r apparent, Thutmose, on his lap. Standing before him is Hekerneheh and a small Prince Amenhotep, who is carrying a bouquet. Hekreshu is specifically

Edward Newberry, “Akhenaten’s Eldest Son-in-Law ‘Ankhkhe-prure’,” JEA 14 [1928], 83–84). Redford points out that Newberry’s argument is not compelling, as all of the others in the scene could easily be wearing the cartouche of Thutmose IV out of deference to the son who succeeded to the throne. He further suggests that perhaps the six princes in the background are sons of Thutmose IV, while Amenhotep could be a brother, and for that reason was singled out to be depicted in a position of honor (Redford, “Coregency of Tuthmosis III,” 113). The problem, however, with the suggestion that the six princes are the sons of the seated Thutmose is that Thutmose and Amenhotep themselves, whoever they might be in reality, are depicted in the scene as children, and it would be odd to depict in the same scene both a father and his children as children. A possible rebuttal against Redford’s suggestion that Thutmose and Amenhotep are brothers might take the following form: Hekreshu is specifically stated to be the tutor of the king’s eldest son, Thutmose, while Hekerneheh is the tutor of the king’s son, Amenhotep. Since a father-son relationship existed between the tutors, perhaps a father-son relationship existed between their charges. Redford dismisses this idea by offering a parallel depiction found in graffiti from Konosso. A king’s son, Amenhotep, is mentioned twice at Konosso, once with Hekreshu and a second time with Hekerneheh. The presence of the cartouches of Thutmose IV in the immediate vicinity lends support to the dating of the graffiti to his reign. More importantly, Amenhotep’s name is accompanied by that of another prince, Okheprure, and the parallelism in the graffiti between the two names strongly suggests a fraternal relationship. Okheprure again is shown on the knee of an unidentified scribe in Tomb 226 of the Theban necropolis, along with three of his brothers. If, as his name would indicate, he was a son of Amenhotep II, then most likely Prince Amenhotep was also his son. On the wall painting from Tomb 64, therefore, Prince Amenhotep also should be considered a brother to Thutmose IV, and not a son (Ibid.). If Princes Thutmose and Amenhotep from Tomb 64 are indeed brothers, who are the six princes in the background? Certainly the fact that all of the princes, including the seated Thutmose, are wearing pectorals that bear the nomen and praenomen of Thutmose IV seems to indicate that the princes are all on the same level, and therefore brothers, as was the case with the Konosso graffiti and Tomb 226. The problem that remains, then, is that Thutmose IV is universally accepted as not having been the firstborn child, which is both confirmed by Thutmose IV’s own account on the Great/Sphinx Stele and by the fact that Prince Amenhotep was shown to be the rightful heir to the throne of Amenhotep II before Thutmose IV. Thus one of two options must be true: either (1) the Tomb-64 painting is falsifying the truth by assigning Thutmose IV the status of “the king’s eldest son,” or (2) the Thutmose who sits on the lap of Hekreshu is intended to portray a different Thutmose. The former option hardly seems possible, since the tomb-wall painting is located in a deeply secluded place, not at all prominently displayed whereone would expect to see propagandistic depictions of a king’s grandeur. If Redford is correct that Prince Amenhotep, who never is called “the king’s eldest son,” was not the eldest son of Amenhotep II, and that by custom a king named “Amenhotep” would name his first son “Thutmose,” and thus that Amenhotep II did name his first son “Thutmose,” the Thutmose sitting on the lap of the royal tutor indeed may be “the eldest son” of Amenhotep II, who could have died a premature death during the tenth and most gruesome of the plagues on Egypt. The painting may be depicting the entire entourage of Amenhotep II’s sons during the time when his firstborn son was still alive. The presence of Thutmose IV’s praenomen on the pectorals of all of the princes, even on that of the long-deceased plague-son, may indicate that the painting was made during the reign of Thutmose IV. Newberry, for one, was convinced that Tomb 64 was constructed for Hekerneheh during the reign of Thutmose IV (Newberry, “Akhenaten’s Eldest,” 82). The reason for the cartouche of Thutmose IV next to each of the princes, which could be a later addition to the painting if instead it originally was painted during the reign of Amenhotep II, may simply be that the painter wanted to demonstrate the sovereignty of Thutmose IV over all of his brothers, being that he was the only one from among them who rose to the position of pharaoh. Certainly this interpretation would better explain why Amenhotep, who was in line for the throne before his younger brother Thutmose IV, was being depicted as smaller in stature than the Thutmose who sat on his tutor’s lap. This detail is highly problematic for any view that instead purports Thutmose



IV to be “the king’s eldest son,”
since Prince Amenhotep is known to have been in line for the throne before him. 59. Wood, “The Rise and Fall,” 478. Shea correctly notes that “Ex 14–15 is not directly explicit upon this point,” though he subsequently takes an unjustified logical leap by extrapolating, “but it is the logical inference there [that pharaoh also drowned]” (Shea, “Amenhotep II as Pharaoh,” 46). 60. Wood, “The Rise and Fall,” 478. 61. Shea disagrees: “Yahweh says that he will get glory over pharaoh. While some of that glory could be maintained by his loss of troops in the Sea of Reeds, if he escaped with his own life, some of that glory could have been diminished” (Shea, “Amenhotep II as Pharaoh,” 46). This statement, though well intended, is not true whatsoever. God displayed his glory by decimating Sennacherib’s army when the Assyrians marched against Judah (2 Kgs 19:35), but his glory was not diminished when Sennacherib returned to Assyria unscathed. A far greater shame for a defeated monarch is to be left in humiliation to rule over a shell of his former empire after being defeated by God, depleted of his army, and—in the case of the exodus-pharaoh—stripped of his servantile workforce. 62. No doubt exists among Egyptologists that this mummy is the corpse of Amenhotep II. Although he was taller than both his father and his son who succeeded him, his physical features bear a marked resemblance to theirs, especially his son’s, particularly in respect to their crania and teeth (James E. Harris and Kent R. Weeks, X-Raying the Pharaohs [New York: Scribners, 1973], 138). 63. Nicholas Reeves, Ancient Egypt: The Great Discoveries (London: Thames & Hudson, 2000), 103. 64. The king’s praenomen is inscribed on one side of the jar, while the other side is inscribed with “Year 26” and “Panehsy,” the name of the king’s vintner (Der Manuelian, Amenophis II, 42). 65. Redford asserts that since polearn spanish

A revealing retelling of Justin’s account, combined with elaborate allegory, can be seen in the work of the great 12th century commentator of th

Joseph in any of the lodging places or houses because of the many travelers from the house of David coming for the registration. So the two of them were obliged to go to a cave near Bethlehem which was a shelter for animals (my translation).32 Here we enter an entirely different exegetical world. This venerable father’s account is rich in the spirituality of his age and his tradition is well worth reading. It is of little help, however, in our attempt at recovering the original Palestinian intent of the material. The Arabic and Syriac versions, like Brown, have opted for neutral words, such as “lodgings,” as their traditions focus on the allegories of the medieval period. What, then, does all of this mean for the faithful as we look forward to the recollection of the miracle of the incarnation? We all face the enormous weight of church tradition which surrounds us with the “no room at the inn” mythology. If our conclusions are valid, thousands of good Christmas sermons, plays, filmstrips, films, poems, songs and books will have to be discarded. But is the traditional myth of a lonely birth in a stable a help or a hindrance to the reality the text proclaims? Surely a more authentic cultural understanding enhances the meaning of the story, rather than diminishing it. Jesus was rejected at His birth by Herod, but the Bethlehem shepherds welcomed Him with great joy, as did the common people in later years. The city of David was true to its own, and the village community provided for Him. He was born among them, in the natural setting of the birth of any village boy, surrounded by helping hands and encouraging women’s voices. For centuries Palestinian peasants have been born on the raised terraces of the one-room family homes. The birth of Jesus was no different. His incarnation was authentic. His birth most likely took place in the natural place for a peasant to be born—in a peasant home. We can and should theologize on the glorious resurrected Christ who meets us in the Eucharist. But a proper understanding of the story of His birth forces us to not lose sight of the One who “took upon himself the form of a servant and was found in the likeness of man.” And, after all, it is still possible for us to sing: Ox and ass before Him bow,For He is in the manger now,Christ is born to save,Christ is born to save. (Reprinted by permission from the Theological Review of the Near East School of Theology, Vol. 2, No. II, November 1979.) Recommended Resources for Further StudyJesus ThroughMiddle Eastern Eyes 50 Proofs for the NTNIV ArchaeologicalStudy Bible Footnotes 1 M. Baily, “The Crib and Exegesis of Luke 2, 1–20,” Irish Ecclesiastical Record, 100 (1963), 358–376; R.E. Brown, “VI. The Birth and Naming of Jesus,” in The Birth of the Messiah (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1977), pp. 393–434; J.D.M. Derrett, “The Manger: Ritual Law and Soteriology,” Theology, 74 (1971), 566–571, and “The Manger at Bethlehem: Light on St. Luke’s Technique from Contemporary Jewish Religious Law,” in Studia Evangelica, VI, edited by L. A. Livingston (Berlin: Akademia-Verlag, 1973), pp. 86, 94; C.H. Giblin, “Refl ections on the Sign of the Manger,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 29 (1957), 87, 101; M.D. Goulder and M.L. Sanderson, “St. Luke’s Genesis” Journal of Theological Studies 8 (1957), 12–30; H.L. MacNeill, “The Sitz im Leben of Luke 1:5–2:20,” Journal of Biblical Literature 65 (1946), 123–130; R.M. Wilson, “Some Recent Studies in the Lucan Infancy Narrative,” Studia Evangelica I (Berlin: Akademia, 1959), 235–253: P. Winter, “Some Observations on the Language in the Birth and Infancy Stories of the Third Gospel,” New Testament Studies 1 (1954–55), 111–121. 2 A single Greek text from the sixth century (Bezae) gives an interesting variant to 6a. It reads, “As they arrived the days were completed,” rather than “It came to pass while they were there the days were fulfilled.” The Bezaen text has no support from any earlier Greek texts and none from the early versions. It would seem that Bezae has been accommodated to the myth of a late arrival on the night of the birth. The transcribers of the Bezae text were more consistent than we are. Our text denies a late night arrival theory and yet we manage to maintain it. 3 Dalmann has a diagram of just such a house from a village near Jerusalem. In this particular instance the entire one room house is in the cave. Cf. Gustaf Dalmann, Arbeit und Sitte in Palästina, Vol. VII (Gütersloh: Hermann Werner, 1940), plate n.40. 4 Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, LXXIX. Cf. The Writings of Justin Martyr and Athenagoras, trans. by M. Dodds, G. Reith and B.P. Pratten (Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, 1868), pp. 195–196. 5 Plummer, The Gospel According to S. Luke (Edinburgh: T. and T. Clark, 1922), p, 54 6 Justin Martyr, The First Apology of Justin 1:32; cf. Op. cit., p. 34. 7 Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, LIII; cf. Op. cit. p. 155. 8 O. Cullmann, “Infancy Gospels: the Protevangelium of James,” in New Testament Apocrypha, Vol. I, ed. by E. Hennecke and W. Schneemelcher (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1963), pp. 383–388. 9 Naboth and his famous vineyard (I Kings 21:1–14) is a classical example of the peasant attachment to the inheritance of his fathers. This same attachment is why Palestinian refugees in the current Middle East cannot simply move elsewhere. 10 K.E. Bailey, Poet and Peasant (Grand Rapids: Wm. Eerdmans, 1976), 147. 11 William Thomson, The Land and the Book, Vol. II (New York: Harper and Brothers, c. 1858, 1871), p. 503. 12 E.F.F. Bishop, Jesus of Palestine (London: Lutterworth Press, 1955), p. 42. In spite of the passage here quoted, in his volume Bishop offers another alternative, that of a shed attached to a village guest house. This ignores the fact that mangers are in homes and the fact that the Holy Family has been in Bethlehem for some time. In a public lecture in Jerusalem in 1958 Bishop reaffirmed his earlier view that the birth was in a private home. 13 Gustaf Dalmann, Sacred Sites and Ways, trans. from the German by Paul P. Levertoff (London: SPCK, 1935), p. 41. 14 G. Dalmann. Arbeit und Sitte in Palästina, plates 1–91. 15 Everyone sleeps on mattresses on the raised terrace floor in the village home, so placing a baby there is perfectly natural. 16 G. Dalmann, Sacred Sites and Ways, p. 41. 17 Ibid. 18 Miller suggests that the birth “was probably unattended” because Mary wraps her own child. Cf. D.G. Miller, Saint Luke (London: SCM, 1959), p. 35. The assumption of Miller’s remark is that the mother in her supposed weakened condition after childbirth would not choose to wrap her own child if she had had assistance. The difficulty with this assumption is that Palestinian peasant women are not physically incapacitated by childbirth. The present writer has heard first-hand accounts of Palestinian peasant women caught in the fields with labor pains who gave birth in the fields and then picked up the newborn child and returned to the village with no unusual



Bronze Age Camel Petroglyphs In The Wadi Nasib, Sinai

As the calm waters reflected the slowly rising sun over the Sea of Galilee, a lonely figure walked from Capernaum along a path near the rocky shore

2½ kilometers to the west of Capernaum. Warm water flowed from these springs, loaded with organic matter that attracted fish during the winter and spring months. Josephus, the first century Jewish historian, called the largest spring at this location the “well of Capernaum” (Wars 3:519; LCL 2:723). It was here that the lonely Man spotted several Capernaum fishermen. Simon, later called Peter, and Andrew were wading in the shallow waters using their cast nets. This circular net, usually 6 to 8 meters in circumference with small stones attached to the edge, was carefully folded so that when the fisherman cast it forth it would open like a parachute and fall over the shoal of fish. The fisherman would dive down, gather the small stones on the edge of the net in order to entrap the fish inside the net, and drag the net to shore to sort out their catch.The lonely Man called out from the shore, “Follow Me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” This was not the first time these fishermen had encountered the Lord Jesus. More than a year and a half prior, Andrew, a follower of John the baptizer, heard his mentor proclaim with excitement: “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” In the process of leaving the Baptizer, Andrew found his brother Simon and told him: “We have found the Messiah” and brought him to Jesus and both followed Him (John 1:29-42).Three days later, Jesus and His new found followers were attending a wedding, probably a relative of Nathanael’s (John 1:45; 21:2), in Cana of Galilee. It was here that the Lord Jesus performed His first miraculous sign by turning water into wine, thus revealing His glory. His disciples (students) put their trust in Him for their eternal salvation (John 2:1-11; cf. 20:30, 31). On several occasions they journeyed to Jerusalem with Jesus and other pilgrims for the various festivals. On the Passover of the next year the Lord Jesus shared with Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews, his need to be born from above by the Spirit of God, as well as God’s tremendous love for the world in sending His Son to provide salvation to all who put their trust in Him (John 3:1-21). On another occasion the following winter, while returning to Galilee, the Lord Jesus stopped with his disciples at a well near Sychar in Samaria. Here He offered a sinful Samaritan woman living water, eternal life. He then challenged His disciples to “… look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest!” (John 4:1-42). A month later, following up on this challenge, Jesus said, “Follow Me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” Simon and Andrew left their nets to follow this lonely Man (Matt. 4:19, 20; Mark 1:17, 18).Further along the shore, the Lord Jesus spotted two brothers, James and John, mending their trammel nets in their father’s large boat which was moored in the harbor near the Seven Springs. He called them as well and they left their father, Zebedee, and his servants and followed Him (Matt. 4:21, 22; Mark 1:19, 20).That evening, Jesus and His new found “fishers of men”, returned to Capernaum for Shabbat. Jesus began training His new followers in the art of “fishing for men” by casting a demon out of a man in the synagogue and healing Simon’s mother-in-law. These demonstrations of power provided two powerful lessons; “fishing for men” included meeting both the spiritual, as well as the physical needs of people (Mark 1:21-35). Early on the morning after Shabbat, Jesus slipped out of town to a quiet place to pray. Later, Simon searched for, found, and informed Him that everybody was looking for Him. He continued His lessons of fishing for men by taking His disciples along as He preached in the synagogues throughout Galilee (Mark 1:35-39).“Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!” (Luke 5:1-11)Discipling people is not an easy task. It takes time and effort because those being discipled do not grasp the lessons being taught or the seriousness of their decision to follow the Lord Jesus. Jesus must have been frustrated with Peter at times, yet He was ever so patient with him.After several months of following Jesus around and listening to Him preach in the synagogues of Galilee, Peter decided to go back fishing. This decision had an adverse effect on the other disciples because several of them went back as well. Jesus needed to get them to understand who He was and that He could be trusted to provide their daily needs..Peter and his fishing partners had fished all night and caught nothing. They had moored their fishing boat in the harbor of the Seven Springs and were washing their nets in the small waterfall near the shore. Jesus borrowed Peter’s boat and used it as a floating pulpit to preach to the multitudes which were gathered to hear the words of the famous Teacher. When He had finished teaching, He again turned His attention to His wayward disciples. Instructing Peter, He said: “Launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” Peter protested for a minute because he and his partners had fished all night and caught nothing. Something else was in the back of Peter’s mind, the trammel net which he was instructed to let down was used only and night and close to shore! Jesus was asking him to do the absurd.The trammel net was 200-250 meters long (656-820 feet) and consisted of three layers of net, a fine meshed net sandwiched between two large meshed outer nets. The fish swim through one of the large meshed outer nets and into the fine meshed middle net and through the other outer net. When the fish tried to escape, it gets hopelessly entangled in the nets. These nets are used only at night because the fish can see the nets in daylight. Peter must have questioned Jesus’ thinking in giving these instructions and was probably secretly daring Jesus to do something, yet he obeyed His words. Much to Peter’s amazement, there was a miraculous catch of fish and the nets began to break. He called for assistance from his partners on the shore. When they came to help, they filled the boats and began to sink. Peter fell down before Jesus and said, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!”Peter realized that he failed to learn the lesson that Jesus taught the day before while preaching on the mountain (Matt. 5-7). The sermon, addressed primarily to those who already trusted the Lord Jesus for their salvation and decided to follow Him, touched on the issue of the disciples daily provision for food, drink and clothing. The Lord Jesus promised He would take care of these daily needs if they sought first the Kingdom of God and his righteousness. If they did, all these things would be provided (Matt. 6:25-34). Peter failed miserably at this point. Rather than seeking the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and trusting the Lord for his daily needs, he went back fishing to provide for himself and his family. The goodness of God led him to repentance (Rom. 2:4) when he realized he was being discipled by the Lord of all Creation whom he could trust for his daily needs.

Rosetta Stone

the agreement with the Sabbatical and Jubilee data and the evidence of the Tyrian king list

ranted, then, that the reign length data of Kings and Chronicles are historically accurate, could it be that some ancient editor was astute enough to add up the numbers and derive a 480-year figure in a fashion something like that of Wellhausen or Barnes, and then project this 480-year figure back into the time between the exodus and the start of Temple construction? In other words, those who are seeking ways to show that the Bible is not to be trusted in historical matters could say that the 480 years were deduced somehow from the regnal data, which can be accepted as historically correct. They would claim that the editor decided to stop counting either after the thirty-seventh year of Jehoiachin’s captivity (Barnes) or after the return under Cyrus (Wellhausen, Burney, and Hawkins). Then this late-date redactor, once he or she had discovered a 480-year sum in the regnal data, imposed it on the time between the exodus and the start of construction of Solomon’s Temple. One would wonder what purpose this might serve, since the pattern had to wait to modern times to be discovered. It would also imply that this editor knew nothing about the proper methods of interpreting the dates, but merely added numbers from various starting and stopping places until a nice sum was found. But let us, for now, consider this option as a possibility: namely, that the 480 years of 1 Kgs 6:1 were extracted somehow from the regnal data. This idea cannot be right because it cannot be reconciled with what has just been established. Since the regnal data of Kings and Chronicles, covering a period of over four centuries, have been demonstrated by careful scholarship to have every mark of authenticity,[28] then how could it be that when we come to 1 Kgs 6:1, the chronological data there are suddenly no longer historical, but contrived and mythical? For those who prefer redaction criticism, if we grant that the surrounding numerical figures, including the “fourth year” of Solomon, are to be taken literally, then could any judicious approach that deals with literary genre say that the 480 years in the same verse are to be taken as unhistorical? This is particularly pertinent if we accept Cassuto’s argument that the very form in which the number is written is meant to convey exactness.[29] Some numbers in the Bible clearly are not to be taken in a strictly literal sense (the “seventy times seven” of Matt 18:22, for example). The context and literary convention being followed are usually plain enough in such cases, however, to show that a non-literal interpretation is intended. For 1 Kgs 6:1, similarly, the context and literary convention being followed dictate that the 480 years must be taken as literal in intention. There is no indication that ancient readers would have understood it in any other sense. To treat it as other than literal would open the door to the radical revisionism that no interpreter with a high view of the inspiration of Scripture could accept: the forty years of Israel in the desert would not be literal, nor the forty days of the temptation of Jesus, nor his three days in the tomb, and so on without end, so that we would no longer be able to understand the plain meaning of any factual statement in Scripture. d. The Jubilee and Sabbatical cycles show that the 480 years are literal years. Redaction criticism, such as would seek to impose a non-literal 480 years in the midst of an otherwise historical account, has been shown by its practitioners to be a very subjective methodology. It can be, and has been, bent to favor propositions that fly in the face of archaeological or historical facts. Fortunately we do not need to use this unreliable method in order to investigate whether the 480 years of 1 Kgs 6:1 are authentic. A proper way of determining their validity is to examine their agreement with the Jubilee and Sabbatical cycles. Once we accept the small adjustment that Solomon died before Tishri 1 of 931 bc, instead of on or after Tishri 1 as Thiele assumed, then we not only have a correction for Thiele’s problems with the reigns of the Judean monarchs that he was never able to resolve,[30] but also, by placing the start of Temple construction in 967 bc instead of 966 bc, the Sabbatical and Jubilee years all fall into place with precision and harmony. This precision and harmony cannot be explained as the interpolations of a late-date deuteronomist and his supposed daughters (dtr1, dtr2, etc.) who were interspersing into their account the various allusions to these events in order to fool readers into thinking that the Jubilee and Sabbatical cycles were observed in Israel’s past. Although interpolations by a “deuteronomist” are the standard wisdom of rationalist scholarship, it is clear that any deceiver who was interspersing allusions in this fashion could never have gotten all the dates right. The principle of the Jubilee years, first presented in JETS in 2003,[31] was cited in Wood’s “Rise and Fall” article (pp. 477, 488) and by Steinmann in the same issue of JETS[32] as an important argument in favor of the early date for the exodus. It is also important in demonstrating the integrity of all the chronological data of Kings and Chronicles and in establishing the date for the composition of Leviticus. The argument, however, has never been addressed by advocates of a thirteenth-century exodus, even though there have been several expansions of the basic thesis and additional information in its support since the original presentation in JETS. These later articles have provided new evidence to show that Israel’s priests were keeping track of the Jubilee and Sabbatical cycles all the time that Israel was in its land, and that the start of counting must have been in 1406 bc. Since these various later articles dealing with the Sabbatical and Jubilee cycles may not be readily available to all readers, a summary will be given here of their findings. This will be a brief summary only; for more complete information the articles referenced must be consulted. The reader may also wish to compare the dates that will be given with the dates for the kings of Judah given in Young’s “Tables of Reign Lengths” article.[33] The simple thesis that Israel’s priests began counting for the Sabbatical and Jubilee cycles when they entered the land in Nisan of 1406, as they were commanded to do in Lev 25:1–10, explains the following facts: First, for the Jubilee years: The Hebrew text of Ezek 40:1, by saying that it was both Rosh HaShanah (New Year’s Day) and the tenth of the month, establishes that Ezekiel saw his vision at the beginning of a Jubilee year. Only in a Jubilee year did the year start on the tenth of the month (Lev 25:9). The date was the Day of Atonement, Tishri 10 of 574 bc.[34] Since the Jubilee year was identical to the seventh Sabbatical year,[35] the first year of this cycle must have been forty-eight years earlier, starting in 622 bc. 1406 bc, the year that Israel entered Canaan that can be derived from the chronological note of 1 Kgs 6:1, was 784 years, or sixteen Jubilee cycles earlier than this date, thus showing that 1406 would have been the first year of a Jubilee (and Sabbatical) cycle. This is in agreement with an entry into Canaan in that year, since Israel was to start counting the cycles when they entered the land of Canaan (Lev 25:1-10).[36] Entirely consistent with this, the Talmud and the Seder ‘Olam explicitly state that Ezekiel’s Jubilee was the seventeenth Jubilee.[37] The Seder ‘Olam, the older of these sources, does not cite the fact that Rosh HaShanah was on the tenth of Tishri in Ezek 40:1 as an argument establishing that it was a Jubilee year. Rabbi Yose simply states that Ezekiel saw his vision at the beginning of the seventeenth Jubilee, apparently based on historical remembrance. The Seder ‘Olam and the Talmud state that another Jubilee was observed in the eighteenth year of Josiah.[38] According to Judean Tishri-based reckoning, Josiah’s eighteenth year began in Tishri of 623 bc, which was forty-nine years, or exactly one Jubilee cycle, before Ezekiel’s Jubile

Rosetta Stone German

Whichever derivation is chosen

the main point is that the 480 years cannot be trusted because according to Wellhausen, whom Burney and Hawkins are following here, the regnal data for Solomon and his successors were manipulated to produce a fictitious 480 years.[15] Hawkins apparently agrees with Wellhausen’s assessment that the regnal data have been falsified, because he writes, “When the books of 1–2 Kings are viewed as a whole, therefore, it seems clear that its author(s) wanted to place the building of the Temple at the center of the biblical history.”[16] The implication is that the regnal data of Kings are not genuine history and cannot be used to create a proper chronology of the kingdom period. To demonstrate this supposed artificiality in the regnal data, Burney added the balance of the years of Solomon’s reign after the initiation of the construction of the Temple (37), to the lengths of reigns of the succeeding kings of Judah (393), to the duration of the exile (50, presumably from the fall of Jerusalem in 587 to the first return in 537), thus obtaining an interval of 480 years.[17] In Burney’s summation there are three mistakes: First, the thirty-seven years assigned from Solomon’s fourth year to his fortieth year should be thirty-six. Second, six years are assigned to Athaliah, from 2 Kgs 11:3, which is the accession equivalent for the seven years of non-accession reckoning that is given to her in the next verse, and which should have been used in keeping with the non-accession system being used at that time in Judah.[18] Third, fifty years are assigned from the exile to the return under Cyrus, instead of the proper forty-nine years (587 to 538 bc). Moreover, we know from modern investigations that this whole procedure is fallacious, a fact Hawkins acknowledges.[19] Timespans in Judahite history cannot be determined simply by adding the lengths of reigns of kings, due to coregencies and non-accession reckoning.[20] The actual duration from Solomon’s fourth year (967 bc)[21] to the end of Zedekiah’s reign (587 bc) was 380 years, not 430, and the total to the first return under Cyrus in 538 bc (Ezra 1:1) was 429 years, not the artificial 480 years calculated by Wellhausen and Burney and cited by Hawkins. It is Wellhausen and Burney who are playing games with the numbers, not the authors of 1 and 2 Kings. The thesis of Wellhausen and Burney that Hawkins follows is premised on an exilic or post-exilic authorship of 1 Kgs 6:1, and depends upon the further presupposition that an author who was recording chronological data in the time of Solomon, or shortly thereafter, had no way to accurately compute long periods of time over the course of Israelite history. This presupposition and the presupposition of exilic or post-exilic authorship of 1 Kgs 6:1 are both false. This will be demonstrated in secs. c and d below. b. The attempt by Barnes to show that the 480 years are artificial. Another attempt to demonstrate an artificial span of 480 years is given by William Barnes. By examining his approach, we can see how arbitrary these schemes are. Like Wellhausen and Hawkins, Barnes does not seem to be aware that the Hebrew text of 1 Kgs 6:1 means that 479 years, not 480, had passed between the exodus and Solomon’s fourth year. He writes: As the reader will no doubt recall, the book of Kings ends on a rather quiet note: in the 37th year of the exiled king Jehoiachin, the Judahite monarch was freed from prison by the Babylonian king Evil-merodach (= Amel-marduk); every day, we are then told, he dined at the king’s table. Now, it is undoubtedly not coincidental that according to the Judahite regnal totals as extant in Kings, exactly 480 years separated this event from the original coronation of King David over Judah. (Once again, the actual historical situation need not concern us at this point, although it would seem that only some 449 years actually separated these two events.)[22] Barnes shows how he gets this calculation of 480 years in a table on p. 145 of his book. Here, each reign length is reduced by one in order to conform to the non-accession reckoning of rabbinic scholarship. Thus David is given 39 years, Solomon 39 years, Rehoboam 16, down to 10 years for Jehoiakim. He then adds thirty-six years to get to the thirty-seventh year of the captivity of Jehoiachin. The sum is indeed 480 years, even though, as Barnes notes, this does not represent actual elapsed time. In his view, however, it shows that the numbers have been manipulated to give an artificial total. This approach is similar to that of Wellhausen cited earlier, as followed by Burney and Hawkins, even though the methods of Wellhausen and Barnes contradict each other: one uses accession years, the other non-accession years; one starts with the construction of the Temple, the other with David’s accession; one ends with the return from exile, the other with Jehoiachin’s release from prison. But both conclude to their own satisfaction that they have shown that either someone has manipulated the reign lengths so that they do not reflect historical reality, or that the 480-year figure of 1 Kgs 6:1 is contrived and artificial. c. The integrity of the chronological data of 1 and 2 Kings shows they are authentic, not artificial. A problem with these schemes is that they are just too clever. The late-date deuteronomists that these scholars posit as the authors of Kings would lack any motive to put together a scheme like this, since it took until the nineteenth century ad (for Wellhausen’s scheme) or the twentieth century (for Barnes’s scheme) for someone to figure it out. And it is not because no one was trying to find numerical schemes in the Scriptures. An example of such searching for patterns is found in the Seder ‘Olam (second century ad), where Rabbi Yose calculated 850 years from the exodus to the exile. He did this by starting with the 479 years from the exodus to Solomon’s fourth year, and then adding, in a non-accession sense, all Judean reign lengths from that time to the last year of Zedekiah. The sum comes to 851, but Rabbi Yose adjusted this to the round number of 850, which he interpreted as seventeen times fifty.[23] Perhaps he got rid of the extra year by taking six years for Athaliah instead of seven, as Burney did. The Seder ‘Olam’s 850-year figure is accepted as authoritative at several places in the Talmud, where no explanation is given for how it was derived; indeed the Seder ‘Olam itself does not explain the derivation, nor does Guggenheimer in his recent translation and commentary.[24] It shows that Rabbi Yose was looking for patterns to impose on the Scripture, but he failed to see the scheme of either Wellhausen or Barnes that covers the same time period. If schemes like this were inherent in the text, why did the Seder ‘Olam, the most extensive and detailed document from antiquity devoted to OT chronology, fail to recognize them? But the main, indeed insuperable, obstacle that confronts the idea that the regnal data of Kings and Chronicles are artificial and late is the fact that these data have all been successfully integrated into a chronology that has every indication of reflecting the actual history of the times. This is more than can be said for the chronologies of Wellhausen and Barnes; their chronological schemes (which are different between the two scholars) have not found any wide acceptance among historians, whereas the Thiele/McFall chronology that accepts these data as authentic is the most widely accepted of any chronology of the divided kingdom.[25] In particular, Thiele’s date of 931 bc for the beginning of the divided monarchy is accepted by the majority of scholars who are most influential in this field, including Jack Finegan, Kenneth Kitchen, T. C. Mitchell, Gershon Galil, Leslie McFall, and Eugene Merrill.[26] This date was derived by accepting the chronological data of Kings and Chronicles as genuine history, not the manipulations of a late-date deuteronomist and his kin to come up with an artificial and obscure numerological puzzle. Furthermore, it is additionally established by two independent methods

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10 Mar 11 Put These 5 Films Together and Spell Terrible 5 Times

Put These 5 Films Together and Spell Terrible 5 TimesBy: Ed Bagley .... Click author's name to view profile and articles!!!Retargeting by ChangoTweet ? 2006 Ed BagleyHere are five more movies you think would be really better than they are, unfortunately for the films, the scripts, the direction, and the actors, they are not.Love Letters – 1 Star (Terrible)Love Letters is a terrible, terrible, terrible film. One of the five worst films every made among those that give a pretense of actually being good while being awful, pared to those films you know are bad and do not disappoint.This stupid story line has two adults reading letters they sent to each other over their entire life, sitting on tall furniture, gazing down as the past action unfolds.Love Letters is beyond bad. It butchers a possibly good story line, has poor direction, poor production, poor acting, poor everything. There is not a redeeming quality in this piece of garbage, not even the opening, or credit lines.The film does not even introduce itself, it takes 5 minutes to realize how bad the film really is; after 10 minutes I put Love Letters on fast forward, and it did not get any better in fast forward. Even the dialogue is bad to awful.The only worse movie I can think of ever seeing is "Pat" (the androgynous character on Saturday Night Live), and that movie I expected to be terrible, and it was. The acting performances in Love Letters were absolutely juvenile, with no depth, no character development, and no delivery worth talking about. These were not 2nd and 3rd rate actors but 8th and 9th rate actors.What a piece of nothing this turned out to be; I was beyond disappointed. I expected a decent attempt at a relationship movie and could not have been more let down.Monster-in-Law – 1 Star (Terrible)Monster-in-Law has a lower class girl (Jennifer Lopez) meeting a rich family doctor (Michael Vartan), and a future mother-in-law (Jane Fonda) who decides to drive away the bride, only to do herself in, discovering that the bride has as much backbone as she does.This film is strictly entertainment and humor; there really is no story line as you know who is getting together at the end, and it will all work itself out when the edy skits are over. I have seen Lopez do a better job in better films, such as Maid in Manhattan.The Fast Runner – 1 Star (Terrible)The Fast Runner, a foreign film in the Inuktitut language with English subtitles, is about Eskimo life and culture on the tundra in Alaska. I promise you this is not filmmakings' crowning achievement. It may not even be Eskimo filmmakers' crowning achievement; if it is, Eskimo filmmaking is in serious trouble.The Fast Runner, also known by the title Atanarjuat, goes on and on for 172 minutes (call it 3 hours), which is about 1? hours too long.Myths and Logic of Shaolin Kung Fu – 1 Star (Terrible)This film lets you know early on that the best Kung Fu fighting style-Shaolin-es from the monks in China. The Myths and Logic of Shaolin Kung Fu is a sketchy, historical account of how the monks train and learn to simultaneously bee a religious as well as a deadly fighting machine.These future monks begin before age 10 and never really end a lifelong quest to bee a master in this fighting style; dividing their time equally between spiritual development and physical prowess. You will be amazed at the physical skills of these boys before they are 10 years old.Myra Breckenridge – 1 Star (Terrible)This is Gore Vidal's then (1970) controversial film about Myron Breckenridge, a man who goes to Europe for a sex change operation and es back as Myra Breckenridge (played by Raquel Welch, who I did not like in the movie), a man-hating woman.It is not clear in the movie if Myra still retains her male parts, not that it is important to the movie, because this film is garbage with no script flow, no message, no acting and an even worse presentation. Myra Breckenridge had a chance to deliver some information and a message about its theme, but failed miserably.I cannot even begin to imagine what Gore must have been doing when he attempted to write this script. Film efforts like Vidal's do not increase understanding, but encourage prejudice and ignorance about a controversial topic. This is one bad example of filmmaking, and deserves to die a slow death.Article Source: abcarticledirectoryEd Bagley is the Author of Ed Bagley's Blog, which he Publishes Daily with Fresh, Original Articles on Internet Marketing, Jobs and Careers, Movie Reviews, Sports and Recreation, or Lessons in Life intended to Delight, Inform, Educate and Motivate Readers. Visit Ed at . . .edbagleyblogMovieReviewArticles.htmledbagleyblogLessonsinLifeArticles.htmledbagleyblogInternetMarketingArticles.htmlNote: The content of this article solely conveys the opinion of its author, Ed BagleyRetargeting by ChangoDid You Like This Article? Share It With YourFriends!Please Rate this Article 5 out of 54 out of 53 out of 52 out of 51 out of 5 Not yet Rated Click the XML Icon to Receive Free Articles About Movies Film via RSS!Additional Articles From - Home Arts Movies FilmWhy Calibrate your High Definition TV?- By : Robert ShefferSweet Phone - By : Tim Webb.Find out Home Theater Methods! What You have Been Missing in Your TV and Movie Encounter.- By : Joesph MellbergPreparing and Setting up a Home Theater system is Easier Than you Think!- By : Zachariah DivensGrown Ups 2010 Movie In Review- By : Elenor CherryCamera Crew Hire- By : Mark A. WilsonReview of Drive Angry Movie- By : Gursel BatmazReturn Of The Horror Legend: Scream 4- By : Gursel BatmazMovie Review: Clash Of The Titans Leaves Audiences Wanting- By : Elenor CherryRed Riding Hood The Movie- By : Gursel Batmaz Still Searching? Last Chance to find what you're looking for. Try using Bing Search!

5 Mar 11 Why You Should Choose Affiliate Programs For Home Based Business

Why You Should Choose Affiliate Programs For Home Based BusinessBy: Reginald Sharp .... Click author's name to view profile and articles!!!Retargeting by ChangoTweet Are you a mother who wants to work at home and spend more time with your child(ren) and family?Are you tired of the daily "rat race" ofNHL Jersey
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