Daniel's 3 year training and the 2nd year of Nebuchadnezzar.

by thirdwitness 91 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  hillary_step

  Thirdwitness,

  Just as an object lesson in pure hypocrisy, how do you rationalize these two statements, both your own :

  Who is this god known as Carl Jonsson that you put so much faith in?

  If you can't overcome the logic of the person then attack the person.

  Both yourself and Scholar and whoever it is that is advising you both, have been unable to overturn Carl Jonsson's collated lines of evidence against 607BCE as being first fall of Jerusalem. Perhaps you 'attack the person' for the very reason that you accuse others of doing?

  HS
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  Jeffro

  Such poor reasoning skills, thirdwitness!!

  First let me answer the Nebuzaradan/Arioch question.

  This 'question' doesn't need answering when the plain reading of Daniel 1:1 is accepted for what it actually says.

  There could be a number of explanations for this apparent discrepancy.

  Yes, and the most obvious is that the events were at different times.

  As we have already shown 607 is the only date that will work with Bible prophecies and chronology.

  Start with a false conclusion and work from there... typical...

  And we have shown that Daniel's 3 year training period could not have been completed until after Neb's 2nd year of actual rule over Babylon.

  Irrelevant. I have indicated perfectly logically that Daniel could already have met Nebuchadnezzar prior to the end of the 3 years when all of the youths who were trained were presented to Nebuchadnezzar.

  In fact, we have shown that Daniel was not even in Babylon at all during the 2nd year of Neb's actual rule over Babylon.

  No such thing has been proven.

  It is possible that Nebuzaradan was also known as Arioch and is merely the same person. Since Daniel 2 is written in Aramaic whereas the other scriptures concerning Nebuzaradan are written in Hebrew it is possible that Arioch is his name in Aramaic. Since Jewish tradition holds that Nebuzaradan means 'roars like a lion' because of the lionlike manner in which he treated the Jews it is possible that he received this name as a result of his treatment toward the Jews but Daniel simply chose to use his name given to him at birth.

  What a lame defense!! Don't just assume that no one will verify, thirdwitness. Actually, the name Arioch is Assyriaco-Chaldaic. Nebuzaradan is also Chaldaic. They are completely different names, and neither is Aramaic. The most logical and consistent conclusion is that completely different periods are described.

  There are many examples in the Bible of persons being called by two different names. For example, in the book of Daniel at chapter 4 it reads in verse 18, “‘This was the dream that I myself, King Neb·u·chad·nez´zar, beheld; and you yourself, O Bel·te·shaz´zar , say what the interpretation is, forasmuch as all the [other] wise men of my kingdom are unable to make known to me the interpretation itself. But you are competent, because the spirit of holy gods is in you.’" Who is this Belteshazzar? Wasn't it Daniel that interpreted Neb's dream? If the Bible had not provided us with further information some may have claimed this to be a contradiction. But of course we know as the Bible says at Daniel 1:7 that the principal court official 'assigned to Daniel [the name of] Bel·te·shaz´zar'. The same is true of his 3 Hebrew companions. They also had their Hebrew name and were assigned Babylonian names. So it would not be surprising if this was also done in the case of Arioch or Nebuzaradan. Perhaps he was of another nation and an addition to his birth name he was given a Babylonian name.

  Irrelevant. Those two names are from completely different languages.

  Another possible explanation is that there were more than one chief of the bodyguard. Since Nebuzaradan was often absent from Babylon because of the military service he performed on the battle front, it is likely that there was also a chief of the bodyguard to handle the duties back home in Babylon as well. That chief was known as Arioch. The proof that there were two separate and distinct positions may be found in the fact that Arioch is called 'chief of the king's bodyguard' whereas Nebuzaradan is merely called 'chief of the bodyguard'.

  Another weak argument... Claim that something possible must be likely.

  So thirdwitness' conclusion is shown to be flawed in several areas. Additionally, thirdwitness does not want to face all of the problems at once because it is easier to build a flimsy case against one argument if all of the others are ignored. But the fact remains that all of the combined facts that I presented earlier prove that Daniel was not taken at the time of Jerusalem's destruction.
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  Jeffro

  Jeffro, your arguments are easily shown to be inconsistent and we have already done this. Here it is

  thirdwitness, you are merely a liar, trying to deceive readers. If you go back to my post, you will see that after I indicate that after examining the logic of part of the wording that suggests that the same event might have been described, I further went on to indicate that it is more likely that the events at the end of Daniel chapter 1 were later than those in chapter 2. Again, you will note that it is all those who were trained who were presented to Nebuchadnezzar at the end of the 3 years, which does not at all preclude him from already having met Daniel.

  There is no discrepancy, and the rest of the information in your rebuttal is irrelevant because I do not deny a complete 3 years.
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  Jeffro

  Aside from that fact that thirdwitness has so far proved nothing, the primarly flaw with his ridiculous notion is that at the end 3 years, Nebuchadnezzar found Daniel to be ten times wiser than all of the other wise men, but some time later in chapter 2, he didn't even know who Daniel was.
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  Leolaia

  Jeffro....Since you've made a study of the chronology of the Divided Kingdom, what do you think of thirdwitness' claimed parallel with Hoshea? Even if we grant the correctness of the Society's reckoning here, the Society is quite clear that it regards Hoshea's 9-year reign (2 Kings 17:1) itself as beginning with his vassalage (e.g. he was installed by the Assyrian king or was recognized as "king of Israel" only from that date), producing a chronological interregnum between the death of Pekah and the beginning of Hoshea's 9-year reign (despite the fact that he presumably "ruled" during this period, 15:30), whereas in the case of Jehoiakim, there was no interregnum and they count the start of his 11-year reign (23:36) from when he ascended the throne, not when Jehoiakim became a vassal to Nebuchadnezzar. Moreover, thirdwitness regards the reference to the "twelfth year of Ahaz" in 17:1 as reckoned from when Ahaz took the throne, despite the fact that Ahaz was made a vassal as well (16:7-10).

  And yet his argument takes for granted the Society's interpretation of not just 2 Kings 15:30 and 17:1 but their idiosyncratic solution to a whole mass of interconnected texts that together pose the thorniest problem in biblical chronology. Any chronology would have to intelligently explain and/or accommodate the following confusing data:

  (1) 2 Kings 15:27 gives Pekah of Israel a 20-year reign. (2) Verse 33 claims that Jotham of Judah, son of Uzziah, "reigned for 16 years in Jerusalem," and yet (3) according to v. 30, Hoshea of Israel murdered and succeeded Pekah "in the 20th year of Jotham". (4) According to v. 5, Jotham actually started ruling as a co-regent during the 52-year reign of Uzziah after Uzziah was struck with leprosy (note that due to his leprosy Uzziah was "exempt from his duties confined to his house"), and (5) v. 32 dates Jotham's accession to the "2nd year of Pekah" of Israel tho (6) v. 27 dates Pekah's accession to the 52nd year of Uzziah's reign, i.e. his final year. Moreover, (7) 16:1 dates the accession of Ahaz of Judah to the "17th year of Pekah" of Israel, and (8) 17:1 dates the accession of Hoshea to the "12th year of Ahaz of Judah, as opposed to the "20th year of Jotham" in 15:30. Moreover, (9) Hezekiah of Judah became king in the "3rd year of Hoshea of Israel" in 18:1, and (10) Samaria became besieged by Shalmaneser in the 7th year of Hoshea and the 4th year of Hezekiah in 18:9, and (11) Samaria fell to Shalmaneser in the 9th year of Hoshea according to 17:6. Furthermore, (12) Ahaz at his accession was 20 years old according to 16:2, and (13) the age of Ahaz's son Hezekiah is given as 25 at his accession in 18:2.

  The Society's reckoning thus starts Jotham's reign AFTER Uzziah despite the suggestion of a co-regency in 15:5, interprets the "20th year of Jotham" as really the "20th year from the accession of Jotham," and thus "the fourth year of Ahaz" (despite the actual sense of the expression and the ad hoc oddness of the expression as it is interpreted), and inserts an interregnum into the chronology that delays the start of Hoshea's reign by 8 or 9 years. The effect of this chronology is that Ahaz fathered Hezekiah at the age of 10 or 11, and the reign of Tiglath-pileser is inflated from the known 17 years (18 with the accession year) to at least 51 years if not more. The Society itself admits that "there is some uncertainty regarding the manner in which the reigns of the Israelite kings are to be fitted into a chronological framework and "the Hebrew Scriptures do not set forth all the details needed for one to state positively that the Assyrian records are in error" (Insight, Vol. 2, p. 1102). There really is no doubt about the length of Tiglath-pileser III's reign and the Society eschews the regencies that harmonize the biblical data with Assyrian data in the efforts of Thiele and others.

  What sort of analysis for the period have you come up with in your studies?
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  thirdwitness

  Steve said: Just for clarification of your post, are you saying: Neb assigns Daniel to be taught for three years, after those three years Neb identifies Daniel to be the greatest among all the wise men, in the Kings second year Daniel interprets the dream. Therefore the second year referred to in Daniel 2:1 has to be much later for the account to be correct?

  I am saying that the 3 years of training ended before the '2nd year' of Neb in Daniel 2:1. If the 3 years of training ended after Neb's actual 2nd year of ruling Babylon, then Daniel had already interpreted Neb's dream and was made district ruler and chief prefect etc before his training ended which is clearly not the case. It is apparent when Daniel was brought before Neb at the end of the 3 years of training that he was not district ruler and chief prefect. Since the 3 years of training ended first Daniel could not have possibly interpreted the dream during the actual 2nd year of Neb's rule. Therefore the 2nd year of Neb's rule mentioned in Daniel 2 is his 2nd year as ruler over the world. It is his 2nd year as ruler since he usurped God's throne. It is not his actual 2nd year as ruler of Babylon. That is impossible.
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  thirdwitness

  As respects Carl Jonsson: I ask the above question about his godship because I notice a lot of the posters here are often referring to him as if he is the final authority on the matter. Whereas I am not quoting the WT publications as the final authority to prove my points. No, I am quoting the Bible. You should be held to the same criteria.
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  thirdwitness

  Jeffro said: What a lame defense!! Don't just assume that no one will verify, thirdwitness. Actually, the name Arioch is Assyriaco-Chaldaic. Nebuzaradan is also Chaldaic. They are completely different names, and neither is Aramaic. The most logical and consistent conclusion is that completely different periods are described.

  Did you read Leo's earlier post about Arioch and Nebuzaradan. They apparently occupied two different positions. It does not prove that they were in their positions at completely different periods in time.
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  thirdwitness

  Jeffro said: you are merely a liar, trying to deceive readers

  Where did I lie?
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  thirdwitness

  Leo's Kingly post.

  Off topic and not necessary to address at this time. If you will contact JWs in your area you can find out the answers for what you bring up. Or consult the WT publications which will explain them by means of the Bible.