Daniel's Prophecy, 605 BCE or 624 BCE?

by Little Bo Peep 763 Replies latest watchtower bible

Alleymom

Marjorie:

But, once again, no matter how literal any translation is, it remains a translation. You simple cannot expect to peer dimly into a translation and examine the nuances of the receptor language's syntax and successfully discern the morphology of the parent language.

Neil ---
The NWT (and other translations) do not always render a particular Hebrew form or phrase the same way in each verse in which it occurs. You seem to think that because the NWT renders mel'oth differently in Lev. 25:30 and in Jer. 29:10, there must be some subtle difference in meaning in the Hebrew verb in these verses.
You should consider the fact that in the 13 verses in which mel'oth occurs, the NWT renders it in a variety of ways.
I am going to list the 13 verses in which mel'oth occurs. Please note that in every one of these verses mel'oth is a qal infinitve construct.
7 verses have the word mel'oth with no additional conjunction or preposition attached.
2 verses have the conjunction "waw" affixed to mel'oth.
3 verses have the preposition "k" affixed to mel'oth.
1 verse has the preposition "b" affixed to mel'oth.
Note that the differences in translation occur even within these groups. In the first group, for instance, compare Dan. 10:3 "the completing of the three full weeks" and Lev. 12:4 "the fulfilling of the days of her purification."
7 verses with mel'oth --- Qal infinitive construct
NWT renderings:
--- of fulfilling
--- the fulfilling
--- has come to the full --- come to the full
--- the completing
Leviticus 8:33 NWT
And YOU must not go out from the entrance of the tent of meeting for seven days, until the day of fulfilling the days of YOUR installation, because it will take seven days to fill YOUR hand with power. Leviticus 12:4 NWT
For thirty-three days more she will stay in the blood of purification. She should not touch any holy thing, and she should not come into the holy place until the fulfilling of the days of her purification.
Leviticus 25:30 NWT
But if it should not be bought back before the complete year has come to the full for him, the house that is in the city that has a wall must also stand in perpetuity as the property of its purchaser during his generations. It should not go out in the Jubilee. Jeremiah 29:10 NWT
For this is what Jehovah has said, "In accord with the fulfilling of seventy years at Babylon I shall turn my attention to YOU people, and I will establish toward YOU my good word in bringing YOU back to this place." Numbers 6:5 NWT
All the days of the vow of his Naziriteship no razor should pass over his head; until the days that he should be separated to Jehovah come to the full, he should prove holy by letting the locks of the hair of his head grow. Numbers 6:13 NWT
"Now this is the law about the Naz´i·rite: On the day that the days of his Naziriteship come to the full, he will be brought to the entrance of the tent of meeting. Daniel 10:3 NWT
Dainty bread I did not eat, and no flesh or wine entered into my mouth, and in no way did I grease myself until the completing of the three full weeks.
uvimel'oth - Conunction waw attached to Qal infinitive construct
NWT renderings:
--- then at the fulfilling
--- and when [ ] had come to the full
Leviticus 12:6 NWT
Then at the fulfilling of the days of her purification for a son or for a daughter she will bring a young ram in its first year for a burnt offering and a young pigeon or a turtledove for a sin offering to the entrance of the tent of meeting to the priest. Esther 1:5 NWT And when these days had come to the full , the king held a banquet for seven days for all the people that were found in Shu´shan the castle, for the great as well as the small, in the courtyard of the garden of the king's palace.
kimel'oth -- Preposition k + Qal infinitive construct

NWT renderings:
--- as soon as [ ] were full
--- that when [seventy years] have been fulfilled
--- as soon as [the days of the siege] have come to the full
2 Kings 4:6 NWT
And it came about that
as soon as the vessels were full she went on to say to her son: "Do bring still another vessel near to me." But he said to her: "There is no other vessel." At that the oil stopped. Jeremiah 25:12 NWT " 'And it must occur that when seventy years have been fulfilled I shall call to account against the king of Babylon and against that nation,' is the utterance of Jehovah, 'their error, even against the land of the Chal·de´ans, and I will make it desolate wastes to time indefinite.'
Ezekiel 5:2 NWT

A third you will burn in the very fire in the midst of the city as soon
as the days of the siege have come to the full. And you must take another third. You will strike [it] with the sword all around her, and the [last] third you will scatter to the wind, and I shall draw out a sword itself after them.
bimel'oth -- preposition beth attached to Qal infinitive construct
NWT rendering:
while [his plenty] is at its peak
Job 20:22 NWT
While his plenty is at its peak he will be feeling anxious;
All the power of misfortune itself will come against him.
Marjorie
Narkissos

Excellent posts Alleymom & AlanF.
The WT doctrine is the type of construction that can be shattered from many many angles.
I already pointed out some of the fallacies in Furuli's philological argument
But what about the meaning of the Hebrew preposition le? Can it really be used in the local sense 'at'? It certainly can, and The Dictionary of Classical Hebrew lists about 30 examples of this meaning, one of which is Numbers 11:10, 'each man at (le) the entrance of his tent'. So, in each case when le is used, it is the context that must decide its meaning. For example, in Jeremiah 51:2 the phrase lebâbel means 'to Babylon', because the preceding verb is 'to send'. But lirûshâlâm [the letters li at the beginning of the word is a contraction of le+yod] in Jeremiah 3:17 in the clause, 'all the nations will gather in Jerusalem' has the local meaning 'in Jerusalem', and the same is true with the phrase lîhûdâ in Jeremiah 40:11 in the clause, 'the king of Babylon had left a remnant in Judah'
on the sibling thread: http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/90425/1524343/post.ashx#1524343
Leolaia
AlanF....Thank you very much for taking the trouble to post Jonsson's original inquiry to Jenni. And, in view of pseudo-scholar's idle speculation that Jonsson had biased Jenni against JWs in his inquiry, it is of note that Jonsson did not make any mention of JWs in his letter, only to Rolf Furuli who is identified as "a lecturer in Semitic languages at the University of Oslo".
Narkissos and Leolaia have simply presented a linguistic opinion based on their use of the syntax, they have not sourced and rule of grammar to support their exegesis of the syntax. My learned friend has read these post and warns that Hebrew syntax is very loose and not that important because Hebrew is not a technical language as Greek is which does require precise rules of grammar. In short, Hebrew is a fluidic language IMHO.
pseudo-scholar....Do you not see the contradiction in your above statement? You require an absolute "rule of grammar" and yet you claim that Hebrew requires no "precise rule" to begin with. All languages have rules and are rule-governed, but languages (yes even Greek!) have syntactic variability as well which is what you refer to as "fluidity". Almost every rule is violable, which is why I said it can never be proven that a rule applies 100% of the time. But that doesn't mean that it's anything goes, and you can willy-nilly translate any way you want because nothing prevents the rendering 100%. As I noted before in post #4275, this assumes a completely inappropriate burden of proof: "The job of the linguist or philologist is to determine the most probable sense of a given word or phrase, not to insist on the least probable sense if the most probable one cannot be established with 100% certainty". That is why Jenni's work is a descriptive grammar, documenting the known patterns of constructions in Hebrew that comprise the given word's usage. His patterns are very robust, with statistical signficance I would predict if they are tested via an algorithm, and thus we should pay attention to what constructions or syntactic patterns fit with Jeremiah 29:10 because these are going to constitute the most probable sense that should be rendered in the text. All the same evidence Alleymom, Narkissos, and I have presented (not the least Jenni himself) also indicates without doubt that the static locative rendering of the NWT is one of the least probable candidates -- one which Jenni with justification rejects.
My learned friend and I are in agreement with the NWT and he has found examples listed by Gesenius in his famous Lexicon which illustrates a locative meaning for 'le'. I will post these examples shortly.
Sure, Gesenius lists examples in which le may suggest a static locative (e.g. Numbers 11:10 or one similar to it), and I have gone over these in my post #4282, as well as earlier in this thread, and Narkissos (in #2885) has shown that these belong to recognizable constructions (e.g. the stereotyped l-ptch "at entrance" expression). As I've stated time and again, what matters is whether a static locative "at Babylon" is appropriate for the grammatical context of Jeremiah 29:10. When you cite your examples, please make sure they have at least two of the following properties:
They locate a verbal EVENT or TIME PERIOD in a spatial location.
The le-phrase is governed by a FULFILL type verb like ml', and especially one that is as a qal infinitive construct.
The FULFILL type verb has a TIME PERIOD as its complement.
I know of no examples that would attest such a pattern. On the other hand, Alleymom, Narkissos, and I have presented many examples that clearly should be rendered as "for, belonging to, with respect to", e.g. with a quasi-possessive, benefactive, and/or dative sense. This is the decisive issue, because this evidence would show whether the NWT rendering is improbable or whether the "FOR Babylon" rendering (which is adopted by almost every modern translation except those influenced by the AV) is most probable.
Alleymom

Almost every rule is violable, which is why I said it can never be proven that a rule applies 100% of the time. But that doesn't mean that it's anything goes, and you can willy-nilly translate any way you want because nothing prevents the rendering 100%. As I noted before in post #4275 , this assumes a completely inappropriate burden of proof: "The job of the linguist or philologist is to determine the most probable sense of a given word or phrase, not to insist on the least probable sense if the most probable one cannot be established with 100% certainty".

That is why Jenni's work is a descriptive grammar, documenting the known patterns of constructions in Hebrew that comprise the given word's usage.

Leolaia ---
Another excellent post. Scholar is apparently searching (in vain) for a prescriptive grammar which would clearly rule out the possibility of "at" or "in" Babylon.
On the other hand, Alleymom, Narkissos, and I have presented many examples that clearly should be rendered as "for, belonging to, with respect to", e.g. with a quasi-possessive, benefactive, and/or dative sense. This is the decisive issue, because this evidence would show whether the NWT rendering is improbable or whether the "FOR Babylon" rendering (which is adopted by almost every modern translation except those influenced by the AV) is most probable.
I thought that was worth highlighting.
Neil wants to disregard the primary evidence of the thousands of dated cuneiform tablets which establish the chronology of the 6th century BCE and hang everything on the WTS's translation of one Hebrew preposition. Their translation of this preposition is not supported by modern scholars (Neil has acknowledged this). By accepting the NWT translation of this preposition, he disregards the fact that this interpretation requires that the letter from Jeremiah is being addressed to the exiles-of-the-future, not to the exiles who are already there (and he also disregards the NWT rendition of 29:4, "I HAVE caused," not "I WILL cause.") Finally, he disregards the implications of all the other scriptures which have been cited by Alan so many times.
Marjorie
AlanF

Carl Jonsson sent the following material to me for posting on this board. The material below that was originally in French was translated and sent to Jonsson by a scholar in France. I want to point out that this material proves that the "scholarship" exhibited by the JW apologist Rolf Furuli in his book Persian Chronology and the Length of the Babylonian Exile of the Jews (self-published, 2003) is atrociously poor.
Jonsson's email, posted with permission:
The statements I quoted in my letter to Professor Jenni from Furuli's book contained a claim that "The Dictionary of Classical Hebrew lists about 30 examples" where le is used in the local sense. It is interesting, therefore, to read what a Hebraist in France, Professor Émile Nicole, says about the examples given in this dictionary in an answer to a question about le published in a French journal for Hebraists. He finds only one example of these "about 30" where le might have a local sense, namely, Numbers 20:24, "you were rebellious at [le] the waters of Meribah." But even here this sense is questionable, and he quotes a French Bible translation that gives the alternative rendering, "respecting [le] the waters of Meriba". I checked how NWT renders this verse, and remarkably, it, too, has "respecting the waters of Meriba"!
I'm enclosing below an English translation of the question with the full answer by Professor Nicole. It is also interesting to notice his remark that "the usual conclusion" is that the 70 years at Jer. 29:10 refer to "the hegemonic period of the Neo-Babylonian Empire." This is contrary to "Scholar's" claim that this understanding of the text is rare. Unfortunately, Nicole, in his last sentence, quotes a translation of Dan. 9:2 that is not quite literal and may easily be misunderstood as applying the 70 years to the ruined state of Jerusalem. (In GTR4, p. 219, I have commented on some similar renderings.) From his comments, however, it is quite obvious that this is not how Nicole understands the 70 years.
JEREMIAH 29:10: ANSWER TO A QUESTION
Translated from the Bulletin du Club des Hébraîsants, Vol. 16 (1999), No. 2:
MAIL FROM OUR READERS
Question:
In Jeremiah 29:10 the Jehovah's Witnesses in their New World Translation give the expression l e babel a locative meaning: "at Babylon". Could you get me a copy of one or several appropriate commentaries, or could you give me an explanation of one or several members of the [Association pour la Lecture de la Bible Hébraîque] team?
Answer:
The commentaries that I consulted do not mention the Jehovah's Witnesses translation. All of them understand the le as introducing an attributive complement: "When 70 years will have been accomplished for Babylon." The question they discuss is the one of calculating the period. The fall of Babylon having happened in 539 B.C., two different dates are proposed for the beginning of the 70 years, either the fall of Nineveh in 612 (which makes an interval of 73 years) or the accession to the throne of Nebuchadnezzar in 605 (= 66 years). The usual conclusion is that 70 must be understood as a round number corresponding to the hegemonic period of the Neo-Babylonian Empire.
The translation "for Babylon" is the most natural one. It corresponds with one of the most common uses of the preposition le and goes well with the sentence as a whole.
The translation "at Babylon" is not very natural, but is it possible?
The spatial meaning of the preposition is well supported, but it often corresponds to a movement (e.g., "to go to Babylon"). It is the preposition be that usually indicates the place where we are ("living in Babylon").
It is true that [the Grammaire de l'hébreu biblique by Paul] Joüon (§ 133d) presents the uses of the preposition in this way: "le means to. Often it expresses the direction (but in a less precise manner than 'el); and often, too, there is neither direction nor movement." The Dictionary of Classical Hebrew (Vol. IV, 1998) indicates the two meanings: direction (to, towards, meaning no. 2) and place (in, near, meaning no. 4). This seems to authorize the translation "in Babylon" (place where we are). Nevertheless, when we examine the quite long list of examples furnished by the DCH for this use, we see that there is often movement (e.g.: Gen 32:2, "Jacob went on his way"; Gen 49:26, "that the blessings come on Joseph?s head"), or that the locative use of le is related to 'al, next to (e.g.: 2Ki 11:11, "the runners ... stayed ... next to the altar ..."). The only example quoted where there is neither movement nor proximity is the first mentioned, Num 20:24, "you were rebellious at the waters of Meribah", but it is also possible to understand the preposition le as does the [French translation by the] Rabbinat Français: "respecting the waters of Meriba".
Thus the possibility of rendering the le as does the New World Translation remains insufficiently founded or justified.
The hottest issue in this debate is that the difference in translation limits what is at stake. The end of the hegemony of Babylon (70 years for Babylon) corresponds to the return of the exiles to Jerusalem, as Jeremiah 29:10 explicitly states and as Daniel understands it when he speaks of "70 years for the ruins of Jerusalem" (Dan 9:2).
Émile Nicole
[The French Hebrew scholar Émile Nicole is Professor of the Old Testament at the Faculté Libre de Théologie Evangelique de Vaux-sur-Seine.]
Narkissos

(Btw Emile Nicole was my OT exegesis professor over 15 years ago...)
I just read Jenni's article « Jer 3, 17 ,,nach Jerusalem" : ein Aramaismus » (ZAH 1/1 1988). Although it doesn't touch on Jeremiah 29:10 (which is not even suspect of being a directional locative to him, not to mention a static locative) it does make a number of interesting points which have some indirect bearing on the subject being discussed. I will try to summarise some of them:
First Jenni notes that l-yrwshlm, which is absent from the LXX of Jeremiah 3:17 as I pointed out earlier, is generally recognised as a still later gloss into a late text. As a secondary complement to the verb qwh II niphal it is to be understood as a directional locative: the place [in]to which something is gathered, e.g. Genesis 1:9, "Let the waters under the sky be gathered together into ('el) one place"; Jeremiah 3:17a, "all nations shall gather to it ('eleyha).
However, even this directional locative does not reflect the classical use of the preposition le, as most lexica don't make clear enough. To express such directional locatives ancient Hebrew rather uses the ending -ah (he locale) or the prepositions 'el or 'ad. On the other hand, le- does not function as an independent locative, but as a part of idiomatic adverbial expressions, generally within a bipolar structure, e.g. Jeremiah 7,24, "backward and not forward," Deuteronomy 28:13 "upward and not downward," Isaiah 47:1 "earthward," 51:6 "heavenward". To the same structure belong such fixed expressions as ledarko / limqomo (going on his way / coming back to his place, 1 Samuel 26:25). The similar uses of le with "house," "tent," "place," "land," "inheritance," "city" reflect a similar underlying polarity (i.e. home vs. elsewhere), otherwise an explicit locative such as 'el is used (e.g. 1 Samuel 29:4, "so that he may return to ('el) the place that you have assigned to him").
As a consequence, le- in ancient Hebrew is never by itself locative. It indicates a more generic relation, which only looks like a locative as a result of the expression it is a part of.
But the use of the preposition le- completely changes in later works (Ezra-Nehemiah, Chronicles) and becomes an independent directional (still not static) locative. This is apparent, for instance, from the way the older min / 'el (from / to) in 1 Kings 9:24 ("from the city of David to her own house") becomes min / le- in the rewriting of 2 Chronicles 8:11. Very probably this new Hebrew usage, which coexists with older directional locative prepositions, results from the influence of Aramaic (e.g. Ezra 4:12,23; 5:8,12,14; 6:5; 7.13). The late gloss l-yrwshlm in Jeremiah 3:17 clearly belongs to this later Hebrew usage.
AlanF

I want to summarize scholar pretendus' main arguments about the proper rendering of "le-babel" in Jeremiah 29:10 up to this point, and then show why they are wrong. He claims that the New World Translation's rendering of "le-babel" as "at Babylon" is not only correct, but is the only possibility, for these reasons:
A. Various lexicons show that translating "le" as "at" is allowable.
B. The context of Jeremiah 29:10 shows that the 70 years are implied to be a period with respect to the Jews in exile in Babylon, not a period with respect to Babylonian supremacy.
C. The fact that the Watchtower Society assigns definite start and end dates to the 70 years means something.
D. The fact that the Watchtower Society claims that it has a definite and complete "Bible chronology" for the Jewish period means something.
Against these claims we have the following:
1. The fact that a rendering is allowable does not make it correct. Context and general usage determines that.
2. All modern scholars who have been asked to give an opinion on the proper rendering of "le" in Jer. 29:10 have replied that "for Babylon" is the correct rendering, and that "at Babylon" is quite improbable.
3. Modern independent English bible translations are almost unanimous in rendering the passage as "for Babylon" or something similar. The only exceptions I'm aware of are the Harkavy Bible (1916), the Spurrell Old Testament (1885), George Lamsa's translation from the Syriac Peshitta, and the New World Translation -- all of which were done by individuals rather than teams of scholars. Old translations like the King James Version and the Latin Vulgate are, well, the products of old and probably outmoded scholarship.
4. All modern Bible commentators who have commented on the proper rendering of Jeremiah 29:10 agree that "for Babylon" is correct.
5. The fact that a rendering is allowable grammatically does not mean it is allowable contextually, either in a local context or an overall context.
6. As I have shown in my post above, the overall context of the biblical mention of the 70 years shows unequivocally that this time period ended in 539 B.C. -- one to two years before the Jews' exile ended or they returned to Palestine. Therefore the phrase "le-babel" in Jer. 29:10 cannot refer to the ending of an exile or captivity of the Jews at Babylon, or a desolation of the land of Judah ending a year or two after 539 B.C.
7. The mere assignment of start and end dates to a time period is meaningless if solid evidence against such dates is deliberately ignored. The Watchtower Society ignores all such evidence.
8. A mere claim to have a complete chronology of the Jews in the biblical period is meaningless if solid evidence against such dates is deliberately ignored. The Watchtower Society ignores all such evidence. Furthermore, a complete chronology of the Jews is irrelevant to the question of our time period of interest here: the Neo-Babylonian period, which lasted from 626 to 539 B.C. and is only marginally concerned with the Jews.
Further discussion:
It is easy to settle on an interpretation and then derive all sorts of corollaries from it. That does not mean that the interpretation or the corollaries are correct. That is especially so when the interpreter ignores all evidence against his interpretion.
For example, about 1876, the founder of the Watchtower Society settled on the interpretation that the 70 years spoken of by Jeremiah were a time of captivity of the Jews in Babylon. Over the years, his successors expanded on and reinterpreted that idea, and now determine the time period as follows:
We are willing to be guided primarily by God?s Word rather than by a chronology that is based principally on secular evidence or that disagrees with the Scriptures. It seems evident that the easiest and most direct understanding of the various Biblical statements is that the 70 years began with the complete desolation of Judah after Jerusalem was destroyed. (Jeremiah 25:8-11; 2 Chronicles 36:20-23; Daniel 9:2) Hence, counting back 70 years from when the Jews returned to their homeland in 537 B.C.E., we arrive at 607 B.C.E. for the date when Nebuchadnezzar, in his 18th regnal year, destroyed Jerusalem, removed Zedekiah from the throne and brought to an end the Judean line of kings on a throne in earthly Jerusalem.--Ezekiel 21:19-27. ["Let Your Kingdom Come" (1981) p. 189]
In other words, they start with 537 B.C. as the date of the return of the Jews to Judah (this date is disputed), then assume that the 70 years were a time of desolation of Judah (ignoring a great deal of contrary biblical evidence, and the fact that their own claims are internally inconsistent), and then simply count back 70 years to derive 607 B.C. as the date of Jerusalem's destruction and the beginning of the desolation of Judah.
By exactly the same kind of reasoning -- except that this time it is backed up by all scriptural and secular evidence -- we can determine the end date, and a candidate for the start date, of the 70 years. Paraphrasing the Watchtower Society's above exposition:
We are willing to be guided primarily by God's Word rather than by a chronology that is based principally on sectarian interpretations that disagree with the Scriptures. We use sound secular chronology to further verify the correctness of our views, because when both Scripture and secular evidence agree completely, we can be certain that we are correct. It seems evident that the easiest and most direct understanding of the various Biblical statements is that the 70 years ended with the fall of the Babylonian Empire in 539 B.C. (Jeremiah 25:8-12; 27:6-8; 29:10; 2 Chronicles 36:20-23) Hence, counting back 70 years from Babylon's fall, we arrive at 609 B.C. for the date when Nabopolassar, in his 16th regnal year, captured the city of Haran and put a final end to the Assyrian Empire, thus establishing Babylon's supremacy over all nations in Mesopotamia.
See how easy that is? But the trick is not in the exposition, but in proving the various parts of it, and proving that they all hang together.
And this is precisely what scholar pretendus, Rolf Furuli, and various other Watchtower apologists fail to do. They focus on little bits of information that don't seem to fit the overall picture, or that they can force not to fit by bad argumentation based on a sectarian agenda, and try to build a whole new picture from these bits. They fail to realize that by focusing on these little bits and ignoring the big bits, they've lost sight of the big picture. Put another way, they're extremely selective, often to the point of outright dishonesty, about the evidence they will accept.
Another extremely important point about Watchtower apologists: their religion forbids them to accept evidence contrary to Watchtower teaching. If they do, they will surely be disfellowshipped and shunned by their fellow Jehovah's Witnesses. Furthermore, because of the extreme mind control brought about not only by such threats of punishment, but by their acceptance of the doctrine that Watchtower leaders speak for God, by their definition all evidence contrary to Watchtower views must be wrong because it contradicts God. Thus, there is no way that a JW can accept such evidence, because if he does, he risks losing many years -- even a lifetime -- of family association and his entire circle of JW friends.
It is this extreme cultishness of Jehovah's Witnesses that results in the wild and ridiculous arguments we see presented here by scholar pretendus and by other JW apologists elsewhere. With them, straw grasping is a fine art.
AlanF
Alleymom

I just read Jenni's article « Jer 3, 17 ,,nach Jerusalem" : ein Aramaismus » (ZAH 1/1 1988). Although it doesn't touch on Jeremiah 29:10 (which is not even suspect of being a directional locative to him, not to mention a static locative) it does make a number of interesting points which have some indirect bearing on the subject being discussed. I will try to summarise some of them:

Narkissos ---
Many thanks for taking the time to summarize this article for those who do not read German.
As a consequence, le- in ancient Hebrew is never by itself locative. It indicates a more generic relation, which only looks like a locative as a result of the expression it is a part of.

But the use of the preposition le- completely changes in later works (Ezra-Nehemiah, Chronicles) and becomes an independent directional (still not static) locative. This is apparent, for instance, from the way the older min / 'el (from / to) in 1 Kings 9:24 ("from the city of David to her own house") becomes min / le- in the rewriting of 2 Chronicles 8:11. Very probably this new Hebrew usage, which coexists with older directional locative prepositions, results from the influence of Aramaic (e.g. Ezra 4:12,23; 5:8,12,14; 6:5; 7.13).

This is in complete agreement with the statement of Prof. Emile Nicole which Alan posted. (You should write to Prof. Nicole and tell him about this thread. I am sure he would love to hear from you, Nark!)
Alan ---
I very much appreciated having the chance to read Prof. Nicole's comments. Thank you (and COJ) for providing them.
Prof. Nicole, writing in Bulletin du Club des Hebraisants, Vol. 16 (1999), No.2:

The Dictionary of Classical Hebrew (Vol. IV, 1998) indicates the two meanings:

direction (to, towards, meaning no. 2)
and place (in, near, meaning no. 4).
This seems to authorize the translation "in Babylon" (place where we are).

Nevertheless, when we examine the quite long list of examples furnished by the DCH for this use,

we see that there is often movement (e.g.: Gen 32:2, "Jacob went on his way"; Gen 49:26, "that the blessings come on Joseph's head"),

or that the locative use of le is related to 'al, next to (e.g.: 2Ki 11:11, "the runners ... stayed ... next to the altar ...").

The only example quoted where there is neither movement nor proximity is the first mentioned, Num 20:24, "you were rebellious at the waters of Meribah",

but it is also possible to understand the preposition le as does the [French translation by the] Rabbinat Français: "respecting the waters of Meriba".
Marjorie
Leolaia

Narkissos brings up a very important point about the danger of using lexicons simplistically. They are artificial constructs which systematize data from literature spanning centuries of an evolving language. Think of the Oxford English Dictionary which includes many obsolete words and expressions from Middle English or Elizabethan English which have not been used for a very long time in the language. Linguistic change in the Hebrew language itself can be witnessed by comparing the oldest parts of the OT (e.g. the very archaic Song of Deborah) with the youngest parts (e.g. Daniel). Post-exilic Hebrew is in many respects quite distinctive in terms of its affinity with both Aramaic and the still later Hebrew of the Mishnah; the text of Jeremiah overall, however, falls much closer with the style and language of Deuteronomy. The radically different recensions attested at Qumran and in Greek moreover show that Jeremiah was edited and modified over time, and thus the point that Narkissos makes is quite a pertinent one. See also Narkissos' discussion earlier in this thread on how the genitive function of le developed over time.
Simon

Narkissos brings up a very important point about the danger of using lexicons simplistically. They are artificial constructs which systematize data from literature spanning centuries of an evolving language. Think of the Oxford English Dictionary which includes many obsolete words and expressions from Middle English or Elizabethan English which have not been used for a very long time in the language. Linguistic change in the Hebrew language itself can be witnessed by comparing the oldest parts of the OT (e.g. the very archaic Song of Deborah) with the youngest parts (e.g. Daniel). Post-exilic Hebrew is in many respects quite distinctive in terms of its affinity with both Aramaic and the still later Hebrew of the Mishnah; the text of Jeremiah overall, however, falls much closer with the style and language of Deuteronomy. The radically different recensions attested at Qumran and in Greek moreover show that Jeremiah was edited and modified over time, and thus the point that Narkissos makes is quite a pertinent one. See also Narkissos' discussion earlier in this thread on how the genitive function of le developed over time.

Yes, I concur

Daniel's Prophecy, 605 BCE or 624 BCE?

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