As usual, scholar pretendus has shot himself royally in the foot with his infantile criticism of the 17 lines of evidence in favor of standard Neo-Babylonian chronology that Carl Jonsson has presented in the 4th edition of The Gentile Times Reconsidered. I wrote to Jonsson about this minor point, among a number of much more interesting things, and received his reply, which is the basis of my comments here.
Observe the usual pretentious and thoroughly unjustified arrogance displayed by scholar pretendus in his responses.
First we note scholar pretendus' apparent demand for evidence in the following statement. In this mangled sentence, one should note the garbled English, where among other grammatical problems he manages to end a declarative sentence with a question mark:
::: By the way I am still looking for those four lines of evidence making a total of 18 lines of evidence which is supposesd to be an advancement from the third edition of the Jonsson hypothesis presented currently in the fourth edition?
I responded in an earlier post:
:: Jonsson provides 17 lines of evidence (cf. GTR4, p. 189). Surely you can read at a level sufficient to do this research.
Obviously, I simply restated what Jonsson said in his book. To this, scholar pretendus said:
: You need to go back to school and learn your arithmetic.
We will now note how this brilliant scholar, who puts "celebrated WT scholars" on a pedestal, has managed to muck up yet another of his inane criticisms of Watchtower critics by failing to get his facts straight before unleashing his fingers on his keyboard.
: Jonsson claims to present 18 lines of evidence but on page 189 he only refers to seventeen different evidences.
Jonsson never claimed to present 18 lines of evidence. His statement on page 189, that "we now have seventeen different evidences", is the only direct comment he made. Scholar pretendus simply failed to read the book with understanding -- for which he stupidly took me to task.
: However, on the opposite page, p.188, he cites Another four astronomical tablets (8-11) which are henceforth briefly discussed. The inclusive 8-11 is not three but in fact four altogether so Jonsson has made an error and so have you
This incredibly stupid bit of "reasoning" is easily shown to be exactly that. The chapter in question here is titled, "The Absolute Chronology of the Neo-Babylonian Era". On page 185, Jonsson begins a section titled "Summary and Conclusions". He begins by stating that the previous chapter had considered seven different lines of evidence that firmly establish the Neo-Babylonian period. Then he states: "In this chapter another seven independent evidences have been presented. All of these are based on ancient Babylonian astronomical texts, . . ." Then he presents seven subsections numbered (1) through (7) titled with the various ancient text names they describe. In particular, subsection (4) is titled "The lunar eclipse tablet LBAT 1417". It begins, "LBAT 1417 records four lunar eclipses, . . ." Finally Jonsson presents an eighth subsection titled "(8-11) Another four astronomical tablets". This is presented as an addendum to the previous sections, as shown by the opening paragraph:
The seven astronomical texts discussed above provide more than enough evidence against the Watch Tower Society's 607 B.C.E. date. And yet this is not all. Another four texts have recently been published that will be described only briefly here. Translations of three of these are published in Hunger, ADT V (2001).
Then Jonsson writes a paragraph that is key to understanding scholar pretendus' misunderstanding of what Jonsson wrote:
The first is LBAT 1415 which, as mentioned on page 174 above, is part of the same tablet as LBAT 1417. It records lunar eclipses . . .
Since LBAT 1415 is part of the same tablet as LBAT 1417, they are not independent, but are logically pieces of the same line of evidence.
Obviously, scholar pretendus missed this simple point, and then attempted to imply something like, "Oh, see how stupid Jonsson and Feuerbacher are! How can you trust them when they can't even count?"
Well obviously, this is now turned back on his head and proves, once again, that scholar pretendus is unable to comprehend what he reads.
The fact that Jonsson counted LBAT 1415 in with LBAT 1417 is proved by what he said in his email to me:
One of the four astronomical tablets added on page 188, LBAT 1415, is, as I point out on there, a piece of the same tablet as LBAT 1417, discussed on pages 174-177. So it wouldn’t be correct to use LBAT 1415 as a separate independent line of evidence. LBAT 1416 is another piece of the same tablet, but it is so fragmentary that it is almost useless, so I chose not to discuss it at all. 1415, 1416, and 1417, then, are three pieces of the same tablet.
So there, scholar pretendus: Now that you've been shown once again to have put forth a criticism of critics of the Watchtower cult, only to have it turned right back on your own head, what do you have to say for yourself?
: but then the whole 18 lines of evidence appears to be somewhat contrived.
In addition to what I wrote in my last post about this incredibly stupid statement, I want to comment that the entire Watchtower chronology is completely contrived. It survives, not because it has merit, but because it has inertia. What sort of inertia? The inertia of Watchtower history along with the inertia of a body of braindead religious fanatics who refuse to deal with facts. It's the same inertia that allowed the Catholic Church to continue with the official condemnation of Galileo until a few years ago.
Furthermore, virtually all of the scriptural discussions put forth by scholar pretendus' idol Rolf Furuli in his book Persian Chronology are demonstrably contrived. Furuli has to invent new forms of Hebrew grammar in order to make his ridiculous claims -- claims that no real Hebrew scholar would go along with. That's why Furuli is unable to get any scholarly endorsements for his silly theories. Theories that have one and only one purpose -- to uphold the fanatical religious belief that the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses has and has always had divine direction.
AlanF
