The Gentile Times Reconsidered Chronology Christ

Furuli’s First Book 437
It is obvious that Josephus, in his works, repeatedly presents confusing and
erroneous statements about the Neo-Babylonian reigns and conflicting
explanations of the period of Jerusalem’s desolation. It is only in his latest
discussion, in which he quotes Berossus’ figures, that his statements can be
shown to roughly agree with reliable historical sources.
The chronology of Ptolemy’s Canon—centuries older than Ptolemy
How important are the writings of Claudius Ptolemy (2nd century CE) for
the chronology established for the Neo-Babylonian era? Furuli assigns them a
decisive role:
“One of the most important sources for the present New Babylonian
chronology is Claudius Ptolemy (2nd century C.E.). As one author
expressed it: ‘The data from the Almagest provide the backbone for all
modern chronology of antiquity’.” (p. 70)
The author quoted is Professor Otto Neugebauer, who until his death in
1990 was a leading authority on the astronomical cuneiform tablets. What did
he mean? Did he mean that the ancient astronomical observations that Claudius
Ptolemy presented in Almagest still are the principal or perhaps even the sole
basis for the absolute chronology scholars have established for the Neo-
Babylonian and Persian periods? As will be demonstrated below, definitely not.
Recurring themes in Furuli’s book are (1) that the Neo-Babylonian and
Persian chronology builds on the writings of Claudius Ptolemy, (2) that
Claudius Ptolemy was a fraud who falsified the ancient observations he used,
and (3) that, therefore, the chronology established for those ancient periods is
false. As early as page 13, Furuli claims:
“The modern view of the chronology of the old world builds on the
writings of Claudius Ptolemy. Twenty-five years ago the geophysicist R.
R. Newton argued that Ptolemy was a fraud because he claimed he made
observations when instead he made calculations backwards in time.”
But Furuli’s thesis is a straw man, an argument without substance. No
informed scholar today holds that the writings of Claudius Ptolemy are now the
basis of the chronology established for the Ancient Near East. True, Parker and
Dubberstein stated half a century ago that they had used the Ptolemaic Canon
and some other classical sources as a general basis for their Babylonian
chronology. But they went on to explain that they checked, confirmed, and
improved this chronology by using Babylonian cuneiform texts such as
chronicles, kinglists, economic texts, and astronomical tablets. (PD, 1956, p. 10)
Furthermore, Claudius Ptolemy did not originally create the Ptolemaic
Canon—he merely reproduced an existing list of kings. As Professor Neugebauer
(the author quoted by Furuli) once pointed out, the common name of the
kinglist, “Ptolemy’s Canon,” is a misnomer. This has been known for a long time.
F. X. Kugler and Eduard Meyer, for example, pointed out long ago that the list
had been in use for centuries before Ptolemy. (For additional details and
documentation about this, see GTR 4 , Ch. 3, A-2.)