Biblical Hebrew Forum

["K Randolph" <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Rashi seems to be saying that when Daniel first calculated the 70
years, it was from the first time Nebuchadnezzar captured and took
captives from Jerusalem. But Rashi says that Daniel should have
counted from the destruction of the temple, which happened 18 years
later. Makes sense.

Karl W. Randolph.

On 9/5/06, Shoshanna Walker <rosewalk AT concentric.net> wrote:
> I can't follow Rashi on the second verse.  Does this make sense to
> anyone?  Does it solve any of the questions we had, dating events?
>
> Shoshanna
>
>
> Daniel - Chapter 9
>
> 1. In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus of the seed of
> Media, who was crowned over the kingdom of the Chaldeans.
>
> In the first year of Darius, the son of Ahasuerus This is not the
> Ahasuerus of the days of Haman, for he was the king of Persia,
> whereas this one was Darius the Mede who was crowned over the kingdom
> of the Chaldeans when Belshazzar was slain, as is written above
> (6:1): "And Darius the Mede took (sic) the kingdom."
>
> 2. In the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, contemplated the
> calculations, the number of the years that the word of the Lord had
> come to Jeremiah the prophet, since the destruction of Jerusalem
> seventy years.
>
> Contemplated the calculations Heb. ????????? ???????????.
>
> the number of the years, etc. I contemplated the calculation of the
> years, for I thought about what Jeremiah (29:10) prophesied: "For at
> the completion of seventy years of Babylon I will remember you," and
> I thought that this remembrance is the building of the Temple, and
> that the seventy years end in the first year of Darius the Mede,
> since the kingdom of Babylon stretched forth a hand upon Israel, when
> Nebuchadnezzar vanquished Jehoiakim to be his slave. Now that was in
> the second year of Nebuchadnezzar's reign, as the master said (Meg.
> 11b): "In the first year he conquered Nineveh; in the second year he
> went up and vanquished Jehoiakim." Figure from that year until now,
> and you will find them [the 70 years]. This calculation is found also
> in the Mishnah of Seder Olam (ch. 28), and we learned there that in
> the year of Belshazzar's death were 70 years from the day that
> Nebuchadnezzar ascended the throne: seventy minus one since the day
> that he conquered Jehoiakim, and yet one more year for Babylon, which
> Darius completed. And when I [Daniel] saw that the redemption was not
> hastening to come, I contemplated and put my heart to the
> calculation, and I knew that I should not have counted according to
> the conquest of Jehoiakim but [according] to the destruction of
> Jerusalem, when 70 years will be complete from the exile of Zedekiah,
> when Jerusalem was destroyed. And there are yet 18 years to come, for
> this exile was in the eighteenth year counting from the conquest of
> Jehoiakim, as we learned in Seder Olam: "They were exiled in the
> seventh year; they were exiled in the eighth year; they were exiled
> in the eighteenth year; they were exiled in the nineteenth year." Our
> Sages in Tractate Megillah (11b) explained that they were exiled in
> the exile of Jeconiah in the seventh year, counting from the conquest
> of Jehoiakim, which is the eighth year of Nebuchadnezzar's reign.
> They were exiled a second time in the eighteenth year, counting from
> the conquest of Jehoiakim, which is the nineteenth year of
> Nebuchadnezzar's reign.