Posted by COJ [COJ] on March 29, 1999 at 04:28:33 {gBxZ1OC1i2GhmT2F6j8QMWjEQYbG2EmDo}:
ANSTEY�S CHRONOLOGY DEAD AND BURIED # 2.
March 29, 1999
Dear Gary,
My secular work and some other commitments have
prevented me from taking a closer look at your latest posts until yesterday. Characteristically, my few comments
on Anstey�s obsolete chronology generated four extensive responses from you--as if the very quantity of words could conceal the total absence of evidence and lack of substance in your argumentation. Your latest posts bristles with mistakes,
and it is impossible for me to point out everyone of them, such as your confused and erroneous statements about Delta-T (e.g. that, if the speed of the earth has been slowing down, the sublunar point is moved eastward instead of westward
when you go backward in time; or your repeated misuse of Liu-Fiala�s statements about the use of Delta-T, which they base on F. R. Stephenson�s work), and your misuse of Josephus� statements about the 70 years (which he refers to 7 times in his
works). Time allows me just to point out a few facts here, although I fear it�s like water off a duck�s back.
THE BABYLONIAN LUNAR CALENDAR
Firstly, you are completely wrong about the Babylonian calendar (generally referred to as a lunar calendar as it was composed of lunar months, but which, of course, more strictly may be called a "lunisolar" calendar; as this is obvious to both of us, I can�t see why you make a point of this). It was not regulated the way you imagine. In the Neo-Babylonian period and earlier, the new year was NOT determined by observing "when the spring equinox occurred", as you claim. A number of tablets make it very clear that at the time of Nebuchadnezzar the beginning of the new year was determined by means of observing the appearance of certain constellations. This has been evident to Assyriologists for a long time (see, for example, the discussion by Johann Schaumberger in his Erg�nzungsheft zu Kugler�s Sternkunde und Sterndienst in Babel,1935, pp. 340ff.), and has been confirmed time and again. It is probably meaningless to give you more references, as you usually ignore them and prefer to insist on your own groundless theories.
Your claim that the Babyloian and Jewish days did not begin at sunset but at midnight is just as hair-raising. This flies in the face of all facts, but it would be a waste of valuable time to go into the details.
The fact remains that the Neo-Babylonian calendar followed an irregular pattern as far as month-lengths and insertion of intercalary months are concerned. I have nowhere stated that the first day of the month "varied from town to town and from village to village", as you claim. This is a device of yours that you have attributed to me, and it is just another example of how you misread and misquote my book.
ASTRONOMICAL TEXTS INTERLOCKED WITH THE CONTRACT TABLETS
As I stated, the astronomical records dated to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar reflect the same irregular pattern of inserted intercalary months as that reflected in the contracts tablets dated to his reign, which turns the relative chronology created by the contracts into an absolute chronology. This pattern of intercalary months was not repeated at 57-year intervals, as you claim, based on your misconception of the Babylonian calendar. The thousands of contracts dated to the first 29 years of Nebuchadnezzar show the same pattern of intercalary months as that given on the lunar eclipse tablet LBAT 1420 (discussed in GTR-3, pp. 180-182), which records about two dozens of lunar eclipses from these 29 years. This annual record of lunar eclipses uniquely fixes them to the period 604-576 BC, establishing this as the first 29 years of Nebuchadnezzar�s reign. You will find it impossible to date this continuous and interconnected pattern of lunar eclipses to the period 511-483 BC (i.e., to the first 29 years of Nebuchadnezzar in your REVISED chronology).
All your talk about "faked king-lists" and "automatic frauds" here is irrelevant and misses the target by 180 degrees. You seem to have missed my argument completely. The pattern of lunar observations is there, and it belongs to the period 604-576 BC. Earlier, you admitted that the Seleucid scholars could not and did not fake the observations from the earlier centuries and that the observations, therefore, are genuine and original. For this reason you argued that your supposed "Seleucid fakes" were limited to their exchanging the names and regnal years of the kings in their copies of the ancient observational tablets. Have you suddenly forgotten all that, or have you changed your mind again? My argument was that even if you remove the name of Nebuchadnezzar from LBAT 1420, its lunar observations are still genuine and belong to the period 604-576 BC. The irregular pattern of intercalary months in this tablet locks it to the identical pattern found in the contracts dated to the first 29 years of Nebuchadnezzar�thus confirming that his rule began in 604 BC.
YOUR INCONSISTENT USE OF VAT 4956
Although you admit that practically all the observations in VAT 4956 are genuine and original and belong to the year 568 BC, you claim�without any evidence whatsoever�that the Seleucid scribes faked their copies of this tablet by inserting "Year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar" in the text.
However, you pick out two or three lines (3, 8, 14) and, by changing the year to 511 BC, the longitude to Honolulu, Beta Virginis in line 3 to Sigma-Leonis (contrary to all the evidence!), and so on, you manage to redate the 37th year of Nebuchadnezzar to 511 BC! It is difficult to find a more arbitrary, conflicting and inconsistent use of an ancient textual source! How can you hold that the three lines you apply to 511 BC (3, 8, and 14) relate to "Year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar" when you have just claimed that the Seleucid scribes fraudulently inserted this date in the text? You can�t have your cake and eat it. Such an arbitrary procedure can only be regarded as utterly inconsistent and dishonest. If Claudius Ptolemy was a fraud because he made some small "adjustments" of the observations he used to make them better fit his theory, what are we to say about your own enormous "adjustments" to make the ancient observations fit YOUR theory?
If you feel free to choose only a couple of lines you need in the text for your alternative chronology, free to choose whatever longitude you want for the observations recorded in these lines, free to change the names and identity of the stars in these lines to fit the new positions, free to declare "Year 37 of Nebuchadnezzar" in the tablet a late forgery and yet RETAIN IT for the few lines you have picked out, it would be possible to date Nebuchadnezzar�s 37th year to any year you want�even to 1999 AD! And you have the cheek to call the results of such procedures "proof" or "confirmation" of your theories, "proof" of your chronology and "proof" of the "Seleucid conspiracy"! Your careless use of the word "proof" sometimes makes me wonder if you really know the meaning of this word. There is no proof whatsoever to show that the Seleucid scholars and scribes "conspired" to change ancient history and for this reason "faked" their copies of the ancient texts. The only fakes I can see here is the dishonest procedures you have resorted to in order to arrive at the 511 BC date. That date is hundred percent a result of your inconsistent procedues, which in turn is hyundred percent a result of your wishful thinking and circular reasoning.
IS YOUR REVISED CHRONOLOGY "BIBLICAL"?
You have repatedly stated that your 455 BC date for the first year of Cyrus is based upon the Bible. The fact is, however, that it has been arrived at simply by retrocalculating the "69 weeks" (483 years) from 29 AD, which is nothing but a SECULAR dating of the 15th year of Tiberius. Thus, whether you like it or not, your 455 BC date is wholly derived from a secular date. And, of course, the 455 BE date for the 1st year of Cyrus is neither a Biblical nor a historical date, as I pointed out in GTR-3, pp. 192-195, in a section that you have repeatedly quoted in a misleading way to give the false impression that I somehow support your counting the 70 weeks from the 1st year of Cyrus. The 455 BC dating exists exclusively in your imagination. It has nothing to do with the Bible.
Further, the 29 AD date for the 15th year of Tiberius is far from sure, because Tiberius was a co-ruler, or co-ceasar, with Augustus for a couple of years before the latter died in August, 14 AD (according to secular history). The actual reign of Tiberius, therefore, which in the provinces was referred to as his "hegemonia" (the word also used by Luke; the normal Greek word for reign was "basileia"), began in 11/12 AD. A number of scholars, therefore, date the baptism of Jesus to the autumn of 27 AD. The first passover after this event, referred to at John 2:13ff., would then have fallen in the Spring of 28 AD. This date is supported by John 2:20, which gives the information that the rebuilding of the temple by Herod had been started 46 years previously. According to your favourite Josephus, that work began in the 18th year of Herod (Ant. 15.380), which corresponds to 20/19 BC. Counting 46 years from 20/19 BC you arrive exactly at 28 AD (instead of 30 AD). This is just an example. There are also other dates for the baptism of Jesus proposed by various scholars. An informative presentation of the ongoing scholarly debate on this and related questions are found in Vardaman & Yamauchi (eds.), Chronos, Kairos, Christos, Vol. 1 (1989) and Vol. 2 (1998). Your 29 AD date is clearly not as securely historically and Biblically founded as you presuppose.
Carl