JW Insider

You are not telling the truth here. Again. What you are implying appears dishonest or appears to show a complete inability to do research -- or perhaps you can explain if there was some other reason you are reporting this idea incorrectly. The jwfacts.com site is actually another excellent site for debunking the idea that Russell was a Freemason. An important statement from the page on the subject is here: Whilst these symbols are used by Freemasonry, Russell's usage is not evidence he was a member. These symbols are not exclusive to Freemasonry, and were in common usage amongst a number of nineteenth century Christian groups, such as the Adventist movement from which Russell drew many of his teachings. The conclusion presented on the site includes this as one of the final statements: To believe Russell was a Freemason implies a conspiracy to hide his involvement that is both pointless and devoid of any evidence. Russell was neither a Mason, pagan or Satanist, but simply a religious leader stealing ideas from those around him to found his own religion. What should have given it away is the very title of the page, which I assume you somehow misread: https://www.jwfacts.com/watchtower/blog/russell-not-a-freemason.php

What happened to you AllenSmith? No, I did not ever say I was a good researcher. I said I was a researcher because that was my assignment. Also, I already debunked this same claim to my own satisfaction years ago, while I was still in Bethel. If you recall, I was the one on jw-archive who not only pointed to debunking material about this topic, but if you recall, I even found the original photo from which the photoshopped picture came from of Russell as a supposed Mason. (See another post by The Librarian on this subject.) I was the one who quoted the 1913 convention report as a primary source in debunking the theory, the same as you do above. Also, in my post above I pointed to a very fair treatment of the subject that also claims the same primary thing you are claiming.

From what I could gather the writers at the "survey" blog seem to say that there are 7 specific issues that the WTS is opposing in the book. I count 6 from the linked article. Perhaps there are more details in the author's own blog about what's happening with his book. So far it looks like the following items are part of the suit: Privacy issue related to collection of data on persons who are studying with JWs Privacy issue related to collection of data on the activities of JWs (voluntarily reported hours, placements, etc.) and the use of that information to review the potential congregational status of the JW Portrayal of the Governing Body as having any type of control over the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society Research quoted from Marvin Shilmer where he claims that more than 50,000 Witnesses have died over blood transfusion issues The suggestion that the WTS might try to control the type of music a Witness listens to That Witnesses believe and share potentially embellished experiences as fact Did I miss one that someone else saw?

I have it somewhere. Hopefully someone has a link to it online. It's from a speech by Russell, as reported in the 1913 Convention Report of the International Bible Students. The commentary here: https://mmoutreachinc.com/jehovahs_witnesses/russell_mason/wasrussellmason.html is as good a place as any to start. The portion above is Russell's long, drawn-out analogy and comparison to show how true Christians are really "Masons" only in a scriptural sense even though they don't belong to any Masonic Order. It's curious that he spent so much time accommodating the Masonic philosophy into his speech. I'm assuming he knew that Masons were in the audience, or he had been recently questioned about his choice of Masonic symbols and language.

Then you and I agree completely. I don't think anyone should make a habit of advocating that someone abuse copyright material. And I agree that many people abuse "fair use" guidelines, or don't understand them. It's fairly easy to comply, although it requires a bit more work than a lot of people want to put into their posts. It's easy to get lazy or in a hurry, and I've done this too. I've seen whole articles posted many times. A good rule of thumb is to keep quotes under 3 lines at a time from any article, and keep excerpts down to less than a paragraph or two from longer works. If anyone thinks I have advocated for abuse of the law, they are mistaken either about what I said, or about the law. You are misrepresenting me again. I agree that JTR made an error. I almost pointed it out before you did, but had to go somewhere and didn't see any notifications from the forum pop up for a couple hours. The rules should be kept MORE strictly if this were an academic site. This is NOT an academic site. But there are parts of the site that tend toward being academic in the sense that they are about religious doctrine and they discuss and quote from the academic or scholarly research of others. They are often discussions and critique of doctrine. Doctrine means teaching. Discussions about teachings and critique of teachings is essentially going to categorized as "academic." When you quote from sources to open up a discussion or refute another persons opinion about copyright law, you are teaching something about copyright law. The person presenting material need not be correct in all aspects, but that's the nature of a forum. It's a mix of teaching and questioning and learning and discussion and controversy and disagreement and social banter and parody and jokes and entertainment. But we should still be able to LEARN from anyone who offers a point of view.

This makes no sense. If this forum were hypothetically an academic forum, copyright rules would still apply. And I suspect they would also be adhered to more closely.

I figured that your moniker meant that you wanted to represent yourself as a "defender of the truth." If that misrepresentation was on purpose, I guess it stands for something else. I think you can see that it is perfectly relevant to the point that JTR was making, even though JTR used a fat bad example. He will have to eat Humble Pie. (Humble Pie also had a song called "Eat it!" : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eat_It_(Humble_Pie_album) ) I have defended your mistakes, too. I'm not an author, however, and have not tried to be one. I have worked as a researcher for authors.

"This infamous ideology that JWI keeps suggesting . . . " LOL. I think that you have made such a habit of looking to find fault with so many things I have said, that you probably don't realize that, up until your most recent comments here, I have generally agreed with everything you said about copyright law. The only problem is that you have likely obscured what I have said, either on purpose, wishful thinking, misunderstanding, misquoting, or false assumptions. To repeat, my position is still as I have stated previously : that there have been many instances on this site of people breaking copyright law, and breaking the "Fair Use" guidelines of copyright law. There are hundreds of sites discussing JW teachings from JWs, non-JWs and ex-JWs that break the copyright laws. At the end of this post I'll point to the previous things I have said about copyright law and fair use law. If you know of other things I have said, please point them out, especially as you seem to think that I have said something about this site being exempt because it is an academic site. You should know that I have never made such a claim, and even if I had, this wouldn't change a thing about "Fair Use" guidelines. The point I recall making was that in places where subjects are discussed for academic purposes (and that includes criticism) you will often find that a corporation or publishing company will allow more leeway because it is easy to create a measure of "bad will" instead of "good will" when fighting for legal rights. It will end up highlighting the fact that the publishing company is afraid of criticism. Scientology created a lot of bad will for itself many years ago when it bought up an entire large site where religion was discussed just so it could crush the site. Scientology discussion was only a small part of the site, but it crushed the entire site. After that BeliefNet became much bigger, but they were hassled by religions and corporations over copyright issues, too. Fair Use guidelines of the copyright law will not change; they don't have to. They have always been vague enough, and many years of precedent in prosecuting these laws has not resulted in specific definitions. Here is a quote about them from a typical site where people try to make sense of it for practical purposes: http://www.booksandsuch.com/blog/fair-use-and-asking-permission/ ------------------- Fair Use The U.S. Copyright Office Fair Use Guidelines, Section 107, lists six purposes for using a particular work that are considered fair: For “criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research.”  It goes on to list four factors you need to consider in deciding whether your intended use can be considered fair: “The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes The nature of the copyrighted work The amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole The effect of the use upon the potential market for, or value of, the copyrighted work.” .    The Section goes on to state that the boundary between fair use and infringement is unclear. “There is no specific number of words, lines, or notes that may safely be taken without permission” ----------------------- The problem is that the lack of a specific number of words or lines "that may be safely taken without permission" will cut both ways. If a publisher is strict they can come after you for very little, if a publisher is not strict, or even perhaps "happy" about the quotes, they would be happy if even more had been quoted. (This has actually happened in context-related issues, where the publisher claims that MORE context should have been quoted to avoid misleading the reader.) These issues are very relevant to the WTS-owned content. It's easy to take something out of context. Also, the WTS always prefers that a school, for example, take 200 copies of the entire Awake! magazine, rather than just a reprint of an article. The reason is probably obvious. In areas where our work is banned, brothers and sisters have been encouraged to copy entire magazines by hand. Entire magazines are often given away not just to interested persons, but (especially-pre jw.org) have even been left in the door of a 'not at home' or mailed to an address where prospects of interest were high. Entire magazines have been left in beauty shops, "laundry mats," and elsewhere with no instructions as to who can share the publication. The WTS would not want to be considered hypocritical for wanting the books and magazines (or at least entire articles) copied in areas where the distribution was banned, but then turn around and cry when the WTS itself tries to ban the distribution of its own publications through unauthorized channels. If it's obvious that the unauthorized channel is not presenting itself as the proper channel from which to receive the original and/or current information, then it is probably obvious that the unauthorized channel is presenting the material in order to teach, promote, or criticize the material. Fair Use requires that only excerpts be used for this purpose. But how long can those excerpts be? Some precedent has indicated this for example: " In all the editorial sources I have researched, the consensus is that 275–300 words can be extracted from a book-length work without seeking permission. . . " (taken from the site just quoted above.) But is a quote from one article a quote from a book-length work? Not normally. But what if the publication of a bound volume is considered to be the work of one author (WTS) for that year, or what if an entire indexed CD-ROM or DVD or archive on wol.jw.org full of publications that are all presented as the current "single" body of work from the same "author"? What is the number of words or lines or percentage that could be appropriate. Would the publisher be happier if more or less was quoted to avoid items being taken out of context? Is there any indication that the publisher merely wishes for nothing to be quoted unless it is fully supportive? *** w18 April p. 30 par. 2 Questions From Readers *** But if we knowingly allow people, even our brothers, to post our digital content on other sites or to use the jw.org trademark to sell merchandise, the courts may not support our efforts to deter opposers and commercial enterprises. It appears that deterring opposition is high on the list. Will the WTS decide to ban its own literature from all places they oppose? Will this be considered a type of persecution? Those are the questions that are going to be asked. That's why I think that the WTS will be hesitant to go after those who break copyright law when it comes to mere criticism. They don't want to position themselves as not being able to stand up to criticism, as this is a sign of fear that they will be exposed for weaknesses. --------------------------- For some reason, someone moved a post on mine on this subject to a new topic, making it look like I started a new thread on the topic here, which might be a fair place to move this current discussion. I believe those comments must have been moved from another topic, probably this one: https://www.theworldnewsmedia.org/topic/50868-is-it-time-for-this-forum-to-close-its-doors/?page=5

A lot of people think that Weird Al went too far in asking or permission before making his parodies. The law would likely have been on his side if he had not requested permission, but that doesn't mean he wanted the legal hassles. The best treatment I found regarding the copyright issues with respect to the Weird Al parodies is here: http://thelearnedfangirl.com/2014/07/the-continuing-influence-of-weird-al-on-law-especially-copyright-law/ I'll quote two entire paragraphs below to present the context of the sentence I have highlighted : Weird Al or his works have been cited by a large number of legal scholars in almost seventy-five law review articles over the years, including in at least six articles by at least three of the top 30 IP scholars — Mark Lemley (Mark Lemley & Stacey Dogan, Parody as Brand, 47 U.C.D. L. Rev. 473, 503 (2013); Mark Lemley, Should a Licensing Market Require Licensing, 70 Law & Contemp. Probs. 185, 191 (2007)); Jonathan Zittrain (Jonathan Zittrain, Privacy 2.0, 2008 U. Chi. Legal F. 65, 83 (2008)) and Rebecca Tushnet (Rebecca Tushnet, Payment in Credit: Copyright Law and Subcultural Creativity, 70 Law & Contemp. Probs. 135, 161 (2007); Rebecca Tushnet, My Fair Ladies: Sex, Gender, and Fair Use in Copyright, 15 Am. U. J. Gender Soc. Pol’y & L. 273, 297 (2007); Bruce P. Keller & Rebecca Tushnet, Even More Parodic than the Real Thing: Parody Lawsuits Revisited, 94 Trademark Rep. 979, 985, 996, 997 (2004)) and many others, including Kembrew McLeod & Peter DiCola, Non-Infringing Uses in Digital Sampling: The Role of Fair Use and the De Minimis Threshold in Sample Clearance Reform, 17 Deakin L. Rev. 321, 329 (2012). But his influence isn’t just in rocking the possibly non-existent borderline between parody and satire – let alone tribute, takeoff, and more, but has been cited in law reviews to talk about topic from racial profiling (Nancy Leong, The Open Road and the Traffic Stop: Narratives and Counter-Narratives of the American Dream, 64 Fla. L. Rev. 305 (2012)) to the RIAA (Vincent J. Galluzzo, When Now Known or Later Developed Fails Its Purpose: How P2P Litigation Has Turned the Distribution Right Upside-Down, 61 Fla. L. Rev. 1165 (2009)) to defining what goes into Spam – the meat product (Pamela C. Chalk, A Pig by Any Other Name Would Smell as Sweet, 12 J. Contemp. Legal Issues 340 (2001)).

Queen Esther, I don't know if it was you who edited the title of this thread, but that's quite a change! I was expressing an opinion, and I still hold to it 100%, but the new title might make others uncomfortable, especially if they were only intending to responding to the thread under it's original title. Thanks for the vote of confidence to you, or whomever made the change. If the "hype" in some of the articles were reworded to a more rational presentation there would be dozens of little changes to make, and I'm not trying to be that picky. But Gordon's site does have several comments on it from Jehovah's Witnesses, too, and they are quite supportive of course. This was one of the reasons to be careful. If I get time, I'll present some of these other problems for those who might be interested. I just noticed that even Nehemia Gordon himself didn't like the new title of this thread. See?

This whole claim is being oversimplified nearly to the point of dishonesty. First of all, "Jehovah" is a perfectly acceptable English name for the Tetragrammaton as long as we admit that it is not intended to match the original Hebrew pronunciation. We have admitted this multiple times: *** nwt p. 1735 A4 The Divine Name in the Hebrew Scriptures *** He said: “Modern grammarians argue that it ought to be read Yahveh or Yahaveh; but JEHOVAH seems firmly rooted in the English language, and the really important point is not the exact pronunciation, but the recognition that it is a Proper Name, not merely an appellative title like ‘Lord.’” Earlier versions of the NWT were very clear that the name "Yahweh" was considered by the NWT translators to be closer to the original Hebrew pronunciation, but chose to use "Jehovah" because it was better known in the English-speaking world. Non-English translations of the NWT are based on this same assumption made for the English translation. The following is from the Foreword of the NWT as published from 1950 through the 1960's: While inclining to view the pronunciation "Yahweh"' as the more correct way, we have retained the form "Jehovah" because of people's familiarity with it since the 14th century. None of this takes away from the point being made in Bible that the whole world will know Jehovah. This is a correct Bible statement even if the original pronunciation was actually YA-HU or YA-HO or YAH-VEH or even a dialectical pronunciation of I-O. The Biblical phras. e was obviously not intended to refer to a specific pronunciation, but a refers to specific actions from God. Next, the initial video is from Michael Rood. Rood is a prophetic "crank" (crack-pot) who continues to use prejudice and misinformation to push his own "End of the World" routine because clearly an end of the world agenda attracts a lot of people and produces a lot of sales activity for his books and DVDs. Perhaps the beard makes one think of a Hebrew scholar, but he is a "Neo-Christian" doomsday preacher. Note the comments here: http://www.empirenet.com/~messiah7/spl_rood.htm His first major prediction was for the end of the world in 1999, and of course most predictions since then are tempered by using questions and inexact wording instead of direct statements. For example, notice how this video of his is sub-themed: "The Rapture: 2017?" Now it's not fair to associate Nehemia Gordon directly with Rood. But Gordon has now been seen to use many such promoters of "crack-pot" end-times religions to help promote his own work. He may be a good scholar, but he participates in hyping it with people like Rood. I have already found several interviews with and about Nehemia Gordon where this method is obvious, and Gordon plays along with those like Rood and his competitors. I am not saying it's exactly the same thing, but there have been several persons from academia who have worked on niche books and articles and then found a way to promote these through the support of religions whose members are expected to want that scholarly or academicc information to support a "niche" religion. People have even written articles in defense of "cults" like Scientology (using euphemisms instead of cults, like "new religions") and then used well-publicized "academic" seminars to their publicize information that they hope will be desired by members of the "cult." This doesn't mean that Nehemia Gordon is wrong, but we should always be careful when we see anything hyped up using such methods. But we should also notice that a lot of information is being left out in order to lead people to the same conclusion that Nehemia Gordon has made.

Anyone who can read can learn exactly what qualifies one as a "scholar." You don't have to be a scholar to know what qualifies a person. I think that even you yourself probably know what qualifies one to be a scholar. Yes, in previous topics, I've already explained the difficulties I go through from the perspective of what I can and can't teach in the congregational setting. I don't get into trouble in the congregation, but it would be very easy for this to happen, and a few people are well aware of my conscientious stance on a couple of subjects. Naturally, I don't consider my views to be "apostate," as they are based on prayer, study, conscience, the Bible, and a desire to be honest in all things. I probably would only be aware of these differences between the Bible view and the Wathtower's view because several persons in the Writing Department and even a couple people on the Governing Body were helpful and instrumental in pointing out some of these things to me while I was at Bethel. Based on their own example and recommendations, I held back from speaking about the wonderful things I was learning, and it was not until just the last few years that I realized I should not hold bak due to fear of men, fear of loss of position, or attachment to traditions. I still think that discussing such things in a congregational setting could be damaging to unsuspecting and unwary ones, but, like you, I find persons in this type of online environment to be much better prepared for controversial subjects and I find it to be a fairly good venue to be always ready to make a defense and let our reasonableness be known to all. I guess I'll have to take your word for it. That would be nice. Any idea of a time frame for mentioning these "in due course"? Only to the extent necessary to keep strict watch over my teaching, and thereby keep a clean conscience: (1 Timothy 4:15, 16) . . .. 16 Pay constant attention to yourself and to your teaching. . . . I've said all I need to say about your own scholarly issues, but I can see you know nothing about mine. I hope so. I'd sure hate to see a rehash of the gibberish I've already seen on this subject.

Perhaps it is too easy to throw it around as an insult. I don't plan on dealing with the question of honesty or dishonesty at much length, especially not on a personal level with you, but I thought that something should be said, especially because some persons here have probably not had the pleasure of reading the long history of comments you have left at various places through the years. And some persons have made comments here which clearly show they haven't looked into any specifics of your claims. If they had, I'm sure that some think your comments are probably well-researched, but if they would look at them carefully, the same people might be appalled at the both the inanity and sometimes even the insanity of many of your comments. But I've also noticed that dishonesty invariably becomes a part of all Bible chronology discussions, especially from those groups, including our own, that came out of the "Great Awakening" after Miller promoted a preview version of the Watchtower's first chronology. I've now read much of the Second Adventist writings, Seventh Day Adventist writings, Barbour's, Russell's and other Bible Student writings --even John and Morton Edgar. They all lead me to believe that a study of the differences among all of the following should be a prerequisite: dishonesty, insincerity, wishful thinking, shallow thinking, logical fallacies, shoddy scholarship There is absolutely no doubt that you are, by definition, a troll. Repeatedly calling yourself a "scholar" while simultaneously showing a complete disregard for scholarship, and an unwillingness to provide anything of any scholarly value is, in itself, a provocation. For example, going onto sites where non-JWs and ex-JWs frequent, and where you repeatedly refer to "celebrated WT scholars" can have only one purpose, especially if you have also gone to some lengths elsewhere to show why these same scholars have supposedly remained anonymous specifically so that, as they claim, they will not become "celebrated" or "celebrities" in any way. Strange, maybe, but hardly mysterious to me. That makes no sense. Perhaps you meant "that really annoys(?) our critics." At any rate, you didn't stump anyone, and I'm sure I have now completed all the "Jeremiah 29:10" discussions on the previously referenced forum where you are (or were) involved. In fact, it is easy to show you made many false statements, made many logical fallacies, acted like the opposite of a scholar, indicated that you had not read or had not comprehended any sources that anyone was quoting, made the flimsiest of excuses, asked other people to do more work when they had already demolished your argument, showed yourself unwilling to present any information that would have been easy for you to see or find, would evade instead of answering questions, or claim you had proven a point by merely asserting that another person was wrong. I could go on and on. Your posts read like a parody of scholarship. As you already admitted: it will remain your considered opinion until the Watch Tower publications tell us to consider another one. Obviously, that will instantly become your new "considered" opinion. You could not begin to write a scholarly paper with the complete lack (or even disdain) of scholarship that you have shown. It doesn't matter how tempered and unemotional it is; it would need more than just your empty claims that you are right to accept an interpretation based on little to no evidence and that everyone else is wrong to accept an understanding based on most or even all the best evidence. That's a much better view. Although I linked to the entire context and merely included a statement you made just in front of your Jeremiah 29:10 quote and a statement from just after that Jeremiah 29:10 quote. I added your own context specifically so that you couldn't honestly make a claim that it was out of context. But you did anyway. Feel free to explain, and I hope your explanation is NOT simply that everything you have ever said has been out of context. Since it was an observation that explains so much to anyone who might find you "mysterious" I thought it worth mentioning. But I won't make any more claims about what you have said elsewhere. You may have the last word in your own defense if you wish, and I will definitely attempt to only respond to the specifics of any claims you have made here. I'm happy to look at any good, sound scholarship related to the points of this topic.

I just read several threads on this exact topic over on another forum that you have frequented in the past, such as this one: Jer. 29:10 -- Dr. Ernst Jenni replies to Leolaia and Scholar I know it's not fair to call you dishonest here just because you have been dishonest on other forums. And I am not doing that. You have already left a trail of dishonesty here, too. But I'm still marveling at how you appear to have learned nothing in the 13 years since that particular topic was discussed in such detail. Your method has not changed either. Much more scholarly persons than you summarized your own method there so perfectly by saying things like this about you: Read all about it! Read all about it! - "Knocked Out Boxer Claims Victory". modus operandi is basically bluffing and saying anything in favor of the NWT and seeing whether it would stick. record of unfulfilled bluffs and false claims And then after several of these completely false claims were summarized for you, you immediately went on to make another ridiculously false claim which you could have easily looked up for yourself, as any true scholar would have. I notice that you claim above in your discussion with AlanF that you have always argued undogmatically for a range of meaning for Jeremiah 29:10. You have an odd method of doing this which involves 2 steps. Your argument is that, yes, there is a range of meanings in the lexicon, but then you move on to arguing that "therefore" the NWT is absolutely right in the meaning they give it in the context of Jeremiah 29:10. It's a simple assertion until you are pressed to add some evidence, and then you just literally make stuff up. You try to play this one out of both sides of your mouth however. You claim that others cannot be dogmatic, but then go on to dogmatically claim that this means that only the NWT here is correct. Just as you already said on a forum 12 years ago: (Last quote of yours from another forum, I promise.) There is no need to offer an alternative Neo-Babylonian chronology because the date is incomplete or unreliable, if that position is altered by new research then celebrated WT scholars will be pleased to devise a new constructed scheme. Jeremiah 29:10 is translated accurately by the NWT and refers to all of those exiles living in Babylon up until their release. . . . There are no other views other than that of celebrated WT scholars that provides a consistent, holistic account of the seventy years based upon the Bible. That is such a good summary you made of your own views: There is no need to offer an alternative to the WT view unless the celebrated WT scholars devise a new scheme for you. Jeremiah 29:10 is accurate in the NWT. And then, most dogmatically of all, "There are no other views other than that of the celebrated WT scholars. . . " Based on all that you have said here, I can see that your modus operandi is also to be purposely unscholarly so that the hypocrisy of calling yourself a "scholar" drives people to expose you. You admitted that the average Witness is uninformed on these matters, and you are therefore able to count on them to see you as "persecuted for righteousness' sake" instead of noticing that your dishonest method was easily exposed by more honest minds.

Exactly! It's very useful to look at all the various ways that this time period was interpreted prior to Ussher. And after Ussher, more and more evidence continues to show that Ussher's date was not based on any evidence, either secular or Biblical. It was merely based on counting backwards from the secular date he preferred to use for the major events in Jesus' ministry. And, of course, there have been many attempts by Jewish persons going back to the Dead Sea Scrolls and Josephus and several more attempts among Jewish scholars and commentators and the dates are all over the place. Of course, even though we generally keep to the explanation from the Watch Tower you quoted, this particular theory for the date has had even more damaging evidence against it which continues to pile up. What some other Bible commentators have done is to keep a similar set of dates and count them with 360 day years. Some allow them to land closer to 70 C.E., and some still look for ways to dismiss the Persian chronology to start the 70 weeks closer to 539 B.C.E as seen in sources that AllenSmith has repeatedly posted.

By your words here you appear to misunderstand WHY you believe 607 is the year the wall was breached, and the temple burned, etc. You believe Zedekiah's 9th year was 609, and was the beginning of the siege, and that 607 was his 11th year. So then you question why the 70 years of domination would not run from 609 to 539. You seem to forget WHY you believe in 539. How did you get that 539 date? If you would ever look into it and admit WHY you personally concluded that it's a reasonable date, then you would immediately realize why 609 could NEVER be the 9th year of Zedekiah. Any of us who admit that we think that Jerusalem could have been destroyed in 607 or that the preceding siege started in 609 are inadvertently admitting that we have never looked into the matter of why we accept 539. EVERYONE who knows why we accept 539 knows that it is dishonest to accept 607 and 609 for those particular events that came upon Jerusalem. This is how and why it is instantly possible to tell that someone who claims to have truly looked into the matter is being dishonest if they still insist that both 539 is correct and this view of 607 is correct. This is why someone who has claimed to study the issue for several decades and who touts their secular degrees and scholarship should be immediately called out for hypocrisy, sloppiness, or dishonesty. You can see on this very thread that those claiming to be scholars, but who have accepted 607 to 537, have learned to avoid evidence altogether. ON THE OTHER HAND. . . I think that 609 to 539 is perfectly adequate as the secular timing of the 70 years of Babylon's domination, although I have no real use for the specific secular years. I think that 607 to 537 is also an adequate secular timing of the 70 years of Babylon's domination since the greatest effect upon Judea from Babylon was likely felt from about 606 to 538, which includes about 69 years. Now that I have looked into it carefully I see it would be dishonest for ME to attach the same events to those years as you attach to them, but of course, I can see your reasoning. You would claim, as most all Witnesses have claimed at some point, that this period of greatest desolation on Judea in particular could be Biblically dated from about the 18th year of Nebuhadnezzar to the accession year of Cyrus. It could be tempting to name this period as the same as the 70 years of Babylon's greatest domination, and several commentators, especially in previous centuries did just that. In the same way, several commentators thought that the beginning of the 70 weeks of years (Daniel) must have started with Cyrus' decree, rather than in the years of Artaxerxes. Secular data got in the way and commentators had to adjust. It turned out not to be what had seemed like the simplest and most obvious interpretation. But it can also be shown that we should have questioned this "most simple and obvious interpretation" even without the secular data, but just on Bible data alone.

I will happily admit that there is a small measure of Biblical evidence that there could have been 70 years between Nebuchadezzar's 18th and Cyrus' accession. (Which could also be known as Nebuchadnezzar's 19th and Cyrus' 1st, depending on your counting method.) That particular understanding of the evidence is called into question by additional Bible evidence, not just by secular evidence. But this thread was more specifically about whether 607 is supported Biblically. And of course it isn't. No secular date is supported Biblically. We have to consider why we think (or why we ever thought) that 607 might be supported. Our reasoning is clear: it's because we accept that Cyrus conquered Babylon on a certain secular date, 539, and then we count back 70 years from that secular date and say that the fall of Jerusalem must have been the exact start of the time when the 70 years were given to Babylon. It's easy to see what's wrong with that reasoning, and why 607 is not Biblically supported. It's because it requires us to accept the secular date 539. So then we need to consider why we accept the date 539. There is absolutely no Biblical support for it, because the Bible gives us no secular dates. If we were to admit why we accept 539 this would be a disaster for 607. We accept 539 only if we are accepting that it is part of the Neo-Babylonian/Persian timeline that has been built up and verified by tens of thousands of pieces of evidence. It's part of a block of time based especially on lines of evidence running from about 626 to 522. There is no 539 without accepting this block of evidence. It is simply not honest to claim that one particular date is better than others for any year of the reign of any king in this period. The Watch Tower publications imply that there must be an unknown or yet undiscovered king in this period, or that any of the kings of this period may have had a reign longer than what the evidence shows. In other words, the Watch Tower publications indicate that they doubt this same evidence, yet ask us to be certain about one particular date within the block of evidence they are uncertain about. This is dishonest. It's using two sets of scales, or "a cheating pair of scales." (Proverbs 11:1,3) A cheating pair of scales is something detestable to Jehovah, but a complete stone-weight is a pleasure to him.. . . 3 The integrity of the upright ones is what leads them, but distortion by those dealing treacherously will despoil them.

I agree completely. There were several different periods of exile of varying lengths depending on which group of persons any particular person was exiled in. Apparently there were 4 that were significant enough to get a Biblical mention: Nebuchadnezzar's accession year (Daniel 1) Nebuchadnezzar's 7th year (Jeremiah 52) Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year (Jeremiah 52) Nebuchadnezzar's 25th year (Jeremiah 52) And there were several different periods of servitude during the 70 years of Babylon's hegemony, as you already mentioned. So if it is also true that we can also speak of multiple desolations leading up to the most significant desolation I would think we should be able to agree that there is nothing in Jeremiah that ties a 70-year period to a single instance of those desolations. Just because there was a single desolation that might have been worse than all the others, or one that finally rid the land of the most significant final threshold of inhabitants, this doesn't mean that a 70-year clock starts counting at that event. You have given additional evidence of this yourself, and I'm sure you are aware that there is plenty more in the book of Jeremiah that confirms that Jeremiah carried on a theme about 70 years of Babylonian domination that was poised to produce punishments all around and which would ultimately result in complete desolation of Judea as a country. Judea collapsed. Judea's capital city, religious center, independence, self-governance, peace and safety were so devastated that the people could not remain on the land in any sustainable fashion. This was punishment from Jehovah that they could have avoided. The wording of Ezekiel 21 is another point of interest. Notice that you quoted several verses, even from Jeremiah 25 that shows that punishment is being brought upon Judea and the nations around them. With reference to the earliest of these punishments mentioned in Daniel, we should notice the time and specifics mentioned here. When a nation creates incursions that kidnap persons from Judea, this is part of the punishment, too. Ending up in a nation where you are liable to be thrown into a lion's den or a fiery furnace at the whim of some high officials should be seen as a terrifying consequence of Jehovah allowing Babylon to rise in power over the nations all around. Yet this obviously happened well before the "final punishment" to the kingdom of Judea itself, as you quoted from Ezekiel 21:25. I am merely repeating the point that the 70 years of power that Jehovah gave to Babylon obviously resulted in a long process that ultimately resulted in complete devastation of the population of Judea. In this way the 70 years for Babylon were obviously very closely related to Judea's ultimate and final desolation. It makes perfect sense that the process of punishment, exile, and desolation could go on or a period of 70 years and that the "final punishment" could occur closer to the end of that time, not the beginning. At it happened, evidently, the "full and final punishment" reached its peak only about 20 to 25 years into the 70, leaving about 50 years or at least 45 of those years for Judea to have reached that peak of punishment.

Yes. Jeremiah speaks of desolation upon Jerusalem, but nowhere does Jeremiah say anything about 70 years of desolation. He speaks of 70 years of Babylonian domination over the nations around Babylon. Babylon has been granted 70 years of "empire" or hegemony. The first point above was that it makes no sense to speak about a 70-year period of exile, because there were several periods of exile, some longer and some shorter. Historically, there was not a 70-year period between Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year and Cyrus' accession year. But even if there had been, we learn from the Bible that a larger exile took place 11 years earlier, and another important exile took place 5 years later. If the Bible says there were exiles several years before and several years after Nebuchadnezzar's 18th, then it makes no sense to speak of a 70-year exile, anyway. Thus, the Bible never mentions a 70-year exile. So, after skipping that point, you have now gone on to make the point that there would be 70 years of desolation. Again, Jeremiah says nothing about 70 years of desolation. But I would agree that there is a possible implication that can be made from the statements in Jeremiah 25:18, 29 that punishment and ruination would begin with Jerusalem and the cities of Judah. This doesn't account for the fact that the punishment and ruination was an ongoing process. This would be a major reason that Babylon was given 70 years to continue making the nations serve them. Daniel 1 says, that for Judea and Jerusalem, it started as far back as the first year of Nebuchadnezzar. This fits the Babylonian chronicles, which says that Nebuchadnezzar was taking booty back from the Judean area even before he had become king (605). Ultimately, the desolation would become nearly total as far as the independent power of Judea as a nation was concerned. (habitation, agriculture, economy, etc.) We know that the desolation was a process rather than driven by a single specific event because Daniel uses the term "desolations" (plural) even where the NWT changes it to a singular term "desolation." We also know from the description of 70 years of desolation upon Tyre for example, as mentioned above. If the 70 years were counted by "events" then how could Tyre have a full 70 years of desolation? Did it start at exactly the same time as the 70 years of a single desolation upon Jerusalem? This would imply that the idea of 'first' is one of primacy and importance, or that it "starts" with Judea, but continues getting worse and worse for them.

Yes, Judah was significantly desolated in Nebuchadnezzar's 18th/19th year. But Jeremiah never said that the 70 years were to be counted as 70 years of a specific desolation of Judea. He said that the 70 years were the 70 years given to Babylon to dominate the nations all around them. This would include Ammon, Moab and Tyre and Judea, of course, but not all nations would see exactly 70 years of desolation starting and ending at exactly the same time, right?

I have no problem with starting the 70 years for Babylon in 607 (+/-). However, since I accept that the first year of Cyrus over Babylon was in 539, then it would be dishonest for me to try to claim that the Fall of Jerusalem could have been in 607. If you accept the evidence that puts the accession year of Cyrus over Babylon in 539, then you are accepting the evidence that puts Nebuchadnezzar's accession year in 605, and his 18th year in 587. You can't claim that you are using historical evidence to agree that WWI ended in 1918, but then claim that WWI started in 1894 under U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. Once someone points out that all the evidence shows that Grover Cleveland was the U.S. President in 1894, it is even more dishonest to just print up a 20 million magazines every few months that would use an expression like "When President Woodrow Wilson saw the United States enter WWI shortly after 1894. . . ." Yet, this is almost exactly what the Watchtower is doing when it uses an expression like: "When Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem in 607 B.C.E. . . . " It would not be dishonest to claim that we think that Jerusalem was destroyed in 607 because we disagree with the archaeological evidence. But it is completely dishonest to claim that we believe there is good evidence for 607 because we we accept the evidence for 539. After all, we have the evidence for 539 because we have the evidence for 607, and vice versa.

It's possible that what you really meant that it doesn't matter whether you render the one word as "for" or "at" because either one can be made to seem to support the meaning the Watchtower insists upon. But if you really meant to say what you said, then you are saying that both renderings, either "for Babylon" or "at Babylon" can have either meaning. In other words: "for Babylon" can mean the same as "at Babylon" "at Babylon" can mean the same as "for Babylon" That's an interesting proposition, because it also admits that the meaning could also be as follows. "When 70 years have expired for Babylon, I will turn my attention to you. . . and bring you back here to Jerusalem." Meaning, of course, when the time given for Babylon to rule the nations expires, then you'll know it's the time when I am going to keep my promise to you and allow you to come back home. "When 70 years have expired at Babylon, I will turn my attention to you. . . and bring you back here to Jerusalem." Meaning, of course, that when the 70 years of domination now centered at Babylon expires, then you'll know that it's time when I am going to keep my promise to you and allow you to come back home. This is a perfect match to what Jeremiah has said about the 70 years all along. (Jeremiah 25:9-12) 9 I am sending for all the families of the north,” declares Jehovah, “sending for King Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar of Babylon, my servant, and I will bring them against this land and against its inhabitants and against all these surrounding nations. I will devote them to destruction and make them an object of horror and something to whistle at and a perpetual ruin. 10 I will put an end to the sound of exultation and the sound of rejoicing from them, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the hand mill and the light of the lamp. 11 And all this land will be reduced to ruins and will become an object of horror, and these nations will have to serve the king of Babylon for 70 years.”’ 12 “‘But when 70 years have been fulfilled, I will call to account the king of Babylon and that nation for their error,’ declares Jehovah, ‘and I will make the land of the Chal·deʹans a desolate wasteland for all time. Notice that Jeremiah never says that inhabitants of Jerusalem and Judea would be exiled for a 70 year period, or that any other particular nations would be exiled for a 70 year period. It's BABYLON that gets the 70 years of domination over other nations. It would be quite a trick if Babylon rises to domination and suddenly every nation all around begins serving Babylon at the same time for exactly 70 years. This is exactly what is perfectly stated about the meaning of Jeremiah 25 in the "Isaiah's Prophecy" book: *** ip-1 chap. 19 p. 253 par. 21 Jehovah Profanes the Pride of Tyre *** Jehovah, through Jeremiah, includes Tyre among the nations that will be singled out to drink the wine of His rage. He says: “These nations will have to serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” (Jeremiah 25:8-17, 22, 27) True, the island-city of Tyre is not subject to Babylon for a full 70 years, since the Babylonian Empire falls in 539 B.C.E. Evidently, the 70 years represents the period of Babylonia’s greatest domination—when the Babylonian royal dynasty boasts of having lifted its throne even above “the stars of God.” (Isaiah 14:13) Different nations come under that domination at different times. But at the end of 70 years, that domination will crumble. And, of course, all of this has been said before, but I don't think you took an opportunity to respond to why the Watchtower publications were wrong on this point in the "Isaiah's Prophecy" book. Also, it was mentioned before, but it is clearly impossible to claim that it was the inhabitants of Judea or Jerusalem that had to be in exile for exactly 70 years. This was made perfectly clear by the passage in Jeremiah 52 that shows that exiles occurred, not just in Nebuchadnezzar's 18/19th year, but as Jeremiah 52 states: (Jeremiah 52:28-30) These are the people whom Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar took into exile: in the seventh year, 3,023 Jews. In the 18th year of Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar, 832 people were taken from Jerusalem. In the 23rd year of Neb·u·chad·nezʹzar, Neb·uʹzar·adʹan the chief of the guard took Jews into exile, 745 people. In all, 4,600 people were taken into exile. If it really started counting from Nebuchadnezzar's 18th year, then not just some, but MOST of the exiles were taken 11 years earlier, and just about as many were taken 5 years later, as were taken in the 18th year. Obviously, the exiles taken 11 years earlier didn't get to leave 11 years earlier, before Babylon fell. And, obviously, the exiles taken 5 years later didn't have to stay an extra 5 years after Babylon fell. So the 70 years never made sense as an exact time of exile for Judeans. This is why it was always about the start and end of Babylon's rise to power over the nations around them. Also, just because a preposition can have a lot of different meanings in a lexicon, does not mean it will have all those possible meanings in the specific context of the verse in question (Jer 29:10). We know that the scholarly understanding of Biblical Hebrew usage has become better, not worse, with the discovery of more Bible manuscripts. Therefore, before drawing the conclusion that either term means the same thing, we should be able to explain why the majority of translations up to the King James (plus the NWT) have used "at" and the majority of translations since the KJV have used "for." Can you explain why "for" is preferred in almost all modern translations? I'm not asking why you think the Watchtower doesn't use the majority view, or why the Watchtower disagrees with the majority view; I'm asking if you can explain why modern translations prefer "for." If you can't, then your claim at the beginning of your post is merely an assertion without evidence.

I heard Brother Klein give this illustration about "a sailboat tacking into the wind" during his comments on the morning text at Brooklyn Bethel. (The text, comments and prayer at the breakfast meal at Bethel are called "morning worship.") You could sometimes get a hint of what article a brother in the Governing Body was working on by their morning text comments. Of course it could be a few months before you finally saw the article in print, although I worked in the Art Department and sometimes we'd see the articles in an unfinished state to begin working on artwork. The brother who got this article didn't realize that the illustration has much less application to big sailing ships like packet ships, clipper ships, and schooners. It's more applicable to sailboats where the force of drag on the keel doesn't cancel the force of the Bernoulli effect. The final article was worded much better than the original comments by Brother Klein. In the original it was more like the spirit blows a certain way and you want to go exactly the opposite direction. It was easy to interpret him saying that Bible pushes you in one direction and you wish to explain how we ever got to a position that was exactly the opposite of the Bible. He didn't actually say that, but it was so easily confused that I never expected these comments to finally get into an actual Watchtower article. Also, Brother Klein gave too much attention to the ship's rudder which is also only a very small part of the effect. The wind force on a well-shaped sail really becomes about perpendicular (90 degrees) to the actual direction of the wind, so the rudder is important to maneuver at 45 degree angles against the wind in "tacking", but this isn't where the effect comes from. He described 45 degree angles as if they were all-important, but a good sailor/sail can use the effect without requiring such a large tacking angle.

Yes. A very close relative of mine abandoned her husband who was a ministerial servant and who is now an elder. He had beaten her several times, and he even sent her to the hospital once. The elders in her congregation warned her about bringing reproach on Jehovah if she were to explain to any hospital or law enforcement personnel that these injuries came from her husband. She was counseled to stay with him, continue to show a humble, meek, mild, obedient spirit, and thereby "heap fiery coals" upon his head to soften him. She could get through it by making sure she always did more in the field ministry (she was already pioneering), more prayer, more study, etc. She obeyed the elders by not turning in her husband, but was angry enough at this overall directive to tell them know that she was leaving him right then instead of waiting until it happened again. She received a "public reproof" and was threatened with disfellowshipping. In her new congregation, the following month the elders got the recommendation to take away her pioneer "status" because of her willful and unrepentant choice to disobey the directives of the elders. Her husband was spoken to but not reproved or disciplined in any way that would have been discernible by the congregation as a whole. I called him from Brooklyn Bethel and threatened to send him to the same hospital where he would be free to let them know exactly what happened. I was never counseled over the incident. I prayed for forgiveness over my outburst of anger, but I'm not so sure yet that I am fully repentant.

The Danish, Norwegian and Swedish NWT ("2013 Revised") were just released in the last few days. Of course, these are not direct translations of the original Hebrew and Greek into those languages, but translations of the English NWT into those languages. Evidence of this is the new and updated translation of Jeremiah 29:10 in Danish and Swedish. This particular translation (in the English especially) has been used to prop up the idea that the 70 years mentioned here might have meant the exact time period of the Jewish exile in Babylon. In Jeremiah, however, the "70 years" always refers to 70 years of Babylonian domination that Jehovah allowed to them so that the nations all around them would ultimately end up in servitude to Babylon at various times during these 70 years of "empire" or domination that Jehovah gave to Babylon. The new Danish revised translation that just came out on JW.ORG: “Jehova siger nemlig: ‘Når der er gået 70 år i Babylon, vil jeg rette min opmærksomhed mod jer, og jeg vil opfylde mit løfte og føre jer tilbage hertil.’ BING.com's translation into English: "Jehovah says: ' When 70 years have passed in Babylon, I will direct my attention to you, and I will fulfill my promise and take you back here. ' Yet here is the Danish NWT as it still appears on JW.ORG if you change the translation back to the Reference NWT: https://www.jw.org/da/publikationer/bibelen/bi12/bøger/jeremias/29/ 10 „For således har Jehova sagt: ’Først når halvfjerds år er udløbet for Babylon vil jeg vende min opmærksomhed mod jer,+ og jeg vil over for jer stadfæste mit gode ord ved at føre jer tilbage til dette sted.’ BING.com's translation: 10 "For thus, Jehovah has said: ' Only when seventy years have expired for Babylon will I turn my attention to you, + and I will agree with you to confirm my good words by bringing you back to this place. ' Here is the new Swedish Revised translation that just came out on JW.ORG: 10 Så här säger Jehova: ’När det har gått 70 år i Babylon ska jag ta mig an er, och jag ska infria mitt löfte genom att föra er tillbaka hit.’ Yet here is the Swedish NWT as it still appears on JW.ORG if you change the translation back to the Reference NWT: https://www.jw.org/sv/publikationer/bibeln/bi12/böcker/jeremia/29/ 10 ”Ty detta är vad Jehova har sagt: ’När sjuttio år har gått för Babylon skall jag vända min uppmärksamhet till er, och jag skall gentemot er befästa mitt goda ord genom att föra er tillbaka till denna plats.’ BING.com's translation into English: 10 "For this is what Jehovah has said: ' When seventy years have gone for Babylon, I will turn my attention to you, and I will fortify in you my good word by bringing you back to this place. '