The Gentile Times Reconsidered Chronology Christ

Sham Scholarship 471
Throughout the historical books, the Psalms, and the prophets, the word
goim primarily signifies those nations which lived in the immediate
neighbourhood of the Jewish people; they were regarded as enemies, as
ignorant of the truth, and sometimes as tyrants.
This is corroborated by Brown-Driver-Briggs (page 156), according to which
this term (goy) is used ‘usually of non-Hebr. peoples’. In a way, the seed of this
development was sown very early -- as we know, when Noah’s offspring had
reached 70 generations the Scriptural narrative began focusing on Shem’s line,
and from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and his twelve sons onward the focus was
narrowed down to just one nation, the chosen one, especially after the law
covenant was given to it at Sinai. Of course, that did not mean that the other
nations were never mentioned again, but from then on they were on the
sidelines, as it were, as ‘the nations’, meaning the non-Jews, i.e. the heathen or
Gentiles, as they are often called in older translations, such as KJV. The word
itself occurs more than 830 times in the Hebrew Bible, and of these 86 or more
than 10% are found in the book of Jeremiah; actually, in accord with the
developments of his time, it is the Bible book with the most occurrences of this
word. It is primarily used in the plural (goyim), often determined (haggoyim) and
with the word kol (‘all’) in front; thus kol-haggoyim (‘all the nations’) occurs 16
times in Jeremiah; there are also definite forms like the one in 25:11, that is,
haggoyim ha’elleh (‘the nations the these’). This is a very emphatic construction,
indicating (like all the determined ones, only stronger than most) that the
nations referred to are well known to both the speaker and the listener. To
anyone familiar with the contents of the prophecy of Jeremiah this comes as no
surprise. – Gen. 10:1-32; 11:10-12:5; 17:1-27; 26:1-5; 35:22b-27; Ex. 19:1-20:21;
24:1-18; 34:1-17; Deut. 7:1-7; 11:23, 24; 26:17-19; 28:1; Josh. 11:23; 2 Sam. 7:23;
l Kgs 4:20-25.
Actually, we have other witnesses to the understanding of Jeremiah defended
here, namely the Watchtower writers who produced the book “All Scripture Is
Inspired of God and Beneficial” (New York 1990), in which we read on page 127,
paragraph 20:
Jehovah’s controversy with the nations
(25:1-38). This chapter is a summary of judgments that appear in greater detail
in chapters 45-49. By three parallel prophecies, Jehovah now pronounces
calamity for all the nations on earth. First, Nebuchadrezzar is identified as
Jehovah’s servant to devastate Judah and the surrounding nations, “and these nations
will have to serve the king of Babylon seventy years.” Then it will be Babylon’s turn,
and she will become “desolate wastes to time indefinite.” – 25:1-14 (emphasis
added).
Thus the Watchtower people are in full agreement with the Bible on this point,
although their pupil, RF, has chosen to view things differently. Actually, he
again shows that he knows full well what is the natural translation of the latter
clause in Jer. 25:11, namely the one shown as number 1 on top of page 84, ‘and
these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.’ Moreover, his claim
that the context focuses ‘upon the inhabitants of Judah rather than on some
undefined nations’ is palpably false: as has been already demonstrated clearly,