Saturday 27 May 2023
Let God be found true.
When Was Ancient Jerusalem Destroyed?—Part One
Why It Matters; What the Evidence Shows
This is the first of two articles in consecutive issues of The Watchtower that discuss scholarly questions surrounding the date of the destruction of ancient Jerusalem. This two-part series presents thoroughly researched and Bible-based answers to questions that have puzzled some readers.
“According to historians and archaeologists, 586 or 587 B.C.E. is generally accepted as the year of Jerusalem’s destruction.*Why do Jehovah’s Witnesses say that it was 607 B.C.E.? What is your basis for this date?”
SO WROTE one of our readers. But why be interested in the actual date when Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II razed the city of Jerusalem? First, because the event marked an important turning point in the history of God’s people. One historian said that it led to “a catastrophe, indeed the ultimate catastrophe.” The date marked the end of a temple that had been at the heart of the worship of Almighty God for more than 400 years. “O God,” lamented a Bible psalmist, “they have dishonored your holy temple. They have left Jerusalem in ruins.”—Psalm 79:1, God’s Word Bible.*
Second, because knowing the actual year when this “ultimate catastrophe” began and understanding how the restoration of true worship in Jerusalem fulfilled a precise Bible prophecy will build your confidence in the reliability of God’s Word. So why do Jehovah’s Witnesses hold to a date that differs from widely accepted chronology by 20 years? In short, because of evidence within the Bible itself.
“Seventy Years” for Whom?
Years before the destruction, the Jewish prophet Jeremiah provided an essential clue to the time frame given in the Bible. He warned “all those living in Jerusalem,” saying: “This whole country will become a desolate wasteland, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” (Jeremiah 25:1, 2, 11, New International Version) The prophet later added: “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.’” (Jeremiah 29:10) What is the significance of the “seventy years”? And how does this time period help us to determine the date of Jerusalem’s destruction?
Instead of saying 70 years “at Babylon,” many translations read “for Babylon.” (NIV) Some historians therefore claim that this 70-year period applies to the Babylonian Empire. According to secular chronology, the Babylonians dominated the land of ancient Judah and Jerusalem for some 70 years, from about 609 B.C.E. until 539 B.C.E. when the capital city of Babylon was captured.
The Bible, however, shows that the 70 years were to be a period of severe punishment from God—aimed specifically at the people of Judah and Jerusalem, who were in a covenant to obey him. (Exodus 19:3-6) When they refused to turn from their bad ways, God said: “I will summon . . . Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon . . . against this land and its inhabitants and against all the surrounding nations.” (Jeremiah 25:4, 5, 8, 9, NIV) While nearby nations would also suffer Babylon’s wrath, the destruction of Jerusalem and the 70-year exile to follow were called by Jeremiah “the punishment of my people,” for Jerusalem had “sinned greatly.”—Lamentations 1:8; 3:42; 4:6, NIV.
So according to the Bible, the 70 years was a period of bitter punishment for Judah, and God used the Babylonians as the instrument for inflicting this severe chastisement. Yet, God told the Jews: “When seventy years are completed, . . . I will . . . bring you back to this place”—the land of Judah and Jerusalem.—Jeremiah 29:10, NIV.
When Did “the Seventy Years” Start?
The inspired historian Ezra, who lived after the 70 years of Jeremiah’s prophecy were fulfilled, wrote of King Nebuchadnezzar: “He carried into exile to Babylon the remnant, who escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and his sons until the kingdom of Persia came to power. The land enjoyed its sabbath rests; all the time of its desolation it rested, until the seventy years were completed in fulfillment of the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah.”—2 Chronicles 36:20, 21, NIV.
Thus, the 70 years were to be a period when the land of Judah and Jerusalem would enjoy “sabbath rests.” This meant that the land would not be cultivated—there would be no sowing of seed or pruning of vineyards. (Leviticus 25:1-5, NIV) Because of the disobedience of God’s people, whose sins may have included a failure to observe all the Sabbath years, the punishment was that their land would remain unworked and deserted for 70 years.—Leviticus 26:27, 32-35, 42, 43.
When did the land of Judah become desolated and unworked? Actually, the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar attacked Jerusalem twice, years apart. When did the 70 years commence? Certainly not following the first time that Nebuchadnezzar laid siege to Jerusalem. Why not? Although at that time Nebuchadnezzar took many captives from Jerusalem to Babylon, he left others behind in the land. He also left the city itself standing. For years after this initial deportation, those left remaining in Judah, “the lowly class of the people,” lived off their land. (2 Kings 24:8-17) But then things drastically changed.
A Jewish revolt brought the Babylonians back to Jerusalem. (2 Kings 24:20; 25:8-10) They razed the city, including its sacred temple, and they took many of its inhabitants captive to Babylon. Within two months, “all the people [who had been left behind in the land] from the least to the greatest, together with the army officers, fled to Egypt for fear of the Babylonians.” (2 Kings 25:25, 26, NIV) Only then, in the seventh Jewish month, Tishri (September/October), of that year could it be said that the land, now desolate and unworked, began to enjoy its Sabbath rest. To the Jewish refugees in Egypt, God said through Jeremiah: “You have seen all the disaster that I brought upon Jerusalem and upon all the cities of Judah. Behold, this day they are a desolation, and no one dwells in them.” (Jeremiah 44:1, 2, English Standard Version) So this event evidently marked the starting point of the 70 years. And what year was that? To answer, we need to see when that period ended.
When Did “the Seventy Years” End?
The prophet Daniel, who lived until “the kingdom of Persia came to power,” was on the scene in Babylon, and he calculated when the 70 years were due to end. He wrote: “I, Daniel, perceived in the books the number of years that, according to the word of the LORD to Jeremiah the prophet, must pass before the end of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years.”—Daniel 9:1, 2, ESV.
Ezra reflected on the prophecies of Jeremiah and linked the end of “the seventy years” to the time when “the LORD moved the heart of Cyrus king of Persia to make a proclamation.” (2 Chronicles 36:21, 22, NIV) When were the Jews released? The decree ending their exile was issued in “the first year of Cyrus the king of Persia.” (See the box “A Pivotal Date in History.”) Thus, by the fall of 537 B.C.E., the Jews had returned to Jerusalem to restore true worship.—Ezra 1:1-5; 2:1; 3:1-5.
According to Bible chronology, then, the 70 years was a literal period of time that ended in 537 B.C.E. Counting back 70 years, the start date of the period would be 607 B.C.E.
But if the evidence from the inspired Scriptures clearly points to 607 B.C.E. for Jerusalem’s destruction, why do many authorities hold to the date 587 B.C.E.? They lean on two sources of information—the writings of classical historians and the canon of Ptolemy. Are these sources more reliable than the Scriptures? Let us see.
Classical Historians—How Accurate?
Historians who lived close to the time when Jerusalem was destroyed give mixed information about the Neo-Babylonian kings.* (See the box “Neo-Babylonian Kings.”) The time line based on their chronological information disagrees with that of the Bible. But just how reliable are their writings?
One of the historians who lived closest to the Neo-Babylonian period was Berossus, a Babylonian “priest of Bel.” His original work, the Babyloniaca,written about 281 B.C.E., has been lost, and only fragments are preserved in the works of other historians. Berossus claimed that he used “books which had been preserved with great care at Babylon.”1 Was Berossus really an accurate historian? Consider one example.
Berossus wrote that Assyrian King Sennacherib followed “the reign of [his] brother”; and “after him his son [Esarhaddon ruled for] 8 years; and thereafter Sammuges [Shamash-shuma-ukin] 21 years.” (III, 2.1, 4) However, Babylonian historical documents written long before Berossus’ time say that Sennacherib followed his father, Sargon II, not his brother, to the throne; Esarhaddon ruled for 12 years, not 8; and Shamash-shuma-ukin ruled for 20 years, not 21. Scholar R. J. van der Spek, while acknowledging that Berossus consulted the Babylonian chronicles, wrote: “This did not prevent him from making his own additions and interpretations.”2
How do other scholars view Berossus? “In the past Berossus has usually been viewed as a historian,” states S. M. Burstein, who made a thorough study of Berossus’ works. Yet, he concluded: “Considered as such his performance must be pronounced inadequate. Even in its present fragmentary state the Babyloniaca contains a number of surprising errors of simple fact . . . In a historian such flaws would be damning, but then Berossus’ purpose was not historical.”3
In view of the foregoing, what do you think? Should Berossus’ calculations really be viewed as consistently accurate? And what about the other classical historians who, for the most part, based their chronology on the writings of Berossus? Can their historical conclusions really be called reliable?
The Canon of Ptolemy
The Royal Canon of Claudius Ptolemy, a second-century C.E. astronomer, is also used to support the traditional date 587 B.C.E. Ptolemy’s list of kings is considered the backbone of the chronology of ancient history, including the Neo-Babylonian period.
Ptolemy compiled his list some 600 years after the Neo-Babylonian period ended. So how did he determine the date when the first king on his list began to reign? Ptolemy explained that by using astronomical calculations based in part on eclipses, “we have derived to compute back to the beginning of the reign of Nabonassar,” the first king on his list.4 Thus, Christopher Walker of the British Museum says that Ptolemy’s canon was “an artificial scheme designed to provide astronomers with a consistent chronology” and was “not to provide historians with a precise record of the accession and death of kings.”5
“It has long been known that the Canon is astronomically reliable,” writes Leo Depuydt, one of Ptolemy’s most enthusiastic defenders, “but this does not automatically mean that it is historically dependable.” Regarding this list of kings, Professor Depuydt adds: “As regards the earlier rulers [who included the Neo-Babylonian kings], the Canon would need to be compared with the cuneiform record on a reign by reign basis.”6
What is this “cuneiform record” that enables us to measure the historical accuracy of Ptolemy’s canon? It includes the Babylonian chronicles, lists of kings, and economic tablets—cuneiform documents written by scribes who lived during, or near, Neo-Babylonian times.7
How does Ptolemy’s list compare with that cuneiform record? The box“How Does Ptolemy’s Canon Compare With Ancient Tablets?” (see below) shows a portion of the canon and compares this with an ancient cuneiform document. Notice that Ptolemy lists only four kings between the Babylonian rulers Kandalanu and Nabonidus. However, the Uruk King List—a part of the cuneiform record—reveals that seven kings ruled in between. Were their reigns brief and negligible? One of them, according to cuneiform economic tablets, ruled for seven years.8
There is also strong evidence from cuneiform documents that prior to the reign of Nabopolassar (the first king of the Neo-Babylonian period), another king (Ashur-etel-ilani) ruled for four years in Babylonia. Also, for more than a year, there was no king in the land.9 Yet, all of this is left out of Ptolemy’s canon.
Why did Ptolemy omit some rulers? Evidently, he did not consider them to be legitimate rulers of Babylon.10 For example, he excluded Labashi-Marduk, a Neo-Babylonian king. But according to cuneiform documents, the kings whom Ptolemy omitted actually ruled over Babylonia.
In general, Ptolemy’s canon is regarded as accurate. But in view of its omissions, should it really be used to provide a definite historical chronology?
The Conclusion Based on This Evidence
To sum up: The Bible clearly states that there was an exile of 70 years. There is strong evidence—and most scholars agree—that the Jewish exiles were back in their homeland by 537 B.C.E. Counting back from that year would place Jerusalem’s destruction in 607 B.C.E. Though the classical historians and the canon of Ptolemy disagree with this date, valid questions can be raised about the accuracy of their writings. Really, those two lines of evidence hardly provide enough proof to overturn the Bible’s chronology.
However, further questions remain. Is there really no historical evidence to support the Bible-based date of 607 B.C.E.? What evidence is revealed by datable cuneiform documents, many of which were written by ancient eyewitnesses? We will consider these questions in our next issue.
Footnote
A PIVOTAL DATE IN HISTORY
The date 539 B.C.E. when Cyrus II conquered Babylon is calculated using the testimony of:
▪ Ancient historical sources and cuneiform tablets: Diodorus of Sicily (c. 80-20 B.C.E.) wrote that Cyrus became king of Persia in “the opening year of the Fifty-fifth Olympiad.” (Historical Library, Book IX, 21) That year was 560 B.C.E. The Greek historian Herodotus (c. 485-425 B.C.E.) stated that Cyrus was killed “after he had reigned twenty-nine years,” which would put his death during his 30th year, in 530 B.C.E. (Histories, Book I, Clio, 214) Cuneiform tablets show that Cyrus ruled Babylon for nine years before his death. Thus, nine years prior to his death in 530 B.C.E. takes us back to 539 B.C.E. as the year Cyrus conquered Babylon.
Confirmation by a cuneiform tablet: A Babylonian astronomical clay tablet (BM 33066) confirms the date of Cyrus’ death in 530 B.C.E. Though this tablet contains some errors regarding the astronomical positions, it contains the descriptions of two lunar eclipses that the tablet says occurred in the seventh year of Cambyses II, the son and successor of Cyrus. These are identified with lunar eclipses visible at Babylon on July 16, 523 B.C.E., and on January 10, 522 B.C.E., thus pointing to the spring of 523 B.C.E. as the beginning of Cambyses’ seventh year. That would make his first regnal year 529 B.C.E. So Cyrus’ last year would have been 530 B.C.E., making 539 B.C.E. his first year of ruling Babylon.
The fossil record vs.the narrative re:the origin of the feather
Fossil Friday: A Dinosaur Feather and an Overhyped New Study on the Origin of Feathers
This Fossil Friday features a feather from 100 million-year-old Burmese amber. The age and the strange ribbon-like structure of this fossil feather suggest that it could be a feather of a theropod dinosaur or primitive stem-bird rather than a modern bird (Benton et al. 2019). The fossil was acquired by me some years ago for the amber collection of the Natural History Museum in Stuttgart (Germany), where I worked as scientific curator for amber and fossil insects until 2016. I have already discussed the issue of the origin of birds and feathers in several previous articles on Evolution News (Bechly 2022a, 2022b, 2023). Today, I want to use the occasion to discuss a recent study on the origin of feathers by Cooper & Milinkovitch (2023), which was celebrated as evidence that “tweaking just a few genes transforms scales into feathers” (Starr 2023). The authors boldly claim that their “results indicate that an evolutionary leap — from scales to feathers — does not require large changes in genome composition or expression.“ This is complete hogwash.
And Here Is Why
The scientists injected chicken embryos with molecular triggers that changed the development of reticulate scales on chicken feet into that of ectopic feathers, which means that feathers developed at an abnormal place instead of scales. That‘s all. The mentioned spectacular conclusion from this experiment rests on two hidden assumptions that are both false or at least highly questionable:
Feathers are derived from transformed reptile scales.
The scales on bird feet are primary scales and not reduced feathers.
The first claim was the subject of a long and hot debate in modern biology. Many textbooks still suggest that bird feathers were derived from elongated reptile scales, and this was also promoted by theistic evolutionists Karl Giberson and Francis Collins (2011) in their book The Language of Science and Faith (for a critique see Luskin 2021). However, this still common claim faces several severe problems and no longer represents the consensus view in mainstream science.
One problem is that reptiles are not considered to represent a natural (monophyletic) group and include very diverse and only distantly related taxa such as turtles and tortoises, crocodiles and alligators, and lizards and snakes. These different reptile groups possess very different types of scales (e.g., compare the adjacent scales of a croc with the overlapping scales of a lizard) of dubious and disputed homology. Therefore, the claim that feathers are derived from reptile scales is rather meaningless in the first place. An even more important problem is the ontogeny of feathers, which begin as hollow tubelike filaments, with the feather forming from the disintegration and unfolding of the tube‘s wall, not as elongations of flat scales. Finally, there are significant morphogenetic and molecular differences between the various integumental structures of vertebrates that “for decades, fostered the debate on the homology, or lack thereof, among these skin appendages and led some authors to conclude that homologous skin appendages do not exist beyond amniote classes (reptiles, mammals, and birds); that is, mammalian hair and avian feather would not have evolved from reptilian overlapping scales” (Di-Poï & Milinkovitch 2016).
Common Biological Knowledge
Indeed, the recognition that feathers did not evolve directly from scales has been common biological knowledge for many years and even made it into the prestigious Encyclopedia Britannica, which unequivocally clarifies that “Feathers are complex and novel evolutionary structures. They did not evolve directly from reptilian scales, as once was thought.” An educational site on avian biology by Eastern Kentucky University makes a similarly clear statement: “Feathers, then, are not derived from scales, but, rather, are evolutionary novelties with numerous unique features.” It could hardly be more in your face than that!
Nevertheless, new evo-devo research (Di-Poï & Milinkovitch 2016) about the ontogeny of reptile scales, mammal hairs, and bird feathers was misleadingly advertised in popular media reports as “Human hair, bird feathers came from reptile scales” (Panko 2016). However, what this research really showed is a so-called deep homology of these skin structures (Benton et al. 2019), which all ontogenetically derive from thickened patches of skin (called placodes) in embryos. This means that scales, hairs, and feathers share a similar ontogenetic pathway and may share a common origin in an early precursor skin structure, but it does not demonstrate that feathers originated from modified adult reptile scales. Don’t take my word. Here is what the more recent study of Benton et al. (2019) emphasized: “Furthermore, it is inadequate to say that feathers evolved from reptilian scales, as both morphogenesis and CBPs of feathers are basal to those of avian scales, and that the molecular profiles of avian scales are similar to feathers, but different from reptilian scales.”
Concerning the second assumption, there is growing evidence that the scales on bird feet are not primary scales but reduced feathers. Here is a quote from Dhouailly (2009): “Concerning feathers, they may have evolved independently of squamate scales, each originating from the hypothetical roughened beta-keratinized integument of the first sauropsids. The avian overlapping scales, which cover the feet in some bird species, may have developed later in evolution, being secondarily derived from feathers.” Benton et al. (2019) further elaborated: “During theropod evolution, leg feathers became reduced from the foot to thigh, and scales replaced them. Likewise, such scales are present together with hair in a Cretaceous mammal, as well as over the whole body in the pangolin or along the tail in rodents, such as rats and mice. These scales are commonly interpreted as primitive holdovers from reptilian ancestors, but palaeontological and genetic evidence suggests that they are secondarily derived from feathers or hairs.”
Impressive to the Uninformed
We can therefore safely conclude that the new study by Cooper & Milinkovitch (2023) is just the most recent example of overhyped science that only sounds impressive to the uninformed, who neither know that mainstream evolutionary biology no longer supports an evolution of bird feathers from reptile scales, nor know that the scales on bird feet are believed to be reduced feathers. So, it is hardly surprising that a simple mutation can change bird leg scales back into feathers. Misleading research like this is one important reason I have lost faith in the overblown claims of evolutionary biology. It‘s mostly smoke and mirrors.
So, what about the grandiose claim that an “evolutionary leap — from scales to feathers — does not require large changes in genome composition or expression“? This is of course complete rubbish as well. In reality, the creation of feathers, which are the most complex integumental structures known in the animal kingdom, without doubt required coordinated changes in numerous genes.
This is because it involved differences in keratin structure, a sophisticated pattern formation of branches (rami) and subbranches (radii), as well as highly specific programmed cell death that sculpts the feather during ontogeny, and many more biological novelties that required new genetic code. The whole idea that a simple developmental switch could perform this trick is nothing short of ludicrous. What the simple switch does is just reactivate the already existing code for feather formation in a body region with secondarily reduced feathers. This has nothing to do with an evolutionary origin of biological novelty and has zero explanatory power for the origin of feathers. As I said, smoke and mirrors!
References
Bechly G 2022a. Fossil Friday: The Temporal Paradox of Early Birds. Evolution News August 19, 2022. https://evolutionnews.org/2022/08/fossil-friday-the-temporal-paradox-of-early-birds/
Bechly G 2022b. Educating “Professor Dave” on the Fossil Record and Genetics. Evolution News December 8, 2022. https://evolutionnews.org/2022/12/educating-professor-dave-on-the-fossil-record-and-genetics/
Bechly G 2023. Fossil Friday: A Waiting Time Problem for Feathers. Evolution News March 10, 2023. https://evolutionnews.org/2023/03/fossil-friday-a-waiting-time-problem-for-feathers/
Benton MJ, Dhouailly D, Jiang B & McNamara M 2019. The Early Origin of Feathers. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 34(9), 856-869. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2019.04.018
Cooper RL & Milinkovitch MC 2023. Transient agonism of the sonic hedgehog pathway triggers a permanent transition of skin appendage fate in the chicken embryo. Science Advances 9(20), 1-13. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adg9619
Di-Poï N & Milinkovitch MC 2016. The anatomical placode in reptile scale morphogenesis indicates shared ancestry among skin appendages in amniotes. Science Advances 2(6), 1-8. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1600708
Dhouailly D 2009. A new scenario for the evolutionary origin of hair, feather, and avian scales. Journal of Anatomy 214(4), 587-606. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7580.2008.01041.x
Luskin C 2021. Listen: Scale-to-Feather Evolution Doesn’t Fly. Evolution News October 17, 2021. https://evolutionnews.org/2021/10/listen-scale-to-feather-evolution-doesnt-fly/
Panko B 2016. Human hair, bird feathers came from reptile scales. Science News June 24, 2016. https://www.science.org/content/article/human-hair-bird-feathers-came-reptile-scales
Starr M 2023. Tweaking Just a Few Genes Transforms Scales Into Feathers. ScienceAlert May 22, 2023. https://www.sciencealert.com/tweaking-just-a-few-genes-transforms-scales-into-feathers
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