vid

Thanks to all.

There are few points I still don't understand:

I don't understand this. How does Passover / equinox, which is variable date in calendar, make us more confident? It doesn't tell us anything about which year they inserted extra month and which not.

So, courses lasted 2 weeks (14 days) each, roughly 2 courses a lunar month. I presume courses were week-based (sabbath, etc.), and people didn't wait day or two to align courses with new lunar month. Did they at least align courses to calendar year somehow (eg. rotation always starts on fixed day in calendar)? Or were the courses completely independent of calendar?

In latter case (courses completely independent from calendar and not aligned with it), do we have fixed point to count from? I think I remember reading about attack on Jerusalem being such, thanks to knowing exact date from Romans, and thanks to Josephus mentioning whose course it was.

DCHindley

Sure it does. If Passover must occur after the vernal equinox, which is a fixed point in a solar year, and a lunar year of 12 lunar months will fall short of a solar year by 11.5 days, then we know that an intercalated month will have to be added the year before the one in which 14 Nisan would have to occur before the Equinox if the intercalation was not present. In the cycle starting Nisan of 367 BCE, the Babylonians intercalated an extra Addaru in the 3rd, 6th, 8th, 11th and 14th year, an extra Ululu in the 17th year, and an extra Addaru again in the 19th year. All intercalated months were "full" (30 days). This was repeated each cycle thereafter.

I was wrong about Josephus adding 2 courses. All the priestly "families" were organized into 24 courses per 1 Chronicles 24:7-18. Each course supposedly worked 2 weeks in the temple before coming up again in rotation. Since 14 days divides into 354 days just over 25 times, that would mean that every lunar year one course would serve twice.

It was the DSS which spoke of 26 leaders of the courses in any one of their 364 day schematic years (14 x 26 = 364). That means in their peculiar 364 day year, or even in a normal 365.25 day solar year, 26 two-week courses would serve, meaning two priestly courses (of the 24 total) would get to serve twice.

There are fragments of calendars among the DSS that seem to synchronize the 24 priestly courses with the 364 day calendar, and possibly with a 354 day lunar calendar, but to be honest I am going from memory. I think this is discussed in some of the books that translate the DSS into English.

If you knew a specific course was serving on a specific date in a known calendar with a standardized way to intercalate with a solar year, you would be able to calculate when each course would have served in any one solar year, within a 2 week window.

So, we thus have four different cycles:

1) Jewish Lunar calendar of 12 29.5 day months (354 days) intercalated to the solar year of 365.25 days by adding 7 lunar months of unsure length (29 or 30 days) at uncertain periods in cycles of 19 solar years.

2) 24 priestly courses of 2 weeks (14 days) each (336 days before repeating).

3) Schematic 364 day year of 52 weeks exactly, with unknown system of intercalation to 365.25 day solar year, if any intercalation was performed at all.

4) Solar year of 365.25 days.

What a mess!

DCH

Sheshbazzar

Of course it will seem to be a mess to anyone whose knowledge only comes from hypothetical reasoning's, some things are only to be learned, or to become understandable by a direct participation in the actual doing.

Perhaps it is beyond the reach of any general (sans-practice) comprehension, none the less I'll give it yet one more try for your sakes.

I am certain that most readers here are aware that The Scriptures command the observance of many Festivals and Sabbath days by the children of Israel.

But how many are fully aware that The Scriptures command the observance of one particular night, once in each year, in all generations?

Allow me to present this from many versions;

Available Translations and Versions for Exodus 12:42

KJV - Exd 12:42 © Info: - King James Version 1769 Info

NKJV - Exd 12:42 - © Info: - New King James Version © 1982 Thomas Nelson

NLT - Exd 12:42 - © Info: - New Living Translation © 1996 Tyndale Charitable Trust

NIV - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - The Holy Bible, New International Version© 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society

ESV - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - English Standard Version © 2001 Crossway Bibles

RVR - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - Reina-Valera © 1960 Sociedades Bíblicas en América Latina

NASB - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - New American Standard Bible © 1995 Lockman Foundation

RSV - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - Revised Standard Version © 1947, 1952.

ASV - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - American Standard Version 1901 Info

YNG - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - Robert Young Literal Translation 1862, 1887, 1898 Info

DBY - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - J.N.Darby Translation 1890 Info

WEB - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - Noah Webster Version 1833 Info

HNV - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - Hebrew Names Version 2000 Info

VUL - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - Jerome's Latin Vulgate 405 A.D. Info

WLC - Exd 12:42 -© Info: - Jerome's Latin Vulgate 405 A.D. Info

LXX - Exd 12:42 - credit to- The Blue Letter Bible
And finally I'll provide my own translation from the Hebrew text;
As many as are obedient, set themselves to the task, searching The Scriptures, and searching the heavens to determine the signs and the seasons, that they might be so found in the -doing- of His will in His appointed season.
Men and families so minded, and so conscious, study, and seek out one another for mutual advice on the determining of that Night when they shall keep The Watch, wherever they may be.

Many opinions are presented, and the Night selected, is selected according to the conscience, and the persuasion of the observer of the Night.
Some will choose this Night, and others will choose that Night in accord with what they perceive and with what they believe. YHWH is that justifies His own.

Over many years of observance, some, with their minds well attuned to many seemingly unrelated verses of Scripture, will gain additional insight into "hidden things", things which those who are only "going through the motions" or are only following traditions cannot at all apprehend, much less those who have never at all kept His words to do them.

Like many things in life, for a person to receive the benefit, they must be in the right place, at the right time, with the right knowledge, and in the right frame of mind.
All of this is something no man can supply to another, each must do their own homework.

The simple question is, when does the year(s) begin?
Where is the first hour of the first day of the first Month?
And on what day of the week?
And what difference could it make?

spin

I think it was 1QM col.2, r)$y hm$mrwt $$h w($rym, "heads of the courses, twenty-six", that you may have been thinking of.

Mishmarot were structured over six years so that the sixth year ended in the middle of the course of the same clan that started the first year and the cycle could then be repeated.

I think you'll find that there were 24 clans mentioned (or at least implied through the fragments) in all the mishmarot.

When you take this notion of two competing calendars into consideration along with the two competing but different calendars in 1 Enoch's Astronomical Book, you'll find first a move from a 360-day calendar to 364 days -- those extra special days added at the end of each three month period making the calendar perfect in structure (though, of course, not in reality) -- and a lunar calendar was not in sight although the relations of the moon to the calendar were clearly stated in Enoch. With the DSS mishmarot we can then construct a chronology:

360-day calendar -> 364-day calendar -> 354 day calendar.

It was at the time of the mishmarot that there must have been strife regarding the lunar calendar as it was causing a reaction, though apparently not before.

Uwe Glessmer wrote on Otot and the possibilities of intercalation in the solar calendar in the DSS. VanderKam wrote a Routledge book on Qumran calendars: "Calendars in the DSS: Measuring Time (or via: amazon.co.uk)", 1998.


spin

vid

Okay, now I am confused again. In relation to original question, I think what is important is calendar used by mainstream (temple) Jewish community, if some other communities (authors of DSS) used also something different, I don't think that would change what date the "course of abijah" took place in temple.

Where do we know this from?

Let me try to calculate it: 6 years * 354 days = 2124 days, plus extra 2-3 lunar months (59 or 88.5 days) it is 2183 or 2212.5 days. One priestly course rotation took 14 days * 12 courses = 168 days. Closest hit we can get is 13 rotations: 168*13 = 2184 days, very close align to 6 lunar years with 2 extra lunar months added. But what about 6-year periods when they needed to add 3 extra lunar months? They must have gotten out of synchronisation in these periods.

Elsewhere, I have read they didn't align 13 rotations like this, but instead they inserted extra two weeks after each rotation (during which all priestly families served in temple), making a 52 week / 364 day cycle, almost aligned to solar year. Do we have any sources for this claim?

spin

The mishmarot are the priestly rotations for temple service. It's only the yo-yos who dominated the scrolls in the past who wouldn't get the implication. They thought that the mishmarot from Qumran were theoretical, rather than the obvious choice that they were in fact rosters for priestly temple service. If, as is apparent, they were, it means that the temple used the 364-day calendar for the period of these mishmarot. They didn't have priests serving in any other temples at the time.

The contents of the mishmarot from the DSS.


spin

vid

Okay then, I have already heard something about authors of DSS *not* being some outsider sect as usually claimed, but didn't look into the matter any further.

But 364 / 14 = 26, not 24. So there were extra two weeks after each cycle? (I asked about this in previous post).

If it was this simple (exactly 2 rotations per 364 day year), and given some fixed point (when we know whose course it was on known date), we probably should be able to calculate whose turn it was on any given date (if there wasn't some extra synchronization(s) inbetween, to make up for 19 solar years vs. 235 lunar months vs. 364 day priestly cycle). Right?

spin

I've already said that they used a six year cycle.

364 * 6 = 2184 (days)

2184 / 7 = 312 (weeks)

312 / 13 = 24 (courses)

In six years there are thirteen cycles of the 24 priestly clans.


spin

premjan

They didn't have a special designation (sabbath year) for the seventh year?

DCHindley

I dunno. I may have been thinking of the fact that Nehemiah 12:1-7 (520/519 BC) or Nehemiah 12:12-21 both have 22 courses (many of the names are different between these lists). Nehemiah 10:1-8 (dated depending upon which Artaxerxes was meant: A I 445/444 BC; A II 385/384 BC) or 1 Chronicles 24:3-18 (written between Exra/Nehemiah - 400 BC? - and 250 BC, but probably before 300 BC), on the other hand, have 24. Suposedly, Ezra (who I think is a fictional character) brought two more families with him (Ezra 8:2), but even if he was real no one seems to be able to pin down which Artaxerxes he arrived under (i.e., A I 458/457 BC; A II 398/397 BC; A III 352/351 BC). Another mess!

The DSS do all speak of 24 courses, but 26 will have served in a 364 day, or even a regular solar, year. That means 26 heads of families in a year. Vid, though, is right that each course served for a week at a time. Don't know why I was thinking 2 weeks straight. Funny, though, there is still debate regardng whether the priestly courses rotated backwards as described above, or they had some sort of fixed schedule that was identical year to year, or varied a little in years with intercalations:
http://books.google.com/books?id=6j-...esult#PPA79,M1

<Shudder>

DCH