Remaining Questions

New blog on the kid : Change in Martyrology ... · My Benefactor had Some Points to Make on the Post About the Change in Martyrology · Remaining Questions · Φιλολoγικά/Philologica : Reasons Against? Like against year 47 AD

Citing my already mentioned benefactor, Stephan Borgehammar, again:

Två frågor kvarstår: (1) Vilket år börjar Daniels 70 årsveckor och hur vet vi det? Du har säkert skrivit om det tidigare, men jag har missat det. (2) "Publication of the Gospel". Paulus deltar i riter enligt den gamla lagen när han återkommer till Jerusalem efter sin tredje resa år 57, och gör detta för att offentligt visa att han INTE lär judar att överge lagen, se Apg. 21. Förbudet mot lagobservans måste alltså vara senare. Att det kom med "the publication of the Gospel" är ett påstående av Augustinus om jag minns rätt, men Augustinus tycks alltså inte ha haft något specifikt årtal eller någon viss händelse i åtanke. Har du någon lösning att föreslå på problemet?

Two questions remain:

• (1) What year starts the seventy years weeks of Daniel, and how do we know. You have certainly written about it earlier, but I missed it.
• (2) "Publication of the Gospel". Paul participates in rites according to the Old Law when returning to Jerusalem after his third journey in 57, and does this to show openly he is NOT teaching Jews to abandon the law, see Acts 21. The ban on observing the law must therefore be later. That it came with "the publication of the Gospel" is a claim by St. Augustine, if I recall rightly, but Augustine seems to have had no specific year or event in mind. Do you have any solution to the problem?

My answers:

• (1) I have not written on the weeks of Daniel earlier. "What year starts the seventy years weeks of Daniel," the year from a certain command, authorising the rebuilding of the temple. "and how do we know." In a sense we do not. We do not know it like we know Charlemagne was crowned Emperor 1219 years ago. Even early AD chronology is somewhat fluctuating, as you can see if Gregory of Tours makes a kind of parallel between death dates : 33 for Our Lord, 444 for St. Martin and 555 for Clovis I. It is commonly accepted now that the actual death dates for St. Martin and Clovis I are more like 400 and 510.
  
  You may note that a Jewish Anno Mundi date is different from a "bishop" Ussher Anno Mundi date, while both use Masoretic values for the lifeyears mentioned in Genesis 5 and 11. The centuries that differ are partly about the weeks of Daniel, Kent Hovind once mentioned the chronology after last books of Old Testament acknowledged by them was shortened (by Rabbi Akiva?) in order to make Bar Kochba the promised prince or Christ.
  
  So, we already have a discrepancy of confessional chronology between Jews and the most commonly accepted Christian reckonings.
  
  I'll now cite the Haydock comment for Daniel 9:
  
  

  Ver. 24. Seventy weeks (viz. of years, or seventy times seven, that is, 490 years) are shortened; that is, fixed and determined, so that the time shall be no longer. Ch. — This is not a conditional prophecy. Daniel was solicitous to know when the seventy years of Jeremias would terminate. But something of far greater consequence is revealed to him, (W.) even the coming and death of the Messias, four hundred and ninety years after the order for rebuilding the walls should be given, (C.) at which period Christ would redeem the world, (W.) and abolish the sacrifices of the law. C. — Finished, or arrive at its height by the crucifixion of the Son of God; (Theod.) or rather sin shall be forgiven. Heb. "to finish crimes to seal (cover or remit) sins, and to expiate iniquity." — Anointed. Christ is the great anointed of God, the source of justice, and the end of the law and of the prophets, (Acts x. 38. and 1 Cor. i. 30. Rom. x. 4. C.) as well as the pardoner of crimes. These four characters belong only to Christ. W.
  
  Ver. 25. Word, &c. That is, from the twentieth year of king Artaxerxes, when, by his commandment, Nehemias rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem, 2 Esd. ii. From which time, according to the best chronology, there were just sixty-nine weeks of years, the is 483 years, to the baptism of Christ, when he first began to preach and execute the office of Messias. Ch.

  
  
  I am sad a certain other Haydock site went down, since it had the names written out in full, so, Ch. would be bishop Challoner and W. would be bishop Witham, who ordained priests for the English while in exile in Douay. It might be C. whom I have then mistaken for Challoner would instead be St. Peter Canisius.
  
  Did you note Challoner's words:
  
  

  according to the best chronology,

  
  
  In other words, there is no universally agreed one.
  
  This means there is a real difficulty to actually determine what week of Daniel Our Lord was born in simply from determining the BC year. Artaxerxes is not too well documented in Olympiads or ab Urbe condita, since Persians were somewhat eastward of the scope and themselves not using those chronologies.
  
  I am making the reverse type of conclusion, which is obviously a theological one, rather than that of a secular historian.
  
  Damien Mackey actually, while a Catholic, uses the Jewish chronology, and considers Antiochus IV Epiphanes as identic to Herod. Not sure if it is a joke or not.
  
  
• (2) "Paul participates in rites according to the Old Law when returning to Jerusalem after his third journey"
  
  That would be in the Bible.
  
  "in 57,"
  
  Where do you find this year in the Bible?
  
  "and does this to show openly he is NOT teaching Jews to abandon the law, see Acts 21."
  
  I place Acts 23, two chapters later, in year 47.
  
  "The ban on observing the law must therefore be later."
  
  Or, if St. Paul had just returned, he did not yet know Ananias was the new High Priest and therefore had some catching up to do.
  
  It could be St. Paul didn't know how Ananias looked, but it could also be he was counting on Josephus still being High Priest.
  
  "That it came with "the publication of the Gospel" is a claim by St. Augustine, if I recall rightly,"
  
  Very possible, but it is by St. Thomas taken for granted as common teaching of Church Fathers and of the Ordinary Magisterium in his time.
  
  Also, I think it is cited in the bull to the Armenians at the Council of Florence, which might make it part of the infallible magisterium.
  
  "but Augustine seems to have had no specific year or event in mind. Do you have any solution to the problem?"
  
  Part of the solution would be to place Acts 21 to 23 in AD 47, not 57.
  
  And neither St. Augustine nor St. Thomas giving a specific event would be a probable outcome of an event that was covered up.
  
  If High Priests Theophilus and then Josephus coming just before Ananias had been of the 72 disciples and returned to unilaterally living among Christians after Ananias came, there would have been some cover up. Already bc of their families. It would probably have been impossible for Theophilus and Josephus to become Cohanim Godol in the first place without being married. And this would mean they had children who needed protection.
  
  It seems to be Patristic tradition that St. Zachary offered the sacrifice in the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur in Luke 1, but the text states he was offering the incense sacrifice - however, this would figure, if he had to be standin for a Cohen Gadol who became ritually impure in the last moment - like Hannas (Acts 4) seems to have replaced Kaiaphas (Gospels) after the latter made himself ritually impure (tearing of his garment and the miraculous tearing of the veil).
  
  So, we can count on there having been lots of cover up.

Two questions in return: (1) do you have specific conclusive evidence that Acts 21 must be as late as 57? (2) do you have specifics from Flavius Josephus or anything other that neither Theophilus nor Josephus can have been the Gospeller St. John?

Hans Georg Lundahl
Cergy
St. John Bosco
31.I.2020