The Gentile Times Reconsidered Chronology Christ

Furuli’s First Book 455
Is Furuli’s 70-year desolation of Jerusalem supported by archaeology?
In note 126 on page 91, Furuli indicates that his theory of a 70-year-long
desolation period for Jerusalem is supported by archaeological findings. He
quotes from an article written by Ephraim Stern, “The Babylonian Gap,” in
Biblical Archaeology Review (Vol. 26:6, 2000, pp. 45-51, 76). Stern points out:
“For roughly half a century—from 604 B.C.E. to 538 B.C.E.—there
is a complete gap in evidence suggesting occupation.” (pp. 46-47)
This would indicate a gap of about 68 years. But Furuli fails to explain that
the destruction that Stern dates to 604 BCE is the one caused by the
Babylonian armies at their first capture of Judah and the surrounding nations in
Nebuchadnezzar’s accession and first regnal years. This is evidently the
destruction that Jeremiah, too, refers to at 25:18 and which he, too, dates to the
first year of Nebuchadnezzar in 25:1. Evidently the country was widely
devastated by the Babylonian army on its first swing through Judah. (See the
comments on this in GTR 4 , Ch. 5, A-1, ftn. 10.) Of the destruction of
Jerusalem 18 years later—which Stern dates to 586 BCE—Stern writes: “The
evidence of this destruction is widely confirmed in Jerusalem excavations.” (p.
46) A careful examination of Stern’s article shows that there is nothing in it that
supports Furuli’s views of the 70 years. This is also true of Stern’s more recent
article on the same subject, “The Babylonian Gap: The Archaeological Reality,”
published in the Journal for the Study of the Old Testament (JSOT), Vol. 28:3 (2004),
pp. 273-277.
The Biblical 70 years—Furuli’s “different approach”
In the last few pages of chapter 4, Furuli describes his approach to the
Biblical prophecies on the 70 years as “different.” Different how? It is different,
he says, because he allows the Bible to take precedence over secular historical
sources. He attempts to show this by comparing his approach with the
discussion of the 70 years written by the Seventh Day Adventist scholar Ross
E. Winkle. Furuli brings up Winkle’s discussion, he says, because he is the only
scholar known to him who uses a linguistic approach to the 70-year passages:
“The only person I am aware of who has discussed the prophecies of
the exile from a linguistic point of view and in a scholarly way is a
scholar writing in an Adventist periodical.” (p. 89)
This is a gross overstatement. I have many commentaries and articles that
discuss these passages from a linguistic point of view. Nevertheless, Winkle’s
discussion is excellent. It was published in 1987 in the scholarly SDA
publication Andrews University Seminary Studies (AUSS,Vols. 25:2 and 25:3). As a
subscriber to that journal, I read Winkle’s articles in 1987 and was surprised to
find out how remarkably similar most of his observations and conclusions were
to my own, published four years earlier in GTR 1 . (See the comments on this in
GTR 4 , Ch. 5, G-2, ftn. 57.)
Furuli explains that the difference between Winkle’s approach and his own
is that Winkle “interprets the words of Daniel and the Chronicler in the light of
his understanding of the traditional chronology. I, on the other hand, start with
the words of Daniel and the Chronicler, which I argue are unambiguous, and