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After retiring from teaching in 1965, he moved to ] where he continued to write. | After retiring from teaching in 1965, he moved to ] where he continued to write. | ||
He died in ] in 1986. He is buried in Rose Hill Cemetery in Berrien Springs, Michigan. | He died in ] in 1986. He is buried in Rose Hill Cemetery in Berrien Springs, Michigan. | ||
Chronology The following is based on Thiele's book "The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings". | |||
The chronology of the Hebrew kings rests on a series of cross-references within the books of Kings and Chronicles, in which the accession of each king is dated in terms of the reign of his contemporary in either the southern kingdom of Judah or the northern kingdom of Israel. Unfortunately few of these cross-references match, so that a reign which is said to have lasted for 20 years results in a cross-reference that would give a result of either 19 or 21 years. | |||
Thiele noticed that the cross-references given during the long reign of King Asa of Judah had a cumulative error of 1 year for each succeeding reign of the kings of Israel: the first cross-reference resulted in an error of 1 year, the second gave an error of 2 years, the third of 3 years and so on. He was able to demonstrate that this was due to two different methods of reckoning regnal years - the accession year method and the non-accession year method. | |||
If we think in terms of our own calendar, if the old king died on December 31 and the new king started to reign on January 1, there was no problem. However if the old king died on December 1, what did you do with the remaining 30 days of the old year? Under the accession year method, those 30 days were called the "Accession year" and Year 1 of the new king's reign began on January 1. Under the non-accession year method the 30 days were Year 1 of the new king and Year 2 began on January 1. | |||
If this were not complicated enough, Thiele was able to demonstrate that one kingdom celebrated a spring New Year while the other held to an autumn New Year. Differing new years and different methods of calculating reigns were responsible for much of the confusion in the cross-references, with the additional problem that the southern kingdom appears to have adopted its neighbour's method during the time when Athaliah seized power. | |||
With this understanding of chronology, Thiele showed that the 14 years between Ahab and Jehu were really 12 years, which meant that he could date their reigns precisely, for Ahab is mentioned in the Kurk Stele which records the Assyrian advance into Syria/Palestine and Jehu is mentioned on the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III. As these two events are securely dated by Assyrian chronology at 12 years apart, Ahab must have fought the Assyrians in his last year and Jehu paid tribute in his first year. | |||
Thiele was able to reconcile all the Biblical data with the exception of a single synchronism towards the end of the kingdom of Israel and was reluctantly forced to conclude that at that point the ancient authors had made a mistake. Oddly, it is at that precise point that he himself makes a mistake, attributing an accession year to Hezekiah's co-regency (co-regencies did not begin with an accession year). This simple error destroys the pattern which he claims as evidence of the ancient mistake, but leaves the question still unsolved of how to resolve the cross-references for this period. | |||
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Revision as of 16:18, 13 April 2007
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Edwin R. Thiele (1895–1986) was an American missionary in China, an editor, archaeologist, writer, and Old Testament professor. A native of Chicago, he graduated from Emmanuel Missionary College(which was renamed Andrews University in 1960) in 1918 with a BA degree in ancient languages. After two years of work as home missionary secretary for the East Michigan Conference, he left in 1920 for mission service in China. During his 12-year work in China, he was an editor and manager for the Signs of the Times Publishing House in Shanghai.
After returning to the United States, Thiele received an MA degree in archaeology from the University of Chicago in 1937. He then joined the religion faculty of Emmanuel Missionary College, while continuing his doctoral work at the University of Chicago. He obtained a PhD degree in biblical archaeology in 1943. His doctoral dissertation, later published as The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings, is widely regarded as the definitive work on the chronology of Hebrew kings. He'd traveled extensively throughout the Middle East in the course of his research.
From 1963 to 1965, he served as Professor of Antiquity at Andrews University. After retiring from teaching in 1965, he moved to California where he continued to write. He died in St. Helena, California in 1986. He is buried in Rose Hill Cemetery in Berrien Springs, Michigan.
Chronology The following is based on Thiele's book "The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings".
The chronology of the Hebrew kings rests on a series of cross-references within the books of Kings and Chronicles, in which the accession of each king is dated in terms of the reign of his contemporary in either the southern kingdom of Judah or the northern kingdom of Israel. Unfortunately few of these cross-references match, so that a reign which is said to have lasted for 20 years results in a cross-reference that would give a result of either 19 or 21 years.
Thiele noticed that the cross-references given during the long reign of King Asa of Judah had a cumulative error of 1 year for each succeeding reign of the kings of Israel: the first cross-reference resulted in an error of 1 year, the second gave an error of 2 years, the third of 3 years and so on. He was able to demonstrate that this was due to two different methods of reckoning regnal years - the accession year method and the non-accession year method.
If we think in terms of our own calendar, if the old king died on December 31 and the new king started to reign on January 1, there was no problem. However if the old king died on December 1, what did you do with the remaining 30 days of the old year? Under the accession year method, those 30 days were called the "Accession year" and Year 1 of the new king's reign began on January 1. Under the non-accession year method the 30 days were Year 1 of the new king and Year 2 began on January 1.
If this were not complicated enough, Thiele was able to demonstrate that one kingdom celebrated a spring New Year while the other held to an autumn New Year. Differing new years and different methods of calculating reigns were responsible for much of the confusion in the cross-references, with the additional problem that the southern kingdom appears to have adopted its neighbour's method during the time when Athaliah seized power.
With this understanding of chronology, Thiele showed that the 14 years between Ahab and Jehu were really 12 years, which meant that he could date their reigns precisely, for Ahab is mentioned in the Kurk Stele which records the Assyrian advance into Syria/Palestine and Jehu is mentioned on the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III. As these two events are securely dated by Assyrian chronology at 12 years apart, Ahab must have fought the Assyrians in his last year and Jehu paid tribute in his first year.
Thiele was able to reconcile all the Biblical data with the exception of a single synchronism towards the end of the kingdom of Israel and was reluctantly forced to conclude that at that point the ancient authors had made a mistake. Oddly, it is at that precise point that he himself makes a mistake, attributing an accession year to Hezekiah's co-regency (co-regencies did not begin with an accession year). This simple error destroys the pattern which he claims as evidence of the ancient mistake, but leaves the question still unsolved of how to resolve the cross-references for this period.
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