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  • From: peter_kirk AT sil.org
  • To: <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: Peter, the calendar and Enoch
  • Date: Sat, 26 Jun 1999 18:52:05 -0400


Dear Ian,

I found the Wesley text file version of Enoch from a link on your site
and I am reading it. Interesting stuff, with a lot of parallels with
the Hebrew Bible and with the NT, but given that much (all?) of it is
very probably later than the Hebrew Bible it is not so helpful for
explaining the background of the Hebrew text. But then I haven't got
to the calendar yet.

Why do you insist that I set up the partially specified dates in such
a way that they could not be on the Sabbath whichever month they were
in? These events in fact only took place each on one day of the week.
Also, is there any significance that nothing happened on a Monday? If
not, it is pointless to include it in the statistics. In fact the
correct statistic is (5/7)^11 = 0.02469400930972. But there is an
important statistical principle here. Deal yourself a hand of cards,
find some interesting pattern in it (you probably can), and then work
out the probability that that pattern happened by chance. Probably
tiny, if you chose the right pattern. So was there something
extraordinary about the deal? No, because you only decided what
pattern to look for once you had found it. Believe it or not, that
principle is basic to the Second Law of Thermodynamics which is
fundamental to all physical, chemical and biological processes.
Something similar may be going on with these dates, even in your
"Obviously not random." statement (this MAY be not random, but it is
not at all obvious). Sorry, case not proven.

As for your Hexateuchal dates, I can't let you have Numbers 1:8 which
is a mere repeat of 1:1. But you did miss Exodus 16:1 (Fri) and 40:2
(Wed). So I end up with 6 Fridays, 6 Wednesdays and 1 Sunday. One
partial explanation is a preference for 1st day of the month (which
is after all a feast day) (6 out of 13 dates) which can only be one
of Wed, Fri and Sun. If we omit these, we go back to 3 Fri, 3 Wed, 1
Sun.

So I did a quick scan of the entire Hebrew Bible for dates (looking
for the word "month" in NRSV, so I may have missed some, and ignoring
partially specified dates) with the following result:

Monday 2
Tuesday 5
Wednesday 15 (6)
Thursday 6
Friday 16 (12)
Saturday 1
Sunday 12 (9)

The figures in parentheses are after discounting 1st of the month
dates. This again excludes feast days. The only Sabbath day is Esther
9:15, and both of the Mondays are also in Esther. So, I would agree
that this suggests that the dates are not random; with this number of
dates, the avoiding of Saturday and Monday is statistically
significant. I would suggest that at some stage the books other than
Esther were edited according to the solar calendar, who adjusted
Saturdays to Fridays and Mondays to Sundays throughout the Hebrew
Bible. Can you think of any better suggestion? Note that the author
of 2 Kings had no reason to presuppose that Nebuchadnezzar kept the
Jewish sabbath in his military operations, but I have included those
dates in this list.

Peter Kirk


______________________________ Reply Separator
_________________________________
Subject: Peter, the calendar and Enoch
Author: mc2499 AT mclink.it at internet
Date: 26/06/1999 06:54


Dear Peter,

<snip>

>The dates with no month given add nothing to the argument, i.e.
>subtract nothing from the probability, as there is way that such a
>date could be shown to fall on a sabbath.

Now, Peter, there is *no possibility*. You now have the calendar structure.
In both instances there are the same three possibilities. Can you see *any*
way of making a Sabbath out of those dates using the calendar information
you now have?

If you need more evidence other than Ezekiel, here's what I can find in the
Hexateuch (omitting prescriptions for feast days):

there are five dates in Genesis, all in the flood story,
1 Sun, 2 Wed, 2 Fri; (the flood started on the first day of the week)

five dates in Numbers (1:1, 1:18, 10:11, 33:3, 33:38),
2 Wed, 3 Fri;

one in Deut1:3,
1 Fri;

one in Josh4:19,
1 Fri;
-------------------------------
total of twelve days:
1 Sun, 4 Wed, 7 Fri.

Obviously not random.

<snip>





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