This shows there were Jews who had already surrendered prior to when the city was taken. Jeremiah 39:1 says that Nebuchadnezzar and his whole army came up against Jerusalem and besieged it beginning in Zedekiah’s 9th year in the 10th month. This means that the deportation in Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th year could have come over a full year later after the siege began, and still be in the king’s 18th year. Second, we are told in Jeremiah 52:8-9 that when Zedekiah was taken captive, the Babylonians had to take him to Riblah in the land of Hamath, since Nebuchadnezzar was there:
But the army of the Chaldeans pursued the king and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho, and all his army was scattered from him. Then they captured the king and brought him up to the king of Babylon at Riblah in the land of Hamath, and he passed sentence on him.
Zedekiah is blinded and taken to Babylon, by José Cardero. Jeremiah forewarned Zedekiah, the last Judean king, that his sons would be killed if he did not surrender to Nebuchadnezzar. Zedekiah refused to listen. He was captured, saw his sons killed, and then was blinded.
The reasonable deduction here is that Nebuchadnezzar was not present when the city fell. He had deported Jews who had surrendered before the city was broken up, in his 18th year. The memory of Nebuchadnezzar coming and carrying away Jehoiachin and other captives from Jerusalem was only 11 years earlier, an impressionable event on the Jews that would have given them reason to fear, especially with all that Nebuchadnezzar had done to other countries in the last decade. Better to surrender now than suffer a worse fate. If, then, the deportation happened just before the end of Nebuchadnezzar’s 18th year, there would have been 14 or 15 months for the Jews to have surrendered since the siege began. This would explain why Nebuchadnezzar was not even in the environs of Jerusalem when the city was broken up in his 19th year. The lines had been drawn, so to speak, by the beginning of Nebuchadnezzar’s 19th year—the Jews having already surrendered or else having decided to stay inside the city. (One side note here. A qualifying feature of the deportations was not that Jerusalem had to be taken. For it was not taken in the deportation of the 23rd year of Nebuchadnezzar (see Jer. 52:30), as the city was already destroyed.
Therefore any argument that the city had to be taken and Nebuchadnezzar be present is false.)
Therefore there is no reason to suppose the author of Jeremiah 52 reckoned years any differently than did Jeremiah. And so all the evidence in the entire book of Jeremiah consistently points to a 586 BC destruction of Jerusalem.
Why are we belaboring the point? It is to show that the pre-exilic books in their entirety consistently reckoned regnal years from Nisan, whereas the exilic books reckoned from Tishri. This consistency in chronology is what this book’s model is based upon.
To return, then, to a point discussed a little earlier, the agreement of Jeremiah and the Books of the Kings and Chronicles on a consistent three year difference between the reigns of Nebuchadnezzar and Jehoiakim, and the fact that both kings ascended between Nisan and Tishri (technically speaking, after Nisan 1, up to but not on or after Tishri 1), also explains why all three books put Nebuchadnezzar in the same year of his reign (his 19th) at the time the last Judean King Zedekiah went into exile in August, 586 BC. Incidentally, 586 is another year (besides 597 BC) which some theologians believe the exile began, even though Jews were also deported under Nebuchadnezzar in his 23rd year (see “Jewish exile” at Wikipedia, and cf. Jer. 52:30). Now, for the sake of anticipating an objection, although II Chronicles 36:10 states that “at the turn of the year”, i.e., (Julian) April, 597, Nebuchadnezzar sent and brought Jehoiachin to Babylon and made Zedekiah king over Judah and Jerusalem, statements in Jeremiah 32:1 and chapter 52 show that there was an eight, not nine year difference between the reigns of Nebuchadnezzar and Zedekiah. But a question is raised as to whether Zedekiah was installed before or after the 1st of Nisan, 597. The answer is that Zedekiah ascended after the 1st of Nisan but before the beginning of Tishri, 597, or else II Kings 25:2 (“So the city was under siege until the eleventh year of Zedekiah”), II Chronicles 36:11 (“Zedekiah was twenty-one years old when he became king, and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem”), and Jeremiah 52:5 (“So the city was under siege until the eleventh year of Zedekiah”), could not all agree that Zedekiah went into captivity in his 11th year (in Nebuchadnezzar’s 19th year). And so the phrase “at the turn of the year” in II Chronicles 36:10 is but a general one, and does not mean that Zedekiah was installed before or on Nisan 1, 597. For had that been the case, Jeremiah would have put the length of Zedekiah’s reign at 12, not 11 years, at the time of his capture in summer, 586 BC.
Again, taking all these facts into account, especially the former ones about the early years of Jehoiakim’s reign, note that when Daniel states that he went into captivity in the 3rd year of Jehoiakim, this means the prophet was exiled somewhere between fall/606 BC up to fall/605. It was during this year, then, that King Nebuchadnezzar took captive Jehoiakim’s son, (Jeconiah), and certain prominent persons, including Daniel, from among the various groups of the chief officials, the royal family, and the nobles (Dan. 1:1-3). Therefore this does not appear to be a major deportation in terms of sheer numbers of people, nor was Nebuchadnezzar the sole regent when the exile began, which may explain why only the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th deportations are listed in Jeremiah 52, since each of these is tied to a particular regnal year of Nebuchadnezzar.16 The timeline suggests that as punishment for his rebellion, Jehoiakim had to give up some of the crème de la crème of Judean society, including his eldest son. However, Nebuchadnezzar allowed him to remain on the throne.
Destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. Jer. 52 states that the city was captured on the 9th day of the 4th month [in 586 BC]. Thirty-one days later, Nebuzaradan, Nebuchadnezzar’s captain of the guard, burned the temple, the king’s palace, and all the houses of Jerusalem. The Chaldeans also broke down the city’s walls.
We should note here that scholars seem unaware of these two historical systems of reckoning the reigning years of kings as it would apply to this alleged contradiction between Jeremiah and II Kings about the year of the second deportation, in 597 BC, a dilemma raised not because of the Babylonian record (which agrees with Jeremiah), but because II Kings 24:12 states that Jehoiachin’s surrender came in the 8th year of Nebuchadnezzar, while Jeremiah 52:28 puts the deportation [of Jehoiachin] in Nebuchadnezzar’s 7th. But, again, the solution is that the Books of Kings and Chronicles were written during or shortly after the end of the exile (probably in the middle-late 6th century; given that II Chronicles references Cyrus’ 1st year), when the Jews at Babylon reckoned the reigning years of kings from Tishri to Tishri.17
Let us review once more a crucial fact about Daniel’s deportation. The Lord refers to this time in Jeremiah 27:20 (NASB) as the time he (the Lord):
carried into exile Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, from Jerusalem to Babylon, and all the nobles of Judah and Jerusalem.
And so this deportation in the year beginning fall/606 BC marks the beginning ‘bookend’ date for the 70-year exile. Now recall that we are hypothesizing that the exile should have lasted 69 years less 2 days (70 years of 360 days each, or 25,200 days).18 Yet we also should expect that the ‘bookend’ date ending the captivity occurred on the ninth day of Cyrus’ 2nd year (as already mentioned),19 since the next day began their agricultural year on Tishri 10 (and in this case also a new inaugural year of the 50-year Jubilee cycle). Ezra’s perspective in the 5th century BC, writing about a century after Cyrus’ decree, would have reckoned Cyrus’ 1st year from Tishri up to Tishri, 538/537. This is because Cyrus entered Babylon on October 29, 539, thus after the 1st of Tishri that year.20 Therefore the longest possible length of the exile is from Tishri, 606 up to Tishri, 537, a period which NASA charts confirm could have been up to about 69 years and four weeks, while the shortest possible length of the exile would be about one year less (late in the Tishri to Tishri year 606/605 to the 1st of Tishri, 537). Needless to say, then, a 69 years less 2 days exile fits within this period. Incidentally, if the question is raised whether the 1st year of Cyrus really saw the approaching end of the exile, Ezra 2 with its long list of returning Jewish families and their exact population numbers should leave no doubt. (Side note: some have cited bogus grounds to cherry-pick what year they imagine the exile ended based on false criteria, such as when Second Temple construction began, or the year juridical presence was restored, etc. What’s next?—someone insisting Jehoiakim’s confinement inside Jerusalem during Nebuchadnezzar’s siege, prior to 606 [according to Tishri reckoning] should likewise count as part of the “exile,” since it made farming impossible? But all such notions miss the point that the exile is defined by people removed and put outside the land which they had refused rest. Certainly Jeremiah understood it that way. The exile was not merely practical, but also symbolic. If the Jews refused to serve God in their own land, they would end up serving a foreign king outside their land.)
The Submission of Jehoiachin to Nebuchadnezzar, by William Hole
Now, one possible objection to the designation of the exile from the 3rd year of Jehoiakim to the 1st year of Cyrus, is that the 1st of Nisan21 in 606 BC came earlier than its surrounding years, would likely have required a leap month, and so would have pushed Tishri too far forward in the year 606 to allow for an exile of 69 years, assumed here to have lasted through Tishri 9, 537. But there is no evidence that periodic intercalation of a month over a set period of years followed a strict mathematical pattern in biblical times (though it is often assumed the exiled Hebrews would have intercalated the calendar according to whatever Babylonian intercalation was used), and intercalation was not standardized by the Jews until the 4th century AD. But significantly, even as recently as the year 1994 we have an instance of a year which had an earlier beginning of Nisan (Mar. 13, equivalent to about Julian Mar. 20 in the late 7th century BC) compared to the two years on either side of it, just as with the year 606 BC, yet it was not intercalated. Moreover, the 1st of Nisan in the modern era can come as early as March 11 (equivalent to about Julian Mar. 18 in the late 7th century BC), whereas the 1st of Nisan that we propose here is based on the new moon of (Julian) March 23, 606 BC. Again, although records found at Elephantine show that in the 5th century BC the beginning of Nisan ranged from about (Julian) March 26 to April 24, within a day, there is no reason to suppose the 7th century Hebrews necessarily followed any form of reckoning the 1st of Nisan other than one of their own making for a particular year, if the biblical record requires it. And therefore it is assumed here that is what they did. It may have been reckoned from the new moon, as was done in the mid-early 8th century according to Amos 8. Or the reckoning may have been based on two of the three criteria known to have been used in their later history: (1) the maturation of fruit trees, (2) the state of barley, and (3) the time of the equinox. And so we may accept a March 23 new moon 606 BC as establishing Nisan 1, which yields the date of September 16, 606 for the new moon on the 7th month, Tishri. [Note: for ease of discussion we use the Babylonian names of months, not that of the Hebrews, unless otherwise noted.] The result is an exile up to about 69 years and four weeks, which would have accommodated an exile of 69 years less 2 days.
At this point let us note that the exile did not terminate at the instant of Cyrus’ edict (since it would have taken time for the Jews to organize and travel back to their land). The last day of the exile was on Tishri 9 in Cyrus’ 2nd year (Ezra 3:1-6), since the next day began their agricultural year, and thus the resumption of turning the soil after 70 years. (Technically, the year began on Tishri 10, but because the 10th was considered a Sabbath day regardless of what day of the week the 10th fell on, the sowing of fields would probably not have begun until Tishri 11. Nevertheless, Tishri 10 marked the beginning of the year.) Therefore we should not take II Chronicles 36:22 to mean that the exile necessarily ended with the 1st year of Cyrus. It merely marked the putting into motion of events leading to the end of the exile, thus fulfilling the Word of the LORD.
One more thought here about the span of the exile. Though it is speculation, perhaps Jehoiakim’s evil reign included a cessation of temple sacrifice on the day his son was taken by Nebuchadnezzar. There may have been a resentment or tempting of God by Jehoiakim, e.g., ‘God, if you are really more powerful than Nebuchadnezzar, return my son, and I will worship you’. Again, we cannot know if that was the case. But if so, the exile coincides with (but is not defined by) the absence of temple sacrifice.
To allow for a 69 years less 2 days exile, one other question must be addressed. Did Daniel use Nisan to Nisan reckoning, or that of Tishri to Tishri? That is, although Daniel was somewhat of a contemporary of Jeremiah, the book of Daniel records events as late as the 3rd year of Cyrus (536/535 BC), which is about 46 years later than the latest event recorded by Jeremiah, i.e., the deportation of Jews in Nebuchadnezzar’s 23rd year (582/581). And so, while we know that Jeremiah reckoned from Nisan to Nisan, and that Ezra and the Elephantine Jews of the 5th century BC reckoned from Tishri to Tishri, Daniel is between these. And the earliest of 14 records from Elephantine showing Tishri reckoning is from 471 BC, which appears to be some decades after Daniel wrote his book.
However, there is a biblical reference which demonstrates Tishri use during an era when Daniel would have been in his 50s, or thereabouts. Ezekiel 40:1 shows that Ezekiel, a contemporary of Daniel, used the Tishri reckoning system in 573 BC, slightly over a century earlier than that indicated by the earliest Elephantine record (471 BC). The importance of this is that it means the Tishri system was in use during the latter decades of Daniel’s life, so it is not hard to imagine that Daniel could have used it when writing his book.22 23
Let us look at the historical references in Ezekiel 40:1 that prove all this. Recall that we have already demonstrated the dates of (1) the surrender of Jehoiachin nearly a month before Nisan 1, 597, and (2) the fall of Jerusalem in summer, 586, events Ezekiel references in 40:1. We have already given evidence for the breach of Jerusalem in 586 instead of 587. But it should also be remembered that both Jeremiah and II Chronicles state that Zedekiah was in his 11th year at the time of the City’s fall. Again, this agreement in number in both books means Zedekiah ascended after Nisan 1, 597 BC (a month or so after the surrender of Jehoiachin) and (for reasons discussed earlier) before Tishri 1, 597 BC. Now, Ezekiel states that his vision came in the beginning of the year, the 10th of the month, being the 25th year of “our exile” [KJV: captivity] and the 14th year since the fall of Jerusalem (under Zedekiah). Note especially that Ezekiel is not orienting either of these events to particular regnal years of a king, such as Nebuchadnezzar. He is speaking of each event according to its own date and thus its own anniversary. And so the 25th anniversary of Ezekiel’s exile (not the 70-year exile, which began in 606 BC) is reckoned from March 16, 597 BC. And the 14th anniversary of Jerusalem’s fall is reckoned from August, 586 BC. But what does Ezekiel mean when he says the vision came at “the beginning of the year”? Is he referring to the beginning of the year which the Jews observed on Nisan 1, from the time of Moses up to the exile? Or is Ezekiel referencing Tishri system beginning on Tishi 1, or the slight variant of the sabbatical (i.e., agricultural) year, which began on Tishri 10? (The two Tishri systems will be discussed in a later chapter re: the coronation of King Josiah.)
To determine this, note that the first event, Ezekiel’s exile, began on the 2nd of Addaru (the 12th month) i.e., March 16, 597 BC. This means the 25th year of Ezekiel’s exile ran from Addaru 2, 573 to Addaru 1, This means the “beginning of the year” must fall within this year, and thus either on Nisan or Tishri, The 14th year from the breach of the city in summer, 586 ran from summer 573 to summer, 572. Therefore it is one of the Tishri systems, not that of Nisan, which Ezekiel is referencing.
Of further interest is that Ezekiel says it was “the beginning of the year, the 10th day of the month. Now the phrase “beginning of the year” does not necessarily mean it was the 1st day of the new year. For in Jeremiah 28 we are told it was “the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the fourth year”, showing that “the beginning” may be a comparison to the idea of “the latter”, rather than the very beginning of a thing. However, since it is Tishri which begins the year referenced by Ezekiel, he seems to omit the numbered month by implying the day of the month instead. Significantly, the 10th of Tishri was the actual new year date of the sabbatical year, according to Leviticus. Therefore Ezekiel was referring to new year’s day in terms of the sabbatical year. Interestingly, this was the Day of Atonement for the Jews. This, then, would seem to be the context of Ezekiel’s vision of the temple which follows in chapters 40-48. A lot has been written about the temple in Ezekiel’s vision, and what it stands for. Some believe that because Christ’s death ended the sacrificial system of lambs and goats and bulls, it is nonsensical to be reinstated at a later time. Others believe that even as the Church remembers the death of Christ through the bread and the wine, even so will Israel remember/commemorate the death of Christ through a sacrificial system. I hold to the latter view. But I believe such a system will be limited to the Millennial reign of Christ, since at some point shortly after Christ’s reign He will end all physical death.
However, it is not my intent to argue this point, though all grant a significance to Ezekiel’s vision. Rather, it is to underscore that because Ezekiel referred to Tishri as the beginning of the year, so, too, may we assume Daniel and other exilic writers did as well. This would have been one way of remembering why their nation had gone into exile. It was because of the failure to observe the 7th year (sabbatical) rest.
Ezekiel’s Vision of the Temple. The last nine chapters of Ezekiel describe a yet future temple where Christ will reign, temple activities, and portions of land allotted to the tribes of Israel.
So then, since Daniel would have been in his 50s (at most) at the time referred to by Ezekiel in 40:1, there is no reason to suppose Daniel did not also reckon years from Tishri, especially since he lived at least into his 80s and may have composed his entire book at that time. Therefore when Daniel begins his book by mentioning his exile in Jehoiakim’s 3rd year, we may presume he was reckoning from Tishri, not Nisan. And this means the 70-year exile was, in fact, not approximately 68½ years, which it would have been had Daniel used Nisan reckoning at the beginning of his book in 1:1 (and which would have resulted in a spring, 604 date), but then Tishri toward the end of his book (after Ezekiel has had his ‘Tishri’ vision and Cyrus had begun his reign); rather, a Tishri reckoning was used throughout Daniel’s book for sake of consistency, meaning an exile not longer than about 69 years 4 weeks, which period of time accommodates 70 years of exile if the years are of 360 days each.24