Jim Larmore

Your absolutely correct in this post but what you are ignoring is the fact that Daniel was not a Babylonian or a Greek. He was a Hebrew who was keeping with the tradional 360 day year kept back then.

RGD

Gee, and this little invention now appears for the first time in this thread. Where did you claim this, Jim? And I hate to break the news to you, but the Church did not end the persecution of heretics in 1798; the last burning of a heretic I know of was in 1781 - well before the little fracas in Rome. More interesting is this little tidbit: from here.

The point is that the Church has never abandoned persecution of heretics - they've just changed the penalties from the Catholic Encyclopedia.

RGD

Unlikely, but can you support this claim?
History does not support what you have claimed; every source we have given you points out that you are factually incorrect.

You'll have to deal with real history sooner or later.

Chris Weimer

Jim, you keep claiming that "history" backs you up. Yet you have yet shown any history at all. Out with it! Oh wait, you have nothing.

Amaleq13

I don't understand the relevance of your first two sentences to my question. Are you suggesting that the first year of Tiberius' reign should be dated by the prophecy rather than other sources?

Every source I've found online gives 14CE as the starting year of Tiberius' reign. What year does Tacitus give?

You clearly implied that a margin of error was allowable when you wrote:

"Like I said there is a lot of debate over which is the right year but to be honest to even get within a couple years is amazing considering this prophecy was written over 500 years before." (emphasis added)

Since the Gospel authors who offer a birth year don't appear to agree that doesn't seem to be a true statement but we'll leave that for another thread.

You are missing the point. Why should we assume that the prophecy is referring to the start of Jesus' ministry? The Gospels offer several more obvious "starting points" such as his birth, his baptism, or his resurrection. Either of those three seem to me much better candidates for the point when Jesus is crowned, starts his reign, or is considered the Messiah.

Your choice of the beginning of his ministry doesn't make sense unless you are interpreting the prophecy after performing the calculations and just looking for some event to create a "fulfillment".

Anat

And what is your source for a 360 day calendar in the first place? A lunar calendar has months of 29 and 30 days. I don't know about earlier epochs, but in Mishnaic times the beginning of the month was determined by observation of the moon, despite the fact that Gamliel of Yavne claimed to know the length of the lunar cycle to the 1/18th of a minute (as a means to preserve the authority of the Sanhedrin, and the position of the Judean community over the diaspora). If Passover seemed to be too early an extra month was added. This doesn't require a sophisticated astronomy, observation can get you rather far.

JoeWallack

JW:
Would you be so kind as to define "I can show". For instance:

1) Prove absolutely?

2) Prove beyond a reasonable doubt?

3) Prove based on most likely explanation?

4) Prove based on most likely explanation including can't prove due to uncertainty?

5) Prove based on a majority of the available evidence?

6) Present a reasonable argument?

7) Present a possible argument?

8) Present a post here with your conclusion?



Joseph

Vorkosigan

JJ Collins, one of the world's leading Daniel scholars and an expert on messianism, notes in Scepter and Star:

"In Daniel 9, Jeremiah's prediction of seventy years of desolation is reinterpreted as seventy weeks of years. The first seven weeks end with the advent of "an anointed ruler" (hebrew deleted). The reference is most probably to Joshua the postexilic High Priest, who was one of the two "sons of oil" in Zechariah. Then, after sixty-two weeks, "the anointed one will be cut off" (9:26). Modern critics generally recognize here a reference to the murder of the High Priest Onias III about 171 BCE, whic is recorded in 2 Macc 4:23-28. There is a long line of traditional exegesis that reads both Dan 9:25 and 9:26 in terms of an eschatological messiah. For traditional Christian exegesis, the anointed one who was cut off was obviously Christ. The original reference, however, was neither to a king nor to a savior figure at all, but to a High Priest. Daniel accepted the theocratic organization of the postexilic community, as surely as did Ben Sira." (p34-5)

Looks like those rock-solid scholars don't support you either. In fact, the whole set of imagery of beasts and horns, as Collins -- a conservative Christian scholar -- points out, is rooted in ancient Canaanite mythology.

Vorkosigan

Eldarion Lathria

The last Western Roman Emperor, a figurehead called Romulus Augustulus, was overthrown in 476 by his Magister utriusque militum Odovakar, a Rugian chieftain. Odovakar hastened to swear a vague kind of fealty to the Eastern Roman Emperor. Odovakar was overthrown by Theoderik the Ostrogoth, who called himself King of Italy. The Ostrogoths occupied Italy. Your ten horns leaves them out. The Roman Empire in the west was not replaced by ten kingdoms but by eighteen: the Visigoths, the Franks, the Vandals, the Suebians, the Angles, the Saxons, the Ostrogoths, the Jutes, the Burgunds, the Visigoths, the Euskotar Confederacy (not a kingdom, but occupying territory claimed by Rome) , the Britons, the Heruls, the Rugians, the Avars, the Eastern Roman Empire, the Alans, and the Huns. I did not include the shortlived duchy ruled by Syagrius in northern Gaul, nor Julius Nepos (deposed in 474 CE) and still claiming to be the legitimate Roman emperor. Nor have I included latercomers like the Bulgars, the Langobards, the Norse, or the Serbs. I have included ONLY peoples who occupied territories of the former Western Roman Empire.

Eldarion Lathria

Celsus

No, really, I am listening!

Joel