Missing years

The missing years in the Hebrew calendar refer to a discrepancy of some 165 years between the traditional Rabbinic dating for the destruction of the First Temple and the modern secular dating for it (586 BCE).

The rabbinic work Seder Olam of the second century CE interprets the verses of Daniel 9:24–27 which contain the prophecy of seventy weeks to refer to a period of 490 years (a week is interpreted as meaning a period of seven years) that would pass between the destruction of the first and second temple. This is used to date the destruction of Solomon's Temple to 3338 Anno Mundi i.e 423 BCE - 490 years before the second temple destruction at 70CE.

The historical consensus, however, is that the Babylonian captivity happened in 586 BCE and that the period of Persian hegemony extended from the accession of Cyrus the Great in 530BCE to the Macedonian conquest of Alexander the Great in 334BCE. This is known from a large and varied number of Greek, Persian and Babylonian sources from the period.

Two-year difference within the Hebrew calendar

Today, Hebrew dating places the creation of the world near the end of "Year One" AM and afterwards the first year of Adam's life as "Year Two" AM. However, Seder Olam Rabba shows that the Hebrew dating originally counted the first year of Adam's life as "Year Zero" AM. This may mean that the Hebrew dating has shifted in the course of history such that traditional dating of ancient events appears two years earlier than the modern Hebrew dating would be (Edgar Frank, Talmudic and Rabbinic Chronology, 1956). Alternatively, it could be that there was no calendar shift, or a shift of only one year, as the discrepancies regarding Adam's year of creation (he was not born) may only, or partially, reflect different views of the process of Creation.

Rabbinic tradition^[1] says that the First Temple was destroyed in "year 3338" AM and the Second Temple in "year 3828" AM. If there was no calendar shift, the Common Era equivalents would be 423 BCE and 68 CE, respectively. If there was a calendar shift, the destructions would have taken place in our years 3339 and 3829 AM, or in 3340 and 3830 AM, and the Common Era equivalents would be 422 BCE and 69 CE, respectively, or 421 BCE and 70 CE.

If there was no calendar shift, the length of the missing-years period would be 163 years (586 minus 423). If there was a calendar shift, the length of the missing-years period would be 164 or 165 years.

The missing years and Daniel

A popular explanation for the missing years suggests that the Jewish sages interpreted the prophecy in Daniel 9:24–27 as meaning that there would be 490 years from the destruction of the First Temple to the destruction of the Second Temple and, working backwards from the destruction of the Second Temple (in 3828 AM), wrongly dated the destruction of the First Temple (in 3338 AM).

A variation on this argument states that the Jews deliberately altered the dating so that the true date of the "anointed one" (Mosiach) mentioned in Daniel 9:25 would be hidden. Other apologists^[who?] have countered with claims that the dating was indeed altered for one or another reason and should be understood as fable, not history.

These explanations come from the ambiguous meaning of the word 'week' in Hebrew, which means 'a heptad', or a group of seven. The Hebrew word for 'week' is used to refer to periods of seven days as well as seven years.^[2] The understanding of this number as referring to 490 years can also be found in Seder Olam. Christians also interpreted these verses as years and connect them to Jesus, although Rashi's interpretation is such that it upholds the tradition that the anointed one in question is the Persian king Cyrus. See Prophecy of Seventy Weeks.

Highlighting discrepancies

Mistakes in the Hebrew or secular dating

If traditional dates are assumed to be based on the standard Hebrew calendar, then the differing traditional and modern secular dating of events cannot both be correct. Attempts to reconcile the two systems must show one or both to have errors.

Missing reign lengths in the Hebrew dating

Secular scholars see the discrepancy between the traditional and secular date of the destruction of the First Temple arising as a result of Jewish sages missing out the reign lengths of several Persian kings during the Persian Empire's rule over Israel. Modern secular scholars tally ten Persian kings whose combined reigns total 208 years. By contrast, ancient Jewish sages only mention four Persian kings totaling 52 years. The reigns of several Persian kings appear to be missing from the traditional calculations.

Missing years in Jewish tradition

R' Azariah dei Rossi, in Me'or Einayim (c. 1573), was likely the first Jewish authority to claim that the traditional Hebrew dating is not historically precise regarding the years before the Second Temple.

R' Nachman Krochmal in Guide to the perplexed of our times (Hebrew, 1851) points to the Greek name Antigonos mentioned in the beginning of Avot as proof that there must have been a longer period to account for this sign of Hellenic influence. He posits that certain books of the Bible such as Kohelet and Isaiah were written or redacted during this period.

R' David Zvi Hoffman (1843–1921) points out that the Mishna in Avot (1:4) in describing the chain of tradition uses the plural "accepted from them" even though the previous Mishna only mentions one person. He posits that there must have been another Mishna mentioning two sages that was later removed.

It has been noted that the traditional account of Jewish history shows a discontinuity in the beginning of the 35th century: The account of Seder Olam Rabbah is complete only until this time. It has been postulated that this work was written to complement another historical work, about subsequent centuries until the time of Hadrian, which is no longer extant. It appears that Jewish dating systems only arose in the 35th century, so that precise historical records would naturally have existed only from that time onwards. The Minyan Shtarot system, used to date official Jewish documents, started in the year 3449. According to Lerman's thesis, the year-count "from Creation" was established around the same time (see Birkat Hachama).

It has also been posited that certain calculations in the Talmud compute better according to the secular dating (Y2K solution to the Chronology Problem, Hakirah Vol. 3).

Two possible harmonizations are proposed by modern-day Rabbis:

• 1. R' Shimon Schwab points to the words "seal the words and close the book" in the book of Daniel as a positive commandment to obscure the calculations for the Messiah mentioned within. However, R' Schwab later withdrew this suggestion once it became clear that the whole basis for the dating of the sabbatical and jubilee years would be undermined, labeling it a mere thought experiment.

• 2.An alternative solution suggests that the sages were concerned with the acceptance of the Mishna. There existed a Rabbinical tradition that the year 4000 marked the close of the "era of Torah". The authors of the Hakirah article propose that the Sages therefore arranged the chronology so that the redaction of the Mishna should coincide with that date and thus have a better chance of acceptance.

Critiques of secular dating

Attempts have been made to reinterpret the historical evidence to agree with the Rabbinic tradition, however this approach to the discrepancy is problematic. The reinterpretation of the Greek, Babylonian and Persian sources that is required to support the traditional dating has been achieved only in parts and has not yet been achieved in its entirety. Similar problems face other attempts to revise secular dating (such as those of Peter James and David Rohl) and mainstream scholarship rejects such approaches.

References

• Jewish History in Conflict: A Study of the Major Discrepancy between Rabbinic and Conventional Chronology, by Mitchell First (Jason Aronson, 1997)
• Talmudic and Rabbinic Chronology, by Edgar Frank (New York: Feldheim 1956)
• Chronology of the Ancient World, by E.J. Bickerman (Cornell University Press, 1968, 1982)
• The Crime of Claudius Ptolemy. Robert R. Newton (The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore and London, 1977)
• Daniel 9 in You Take Jesus and I'll Take God by S. Levine, revised edition, Hamoroh Press, Los Angeles, 1980 - explains the Jewish understanding of Daniel 9:24-27
• The Romance of Biblical Chronology, by Martin Anstey (London: Marshall Brothers, 1913) - interprets Daniel as prophesying the crucifixion of Jesus, so the Temple as having been destroyed in 502 BCE
• R' Shimon Schwab in “Comparative Jewish Chronology in Jubilee Volume for Rav Yosef Breuer” pp. 177–197.
• David Zvi Hoffman "Ha'mishna Rishona" (Heb.)
• Fixing the History Books, Dr. Chaim S. Heifetz's Revision of Persian History, by Brad Aaronson - Jewish scholarly critique of secular dating
• Fixing the Mind by Alexander Eterman - a rebuttal of Heifetz's critique.
• Secular Chronology by Walter R. Dolen - Christian scholarly critique of secular dating
• Jewish Dating System - defense of modern secular dating
• Significant Events In Jewish And World History - timeline based on traditional Jewish sources
• A Y2K solution to the Chronology Problem - theory based on calculations in the Talmud