landzastanza

the first first year of Zedekiah: 602-601 B.C.

direct quotations from scripture are in red font

In contrast, the plates of brass that Lehi sent his sons to obtain were found
to have scriptural coverage up to the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah
but not into a first year of his reign: "... a record of the Jews from the
beginning, even down to the commencement of the reign of Zedekiah, king
of Judah, and also the prophecies of the holy prophets from the beginning,
even down to the commencement of the reign of Zedekiah, and also many
prophecies which have been spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah" (The Book
of Mormon RLDS 1 Nephi 1:161-163 - LDS 1 Nephi 5:12-13).

The words "spoken by the mouth of Jeremiah" are significant. They are a
verbal link to the 36th chapter of Jeremiah: "Then Jeremiah called Baruch
the son of Neriah; and Baruch wrote from the mouth of Jeremiah all the
words of the Lord, which he had spoken unto him, upon a roll of a book"
(Jeremiah 36:4). "And they asked Baruch, saying, Tell us now, How didst
thou write all these words at his mouth? Then Baruch answered them, He
pronounced all these words unto me with his mouth, and I wrote them
with ink in the book" (Jeremiah 36:17-18).

Verses 1-7 of Jeremiah chapter 36 describe events in the fourth year of
Jehoiakim. Verses 8-32 of Jeremiah chapter 36 describe events in the fifth
year of Jehoiakim. As I will show, what was then regarded as the beginning
of the reign of Zedekiah was in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, who was at
that time in Babylon). What was then regarded as the first year of
Zedekiah would later be regarded as the fifth year of Jehoikim.

2 Chronicles 36:5-6
Jehoiakim was twenty and five years old when he began to reign, and he
reigned eleven years in Jerusalem; and he did that which was evil in the
sight of the Lord, his God. Against him came up Nebuchadnezzar, king of
Babylon, and bound him in fetters, to carry him to Babylon.

Apocrypha 1 Esdras 1:39-40 Brenton Septuagint Translation (1851)
Five and twenty years old was Joacim when he was made king in the land
of Judea and Jerusalem; and he did evil before the Lord. Wherefore
against him Nabuchodonosor the king of Babylon came up, and bound him
with a chain of brass, and carried him into Babylon.

Daniel 1:1-2
In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, came
Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, unto Jerusalem and besieged it. And the
Lord gave Jehoiakim, king of Judah, into his hand, with part of the vessels
of the house of God, which he carried into the land of Shinar to the house
of his god; and he brought the vessels into the treasure house of his god.

Adam Rutherford Pyramidology Book III (1966) page 572
We know from the Babylonian Chronicle (B.M. 21946) that this battle
[Carchemish] occurred in the first four months of Nabopolassars's 21st
year (Nebuchadnezzar's accession year), hence in 603 B.C. which therefore
fell in the second half of Jehoiakim's 3rd year and not in his 4th year. The
apparent difficulty has been caused by the puncuation of Jeremiah 46:1-2
in English Bibles. Correctly punctuated, it would read:
The word of the LORD which came to Jeremiah the prophet against the
Gentiles --- against Egypt, against the army of Pharaoh-Necho king of
Egypt, which was by the river Euphrates in Carchemish, which
Nebuchadnezzar smote --- in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, the son of
Josiah king of Israel.
The 4th year of Jehoiakim was thus the date when Jeremiah uttered that
prophecy and not the date of the Battle of Carchemish which occurred in
the previous year ...

If the people of Jerusalem did not know how long Jehoiakim would be in
Babylon, they would have kept his throne vacant pending his return. I am
guessing that in what would have been Jehoiakim's fourth year, they may
have wanted to make Jehoiakim's half-brother Zedekiah king. If so,
Zedekiah would have sent a delegation to Babylon to find out if Jehoiakim
was about to return to Jerusalem to continue as king. If Jehoiakim did not
know when Nebuchadnezzar would allow that, Jehoiakim might have
allowed Zedekiah to serve as king until Jehoiakim was allowed to return.
The remainder of what would have been Jehoiakim's fourth year would
become the beginning of Zedekiah's reign and what would have been
Jehoiakim's fifth year would become the first year of Zedekiah.

Only two months after the first year of Zedekiah had begun, Jehoiakim
returned to Jerusalem (Jeremiah 36: 19-32), rendering Zedekiah's reign in
the fourth and fifth years of Jehoiakim null and void. The regnal year of
Judah's kings began in the seventh month of the sacred year. Therefore,
Jehoiakim's return to Jerusalem, in the ninth month of his fifth year, was
only two months after the commencement of the first first year of
Zedekiah. So Lehi was called to be a prophet just prior to the return of
Jehoiakim to Jerusalem.

Evidence that the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah was in the fourth year
of Jehoikim exists. Jeremiah's prophecies to the nations in chapters 46-51
can be dated in the fourth year of Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 46:2). As the
introduction to the Jewish Publication Society's 1973 edition of The Book
of Jeremiah states: "... the oracles against the foreign nations, which in the
Hebrew text are grouped near the end of the book (chapters 46-51) are
located in the Greek [Septuagint] after 25:13." Jeremiah chapter 25
describes events in the fourth year of Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 25:1). Within
the prophecies to the nations is a clear reference to the beginning of the
reign of Zedekiah.

Jeremiah 49:34
The word of the Lord that came to Jeremiah the prophet against Elam in
the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah.

According to Adam Rutherford's studies on Bible chronology, as updated
in his Pyramidology Book III (1966), the phrase "in the beginning of the
reign of Zedekiah" should not even exist. On page 528 he wrote: "The
abundance of synchronisms shows that, contrary to the usual practice, the
accession year of Zedekiah, King of Judah, was counted as his 1st regnal
year." Since a phrase that shouldn't exist does exist, it may refer to the
unusual and awkward political situation suggested in this article. Adam
Rutherford presented a chronological chart of Bible chronology that runs
sideways through many pages at a scale of 1/2 inch per year with columns
of years of the reigns of the kings of diverse nations accurately offset as
needed to show them beginning in spring, fall, or winter. Printed arrows
link events between pertinent columns to show when mutual events
occurred in each nation's system of reckoning.

Jeremiah 27 begins "In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim." Yet in
verses 3 and 12, it is stated that Zedekiah was the king at that time. The
Jewish Publication Society's 1985 translation points out that in a few
manuscripts and in the Syriac version, Jeremiah 27 begins "In the
beginning of the reign of Zedekiah." I think that "Zedekiah" was intended,
because chapter 28 begins "And it came to pass the same year, in the
beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the fourth year [of
Jehoiakim], and in the fifth month..." I think that the words I have added in
brackets are justified. For how can "the beginning of the reign," which
preceded the first year of a king, also be "the fourth year"? It cannot, unless
the situation was as I have shown, with Zedekiah acting as king while
Jehoiakim was in Babylon.

Since Jehoiakim was a killer of prophets (Jeremiah 26:20-24), while
Zedekiah was not (Jeremiah 38:14-16), Lehi and his followers might have
preferred to reference the first year of Zedekiah instead of the fifth year of
Jehoiakim, even after Jehoiakim's return to Jerusalem. The superscription
of 3 Nephi states that Lehi "came out of Jerusalem in the first year of
Zedekiah," even though Jehoiakim had replaced Zedekiah as king prior to
Lehi's departure from Jerusalem.

Since the first first year of Zedekiah was the same as the fifth year of
Jehoiakim, during which Lehi came out of Jerusalem, the imprisonment of
Jeremiah, mentioned by Lehi's son Nephi (The Book of Mormon RLDS
1 Nephi 2:22 - LDS 1 Nephi 7:14), occurred in the fifth year of Jehoiakim.
In that year (Jeremiah 36:9), King Jehoiakim, after he had cut up and
burned a roll of Jeremiah's prophecies (Jeremiah 36:22-25), ordered the
arrest of Jeremiah and his scribe Baruch (Jeremiah 36:26). God prevented
the arrests until after Jeremiah and Baruch had created a new roll of
Jeremiah's prophecies to replace the one that the king had destroyed
(Jeremiah 36:27-32).

Perhaps the stolen 116 pages of Joseph Smith's translation from the Book
of Lehi contained an account of the Jehoiakim-Zedekiah situation. If so,
neither Joseph Smith, nor the scribes he dictated to, mentoned it. See The
Lost 116 Pages (2019) by Don Bradley. Nor did Joseph Smith's new
translation of the Bible make significant changes to the Book of Jeremiah,
which in my opinion has some internal conflicts that might be resolved
when the large plates of Nephi hidden in Cerro Rabon in Mexico are found
and translated. See: sealed portion of The Book of Mormon plates. Until
then, it may be foolish to be rattled that the accepted first year of
Zedekiah occurred too late to have been 600 years before the birth of
Christ:
___RLDS 1 Nephi 3:4 - LDS 1Nephi 10:4
___RLDS 1 Nephi 5:236 - LDS 1 Nephi 19:8
___RLDS 2 Nephi 11:35 - LDS 2 Nephi 25:19
___RLDS 3 Nephi 1:1 - LDS 3 Nephi 1:1
___RLDS 3 Nephi 1:44 - LDS 3 Nrphi 2:6

There must have been two first years of Zedekiah, and it was from the first
first year of Zedekiah that the 600 years should be counted. According to
the table of chronology in Pyramidolody Book III (1966) by Adam
Rutherford, the fifth year of Jehoiakim, which was also the first first year
of Zedekiah, began in the Autumn of 602 B.C. and ended in the Autumn
of 601 B.C. So Lehi "came out of Jerusalem in the first year of Zedekiah"
(3 Nephi superscription) 600 standard solar years prior to the birth of
Jesus Christ, which occurred on the equivalent of April 6th, 1 B.C.

Times and Seasons 3:928-929
In this manner did the Lord continue to give us instructions from time to
time, concerning the duties which now devolved upon us, and among many
other things of the kind, we obtained of him the following, by the spirit of
prophecy and revelation; which not only gave us much information, but
also pointed out to us the precise day upon which, according to his will
and commandment, we should proceed to organize his church once again,
here upon the earth. The rise of the church of Christ in these last days,
being one thousand eight hundred and thirty years since the coming of
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in the flesh, it being regularly
organized and established agreeably to the laws of our country, by the
will and commandments of God in the fourth month, and on the sixth
day of the month which is called April ... [Since there is no year zero
between 1 B.C. and A.D. 1, 1830 years after 1 B.C. is A.D. 1830.]

Evidence that Nephite years were standard solar years is found in The Book
of Mormon RLDS Alma 21:75-76 - LDS Alma 46:40: "And there were
some who died with fevers, which at some seasons of the year was very
frequent in the land —- but not so much so with fevers because of the
excellent qualities of the many plants and roots which God had prepared to
remove the cause of diseases which was subsequent to man by the nature
of the climate" (The Book of Mormon: the Earliest Text). Since there were
" seasons of the year," Nephite years must have been periodically adjusted
to conform to the standard solar year.

According to The Book of Mormon RLDS 3 Nephi 4 - LDS 3 Nephi 8-10,
in the first month of the 34th year after a sign of Christ's birth was shown
in Mesoamerica, three hours of destroying judgments corresponding to the
three hours that Jesus was suffering on a cross at Jerusalem were followed
by three days of darkness corresponding to the three days that the body of
Jesus was in a tomb.

On Wednesday, March 24 (Julian), in A.D. 34, Jesus was suffering on a
cross at Jerusalem from about noon to 3 PM (Matthew 27:45; Mark 15:33;
Luke 23:44), at which time he died (Matthew 27:46-50; Mark 15:34-37;
Luke 23:45-46). His body was removed from the cross prior to the
beginning of the Jewish Passover at sunset (John 19:31). The three nights
and three days his body lay in a tomb (Matthew 12:40) ended on Saturday,
March 27 (Julian) at sunset, at which time his body was resurrected,
restored from all mutilations except for five: four holes in hands and feet
and one in his side. The women bringing burial spices very early on
Sunday, March 28, found that the large stone closing his tomb had been
rolled away. Angels were present. His tomb was empty except for some
burial garments.