merely be sowing more seeds of doubt about the whole interpretation. To keep this theory, you have to somehow keep believers afraid to look at the astronomical and archaeological evidence for the period. I don't think that's a sustainable way to promote a traditional interpretation. People are naturally curious, and some are going to find out, no matter how much doubt is sown.

It's very possible that this was considered a beginning "date" of the exile (meaning the 18th/19th year of Nebuchadnezzar). It obviously was one of the most important dates of exile. But this never says that the exile began counting only at this time. It's a fair interpretation, but not the only one possible. And the very fact that Jeremiah gives 3 different years for the exiles makes a beginning date more nebulous. It actually seems likely that most Jews saw the beginning of the Exile in the 7th year of Nebuchadnezzar. This is also the dating schema that Ezekiel uses to date any year in the "Exilic Era." Starting in 597 BCE according to the evidence. (Ezekiel 1:1, 2) . . .In the 30th year, on the fifth day of the fourth month, while I was among the exiled people by the river Cheʹbar, the heavens were opened and I began to see visions of God.  On the fifth day of the month—that is, in the fifth year of the exile of King Je·hoiʹa·chin. . . *** it-1 p. 793 Ezekiel, Book of *** Another notable feature of the book of Ezekiel is the meticulous care Ezekiel took to date his prophecies, giving not only the year of King Jehoiachin’s exile but also the month and day of the month. Dating everything from the year of the King's exile was the same as dating the exile that started 10 or 11 years before Nebuchadnezzar's 18h/19th year. And Daniel also begins his exile we say in Nebuchadnezzar's 7th/8th year, not the 18/19th. Of course, I'm not saying it's wrong. It seems to be the most described part of the disaster, and one could even interpret Jeremiah 52:27 as saying "thus the exile began" referring to the description before which was mostly of the 17th to 19th years of Nebuchadnezzar. It can also appear to describe the 3 exiles listed just after it. The NWT puts it in the above paragraph, not with the 3 exiles that immediately follow the phrase. Logically, it seems to be a heading for the three that follow. On the issue of Daniel mentioning the third year of Jehoiakim as the beginning of their exile, @George88 has been quoting recently from Wiseman, who takes this to mean that Daniel's exile started closer to 605 BCE, not 597 BCE. In other words, nearer to Nebuchadnezzar's accession year, not this 7th/8th.

You've intrigued me with this view before in past years (under different names). I know why you usually bring up Tobit, as you did again here in this topic. And I know why you have brought up multiple persons named Nebuchadnezzar, and you even asked me why I ignored that particular evidence. I also know why you have left a kind of "teaser" here about "never denying the validity of the 19 years," because, as you say, it can be used in another way. And I also realize that there is one particular king of this "Nebuchadnezzar line" whose 19th year, either coincidentally or providentially, happens to land on the actual "astronomically validated" and "evidenced" year of 607 BCE. It's an interesting and intriguing theory, and I understand why you think it's hardly worthy of being subject to the outside opinions any scholars or non-scholars on this forum. You have even mentioned in the past that you had planned to write it up in a more thoroughly researched and more thoroughly formulated manner in order to present it in some way to the WTS. Because it still fully supports the 607/606 date, and fully supports judgement against both the kingly and religious seat at Jerusalem, and the full 70 years, it would continue to agree with all the major claims we currently make about the current 607 BCE. teaching. And it has the advantage of not being falsified by astronomical tablets. I haven't commented much on it, because I have a feeling you are still working out the details, and i think you are finding some factors that mitigate some of the objections you might expect. I don't need to tell you the kinds of objections you would have to overcome in convincing those who would make a decision about it's usefulness. @xero, perhaps inadvertently, provided one of the biggest ones when he presented the usual comment about the perceived historical unreliableness of Tobit. Of course, you are not "dependent" on Tobit, it might just be that what seems to be a naming anomaly in Tobit happens to reflect a reality that seems otherwise lost in the secular records. And, as you know, there are some ambiguities and confusions among Babylonian names of Kings with overlapping titles, and therefore overlapping names, because those names often contains titles, or were only used as a part of a longer more formal title. There's plenty more to it, and I don't fully dismiss your idea. I understand parts of it. But it's yours to describe, and if I try to guess at the points you are finding in Wiseman and other books that might help support the idea, I'm sure I will get some of it wrong. I'm sure I have got some of the above pieces wrong about it already. Perhaps you have already changed or currently resolved some of the prior issues in a different way than you had tried in the past. I would be happy to discuss it seriously, but you would have to be more specific than you have been to date.

All right then, I moved the BM 33041 post back here.

@George88, I moved your BM 33401 topic over to the new thread, too. If you think it should be discussed back over here, just let me know. For me it makes no difference, but I think it was a good question to get to at some point.

For anyone who is interested, I have moved several posts from here that deal more with the "20 year gap" over to a new topic: https://www.theworldnewsmedia.org/topic/90908-the-watchtowers-20-year-adjustment-to-the-standard-neo-babylonian-chronology/

OK. I understand that. Thanks. And I meant something more like whether the Bible ever contains statements like this: "And Jerusalem and Judea began going into Exile in the 3rd year of Jehoiakim" "And I will bring this nation into exile starting in the 11th year Zedekiah." You will be free from this Exile when the Persians conquer the Babylonians." "And I will free you from this Exile in the first year of Cyrus" "Two years and 3 months after Cyrus conquered the King of Babylon many of the exiled Jews began returning to their homeland and the Exile was declared completed." There is something very close to that for the end of the exile, but nothing like it for the beginning of the exile. So the "dates" for the start and end of the Exile become a matter of interpretation, not a matter of clear Bible declarations or statements. As I said before, we need not worry about the beginning and end of the exile in order to determine the BCE date for the 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar. The 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar is the date for the fall of Jerusalem as far as the Bible tells us. Similarly, the 14th year of Nabopolassar is the primary date for the fall of Nineveh, if we were to return to the original topic of this thread. So whether the Exile began exactly at that time, or 20 years earlier or 20 years later, the real goal is to find a BCE date that fits the 19th year of Nebuchadnezzar and the 14th year of Nabopolassar. But I would like to try to think through your question anyway. It's the one question where you have pushed me to think in a different direction in the past, and I'd like to take it more seriously this time. I'll probably move this part of the discussion to a new topic/thread, so that we'll have a more serious place to discuss it. For now, I'll start rambling off my thoughts about it. I think that it's best to think that the exile began when Nebuchadnezzar first began taking exiles. So we should look for the first time the Bible puts any kind of date on events related to "exiles." The most obvious "first" verse in that regard at first might appear to be this one: (Jeremiah 52:28) . . .These are the people whom Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar took into exile: in the seventh year, 3,023 Jews. I've tested about 8 different pieces of Babylonian astronomical evidence and my software programs always puts that in the year 598. The Babylonian Chronicles claim that it happened very late in that year and therefore probably included an early part of 597. So that would be 598/597 BCE. The next verse shows that a much smaller number of exiles were taken in Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year, which was the same year the city and the temple at Jerusalem was considered destroyed: (Jeremiah 52:29) . . .In the 18th year of Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar, 832 people were taken from Jerusalem. All the astronomical evidence I have seen, and that I have tested myself, consistently places that 18th year as 587 BCE. The next verse shows a smaller number of people taken as exiles in Nebuchadnezzar's 23rd year: (Jeremiah 52:30) . . .In the 23rd year of Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar, Neb·uʹzar·adʹan the chief of the guard took Jews into exile, 745 people.. . . And, of course, all the astronomical evidence places this date as 582 BCE. But that's not the whole story, of course. The Watchtower publications show that Nebuchadnezzar was marching around Syria-Palestine, so that we know he was near the Judean nation much earlier. The Babylonian Chronicles and the Watchtower publications both agree that this was in the Accession year of Nebuchadnezzar . All the astronomical tablet evidence places that date in the year 605 BCE. The same year that Nebuchadnezzar defeated the King of Egypt (Necho) at Carchemish. The Bible dates that, too: (Jeremiah 46:2) . . .For Egypt, concerning the army of Pharʹaoh Neʹcho the king of Egypt, who was along the Eu·phraʹtes River and was defeated at Carʹche·mish by King Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar of Babylon in the fourth year of Je·hoiʹa·kim son of Jo·siʹah, the king of Judah: But do we have evidence that there were exiles taken from Judah this early in Nebuchadnezzar's regime? (Daniel 1:1-6) . . .In the third year of the kingship of King Je·hoiʹa·kim of Judah, King Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it. 2  In time Jehovah gave King Je·hoiʹa·kim of Judah into his hand, . . . Then the king ordered Ashʹpe·naz his chief court official to bring some of the Israelites, including those of royal and noble descent. . . . They were to be trained for three years, and at the end of that time they were to enter the king’s service. Now among them were some from the tribe of Judah: Daniel, Han·a·niʹah, Mishʹa·el, and Az·a·riʹah. So the answer is apparently Yes. During that early march through the land, just as both the Watchtower publications admit and the Babylonian Chronicles also claim, there were some exiles taken at that time, too. They were even called by the term exiles. (Daniel 2:25) . . .Arʹi·och quickly took Daniel in before the king and said to him: “I have found a man of the exiles of Judah who can make known the interpretation to the king.” Of course, I am quite aware that the Watchtower interpretation doesn't agree with the date mentioned in Daniel 1:1. So the Watchtower changes the meaning of "third year of Jehoiakim" to mean something else.