Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 3.djvu/819

 CHRONOLOGY

735

CHRONOLOGY

was King of Judafrom 810 to 75S, but, according to the inscriptions, In' was at war with Tiglat h-pileser about the year 741. Again. Manahen's reign over Israel ex- tended from 770 to 700, but on the monuments he is inscribed as a tributary of Tiglath-pileser in 738. These examples seem to show that, according to the traditional interpretation, the dates of the kings are about 40 years too high.

On the other hand, it has to be remembered thai there is no fixed Bible chronology, though (here are synchronisms and lengl hs of reigns given in the Books of Kings. There are, moreover, textual errors, un- certainty in regard to pre-dating and post-dating, un- reliability as to the accuracy and interpretation of names on the Assyrian tablets. So that, as we should expect, "few tables of dates furnished by Old Testament chronologists exactly agree" (Hastings, "Bible Diet.", I. 103). Another point lias to be re- membered. Elaborate artificial explanations of the chronology of the Bible from the building of the Temple to the fall of Jerusalem are given. These explanations embrace not only the period from Solo- mon to Achaz (741 B. a), but down from that time to the fall of Jerusalem (586 b. a). But it is certain that the chronology of the Books of Kings from Achaz to the destruction of Jerusalem, a period of 15.5 years, is not artificial (cf. Hastings, 401); it is in agreement with the Assyrian chronology. And does not this fact throw considerable doubt upon the whole theory of artificiality?

Finally, the Moabite Stone, referred to above, that Israel dwelt in Medeba during the days of < )mri and half the days of his son — altogether 40 years. Of t his Professor Sayce says : ' ' The real length of time was not more than 15 years" (Early His- tory of the Hebrews, 146). Now, if this be so, may we not at least argue that either the Moabite Stone is accurate or not? If it is accurate, then the number 40 was used in a most loose fashion as a round number in those days; if inaccurate, then it is clear that even the contemporary stone records of the age of the kings cannot be always trusted. How does this affect the Babylonian tablets and their evidence?

We conclude then t hat the Temple was built about 969. The secession of the Ten Tribes took place about 937. The fall of Samaria in 722 or 721, and the destruc- tion of Jerusalem 536 B. c.

(8) From tfu Destruction of Jerusalem to the Birth I. — The two great authorities for Jewish chronology after the destruction of Jerusalem are the Books of Esdras and the First Book of Machabees. There are other books too, but their evidence is so un- certain, and in certain cases so much disputed, that we do not propose to make use of them. Such are, for instance, the prophecy of Daniel and the prophecies of Aggeus and Zaclmrias. In the First Book of Mach- ind the Books of Esdras we have generally ad- mitted ti rst -rate authorities. ThusCheyne's "Encyclo- fl II. 2X65) writes of Machabees I. "The book las proved itself worthy to hold the highest rank as trustworthy chronology", and again, "The accuracy of the dates given being in the main beyond all ques- tion". The book embraces the years 175-135 8. ft, and the chief events are dated according to theSeleu- trid Era, 312 b. c. Of the Books of Esdras, Hat ten says, in Hastings, "The historical value of these books is very great". Difficulties exist in regard to the names of Darius and Artaxerxes. Is the Darius re- ferred to Darius I or Darius II? — Without much doubt. Darin- I. Van Hoonacker is inclined to iden- tify the Artaxerxes of chapter \ ii with the second of that name, and so would place the return of Esdras to Jerusalem under Artaxerxes II. in 404, contrary to the view of most commentators. Xehemias, he says, returned under Artaxerxes I in 444. But it is commonly held that Esdras returned in 457 and Nehemias in 1 14 it. c. The first band of captives re-

turned to Jerusalem under Zorobabel in the first year of Cyrus, i. e. 536 B. c. They laid the foundation of the Temple, which was finished in 516.

We know nothing of the chronology of the Jews after this till the time of the Machabees. But the First Book of Machabees gives information about the period 174-135; it opens with a description of the position of the Jews under Antiochus Epiphanes. Then comes an account of the rising under Matha- thias, in 167, and his death. Next followed his son Judas who continued the struggle till he died in 161. Jonathan, Judas's brother, was the next leader till 143. In the following year the Jews recovered their independence under Simon. Simon was made ruler in 141, was murdered in 135, and was succeeded by his son John Hyrcanus in the same year. _ (9) Date of the Nativity of Jesus Christ. — At first sight it seems a simple thing to fix the date of the birth of Jesus Christ. Was it not in the beginning of the first year of the Christian Era? It was a monk of the sixth century, named Dionysius Exiguus (the Little) who fixed our present Christian Era. laying down that Jesus Christ was born on the 25th of December, a. r. c. 753, and commencing the new era from the following year, 754. That date, as we shall see, cannot be correct and, instead of being an im- provement on, is farther from the truth than the dates assigned by the early Fathers, St. Irena?us and Tertullian. who fixed the date of the Nativity in the 41st year of Augustus, that is to say. 3 years b. c, or A. u. c. 751. We must note first that' St. Matthew says (ii, 1) that Our Saviour was born "in the days of King Herod". Josephus tells us (Antiquities, XVII, viii, 1), that Herod died "having reigned 34 years de facto since the death of Antigonus, and 37 years de jure since the Roman decree declaring him king". We know also that he began to reign in the consulship of Domitius Calvinus and Asinius Pollio, 40 B. c, in the lS4th Olympiad (Ant., xiv, 5); and that he he- came king de facto in the consulship of Marcus Agrippa and Canidius Callus, in the 185th Olympiad (Ant., XIV, xvi. 4). These calculations do not make it sure whether Herod died in the year 3, 4, or 5 b. c, but it is most probable that it was in the year 4 b. c. That date is corroborated by an eclipse of the moon which occurred (Ant.. XVII, vi, 4) on the very night that Herod burnt Matthias alive, a few days before his own death; for there was an eclipse of the moon from 12 March u< 13 March, 4 B. c. All this points to the fact that Herod died in the year 4 b. c, and th Our Saviour must have been born before that date. In May, October, and December of the year 7 B. c., a conjunction of the planets Jupiter and' Saturn took place. Kepler, the astronomer, suggested that per- haps this phenomenon was connected with the star seen by the Magi (Matt., ii, 2). But this idea is alto- gether too uncertain to be entertained seriously, or to form a basis for any reliable chronology. Nor can we come to any more definite conclusion from what St. Matthew says of the sojourn of the child Jesus in Egypt (ii, 14, 19,22), where he remained till the death of Herod. Herod ordered a massacre of the children up to two years old according to the information about the date of the Nativity which he had received from the Magi. In itself there is nothing unlikely in that, for we know that Herod was a uio-l cruel and whimsical man. having, for instance, summoned fo his bedside all the principal men of the Jewish nation with a view to having them shot with darts at the moment of his death, so thai there might be universal lamentation when he left this life. We do not. how- ever, know what information Herod possessed as to

the date of the Nativity, whether the Magi gave him accurate information, or whether tiny possessed it themselves: what the incident would seem to show was. that < )ur Saviour was born some time before Herod's death, probably two years or more. So that,