Furuli's New Books--Attempt to Refute COJonsson

ros

I just heard that the Norwegian Watchtower apologist, Rolf Furuli, who esteems himself a biblical scholar of Semetic languages, has completed the first of two volumes he plans to publish on the Society’s chronology, “Assyrian, Babylonian, Egyptian and Persian Chronology Compared With the Chronology of the Bible.”
Title of this first volume is: “Persian Chronology and the Length of the Babylonian Exile of the Jews.”

I hear that although Carl Olof Jonsson is not mentioned by name, or reference made to his book "Gentile Times Reconsidered," it is nevertheless apparent that these volumes are an attempt to refute Jonsson’s excellent study which has exposed the Watchtower’s 1914 date as total folly.

The book can be ordered now from Furuli’s new personal website:
http://folk.uio.no/rolffu/

The site even sports his picture.

~Ros

Cassiline

Thanks Ros for the information. I am very intrested in reading how this person tries to refute Jonssons' arguments.

Good to see you...

Cassi

Cassiline

Hey Ros

While looking for more info on the book I found this, ( sorry really not related to your post that much) but I found it highly intresting due to a JW defending a book review (by a customers) on Amazon.com of all things. The review of Rolf Furuli's last book upset a witness as it appears his last book defended the NWT. Anyway he complains that the reviewer, Stewart ( non JW ) used "older" JW mags to drive his point across among other things.

At any rate, Stewart's review is unfair and discriminatory. Incorporating quotes from old Watchtowers into a work that is not a Watchtower magazine apologetic is unwarranted, especially when it really had nothing to do with the subject at hand. It was just a chance for Stewart to appeal to a myopic mindset hell-bent on placing JW's in a bad light, thereby creating a distinction of superiority for others, in that, "We would never say such a thing." All in all, it was inappropriate, and frankly, disturbing. In doing this he has placed himself into the realm of pseudo-scholarship as we have seen in Walter Martin, Ankerberg & Weldon, Gail Riplinger, Peter Ruckman, Ron Rhodes, and a host of others.

http://hector3000.future.easyspace.com/stewart.htm

Here is the other book below at a whopping 190.00 for paperback

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0965981495/qid=1057399344/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_1/002-7529173-0499205?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

THIS BROTHER DESERVES 20 STAR RAITING FOR HIS AWESOME BOOK............... AGAPE JAY THE JW --This text

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0965981495/ref=cm_rev_next/002-7529173-0499205?v=glance&s=books&vi=customer-reviews&show=-submittime&start-at=11

I found his web page which was made to defend this review on Amazon very defensive and a bit funny. Sorry to hijack. Back on track...

Hamas

Thanks for the info.

Don't know about you, but I am so bored with this shit. Watchtower apologists coming out with all this speel; I really do hate it.

The Watchtower lives on.

no one

Thanks for posting the link, ros.

After searching for this book for over a year, I found myself unable to donate my credit card number to an unverified e-mail address on a newly-created web site containing numerous spelling and typo errors made by a linguistic expert. I would hope that his English translation of the book and his efforts at presenting his arguments isn't as shoddy as the effort he put into that web site.

I was also amused at his 'word of caution' paragraph:

Ancient history cannot be proven, because there are no living informants. And any attempt to make a chronological scheme of the kings of ancient nations is tentative.

I wonder why this same statement couldn't also be used as a disclaimer for accepting someone's interpretation of biblical chronology which has to use a secular chronological scheme as its foundation.

If anyone finds another source for ordering this book, I would appreciate the information.

outnfree

Waving at ros, feeling like Hamas!

I'm beginning not to care anymore about apologists/counter-apologists, etc. One only needs to check secular reference books (and apparently with the curator at the British National Museum, poor beleaguered guy!) to know that Watchtower chronology is ALL screwed up. However, it's important for newly-outs to reinforce with facts what their guts have been telling them.

Nice to see you again, ros!

out

Nathan Natas

The strongest refutation of the WTS dogma that Furuli defends is the testimony of time itself. As Monty Python said, "Suddenly, nothing happened!"

ros

Hamas:

This is probably of more interest to longer-time-outers who know a little history of Furuli's past attempts to discredit WT critics. At one time, he and Greg Stafford were somewhat in collusion as WT apologists, but I'm seeing a greater distance grow between Stafford and other WT apologists. Example, I see no mention of these latest works by Furuli on Stafford's site: http://www.elihubooks.com
I agree that the newer generation of outers are probably not as interested in this old stuff.
But some of us are going to be very interested in Jonsson's rebuttal of Furuli's work, which is inevitable.

~Ros

scholar

ros

We all look forward to the pub;ication of Furuli's book as it will no doubt provide an alternative viewpoint to the Jonsson hypothesis. I thought I should alert you to the fact that Furuli does not esteem himself as a scholar which implies that somehow his qualifications are not bona fide. In fact, Furuli has posted his academic qualifications and scholarly publications on his website, he is employed as a senior lecturer in Semitic studies at the University of Oslo. He cannot be more qualified to research matters in biblical studies. He did not obtain his degrees from a mail order university as is the case in some states in USA. Johnsson, on the other hand does not possess axademic qualiifications in the fields that he claims to be expert at and his GTR to my knowledge has not been subject to any peer review in the literature; Johnsson's book suffers from a lack of critical analysis as shown by the flawed exegesis in the chapter on the seventy years. Jonsson is simply a amateur scholar not a professional scholar'

scholar

BA MA BA Hons (cand.) University of Sydney

Euphemism

I'm seeing a greater distance grow between Stafford and other WT apologists

Is it even fair to characterize Stafford as a WTS apologist anymore? Based on Three Dissertations, it seems that he's abandoned 1914, the blood doctrine, shunning, and the F&DS doctrine. While his role in the Hughes trial was technically that of a neutral expert, he was called by the father. (I don't mean to imply that his testimony would not have been neutral. What I'm saying, however, is that I doubt that the father would have called him if his views were still those of an apologist.)

I think that Furuli's book disappeared off the Elihu website pretty shortly after the publication of Three Dissertations. The authors of a pending publication, called Your Word is Truth: Essays in Celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the New World Translation, also bolted at the same time. And the link to Stafford's WT-apologetic book, Jehovah's Witnesses Defended, was taken off the jehovah.to website. The shunning was swift and complete.

Anyway, I'm certainly not going to waste money on Furuli's book. I crossed swords with him once on an academic list over the meaning of parousia, and his argumentation bordered on incoherent. Perhaps the problem is just his English skills; but personally, I think that his prominence in the WT-apologetic community is proof of how desperate they are for anyone with any kind of academic credentials.

I do look forward to reading Jonsson's rebuttal, however.

Furuli's New Books--Attempt to Refute COJonsson

Share this