King Herod in the works of Flavius Josephus, Emil Schürer, and Jan Pouč

Based on a comparative analysis of the sources, this revision from 20 January 2018 highlights that: King Herod’s supposed death in 4 BCE is an error of Emil Schürer

The lunar eclipse of 29 December 1 BCE confirms

the death of King Herod in March 1 CE, the birth of Jesus Christ on 25 December 1 BCE,

and the Star of Bethlehem with the arrival of the Magi in January 1 CE and disproves

all the earlier estimated dates of the death of King Herod, the birth of Jesus Christ, and the Star of Bethlehem.

A brief summary of the erroneous claims of Emil Schürer:

Emil Schürer’s (1844–1910) basic mistake is that he was not aware of the chain of Sabbatical years, which was discovered in the Bible by Jan Pouč (1874–1962), and he did not verify the Sabbatical years in the Bible. For the death of Simon according to 1 Mac 16,14, Schürer merely provides an estimate dating of 135 or 134 BCE. He calculated the year 37 BCE according to other authors (see p. 285). He forgets the seven-year pe-riod of the Sabbatical years when he claims that the Sabbatical years in 63 and 37 BCE were spaced the correct 26 years apart, whereas the multiple of seven is 28 years, meaning that the Sabbatical year was 35 BCE. A careful examination of the Sabbatical years could have prevented false claims regarding the “univer-sally accepted date of Herod’s death”, which Schürer acknowledged, and all the subsequent erroneous speculations regarding the earlier birth of Jesus Christ and the various supposed Stars of Bethlehem. – Flavius Josephus lists the Sabbatical years in accordance with the Bible.

A comparative analysis of the works of Flavius Josephus, Emil Schürer, and Jan Pouč

Josephus does not give dates in any of the various eras in his writings; he describes the events in a way that makes it possible to calculate the date.

Jan Pouč supplements Josephus’ descriptions with dates in various calendars and eras. Emil Schürer wrote a historical timeline year after year based on information by many authors, which he

compared with Josephus. They begin with Pompey’s occupation of Jerusalem in the Sabbatical year in 63 BCE, on the Day of

Atonement, Yom Kippur – 10 Tishri in the Jewish calendar and 21 September in our Julian calendar. According to Josephus, Hyrcanus II ruled 24 years and 8 months until Pentecost, 14 May 38 BCE, when he

was captured and Herod travelled to Rome, where he was appointed king in late December 38 BCE. Emil Schürer describes these events identically, but he mentions neither the duration of Hyrcanus II’s

reign, nor Pentecost, and he dates Herod’s appointment as king to the year 40 BCE with reference to several other authors.

Both Josephus and Schürer place Herod’s conquest of Jerusalem 3 years after his appointment as king, and thus each into a different year: Josephus dates the event to 35 BCE, Schürer states 37 BCE.

The death of Herod is also placed 37 years after his appointment and 34 years after his conquest of Jerusalem by both authors, and thus into a different year again, albeit both identically give it as several month before Passover.

Josephus counts 37 years after the appointment in December 38 BCE, giving December 1 BCE, 3 months before Passover in 1 CE. From the conquest of Jerusalem in September 35 BCE, 34 years gives September 1 BCE and 6 months before Passover in 1 CE.

Emil Schürer counts 37 years from his appointment in December 40 BCE to claim that Herod died in 4 BCE! Although he writes that it might seems that he died in 3 BCE, he does not add that Herod’s death would have been before Passover in 2 BCE, not 4 BCE. Counting from the conquest of Jerusalem in 37 BCE, Schürer applies 34 years and writes that the 34th year would have begun after 1 Nisan in 4 BCE, before Passover, but a correct count would place the date in September 3 BCE, with Herod’s death before Passover in 2 BCE, not 4 BCE. Instead of completing these calculations, he makes mistaken objections to Josephus and declares 4 BCE to be the year of Herod’s death according to the “universally accepted date of Herod’s death” (see footnote 165, p. 328).

An astronomical phenomenon – heavenly proof Emil Schürer claimed astronomical proof of the accuracy of his dating of King Herod’s death in 4 BCE according to the lunar eclipse on 13 March 4 BCE. However, this eclipse does not coincide with the description in Josephus, it did not happen several months before Herod’s death and it was not preceded by the events that Josephus explicitly connected to the eclipse.

The death of King Herod in March 1 CE is confirmed by the lunar eclipse on 29 December 1 BCE. This eclipse occurred several months before Herod’s death and was preceded by the events described by Josephus. The lunar eclipse on 29 December 1 BCE was announced by the astronomer J. P. Pratt in 1990. Sunday 26 December 1 BCE in the Julian calendar was the fast of 10 Tevet, the high priest Matthias could not conduct the ritual “Herod deprived him of the high priesthood, and burned the other Mathias, who had raised the rebelion, with his companions, alive. And the very night there was an eclipse of the moon.” (see Ant XVII-vi-4-167) The eclipse was Wednesday 29 December 1 BCE

---------------------------- Flavius Josephus (37/38–100 CE), a Jewish priest and historian. Author of Antiquities of the Jews, War of the Jews, translated into English by William Whiston. His testimony is that of a historian who was closer to the events and source of the 1st century CE than our historical science; he is the main source for the period. He does not mark events with the dates of any calendar but instead with descriptions and references that allow the them to be safely ascertained. The dating for six different eras was calculated and compiled by Jan Pouč. Jan Pouč (1884–1962), author of Náš letopočet, written in 1955, published in 2005 and 2012 (English translation, Our Era, first published in 2013 and further revised). Pouč devoted his whole life to the research of chronology and Biblical chronology, and he used Biblical data to compile the cycle of Sabbatical years, which disproves the cycles of Benedikt Zuckermann and Ben Zion Wacholder. He analysed the Antiquities of Josephus and found 15 dates that had been meddled with – these alterations are even in the copies from 1476 and 1511. To pinpoint the lifetime of Jesus Christ, he converted the complete chain of events starting with the death of Simon acc. 1 Maccabees into the dates of various eras. In a similar manner, he verified the dates from Pompey’s siege of Jerusalem in 63 BCE and found that Herod was appointed king in December 38 BCE, that he conquered Jerusalem in September 35 BCE, and that he died before Passover in 1 CE. Emil Schürer (1844–1910), author of The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, first edition 1885, revised in 1973. He created a compilation based on the claims of other authors, from both Ancient and current times. He acknowledges Pompey’s siege of Jerusalem in the year 63 BCE on 10 Tishri, or certainly in late autumn, but claims Herod’s appointment as king in the year 40 BCE, his conquest of Jerusalem in 37 BCE, and his death before Passover in 4 BCE. He uses these dates to criticise the descriptions of Flavius Josephus. However, a comparative analysis reveals Schürer’s errors in designating the years 40 BCE and 4 BCE. His dispute with Josephus is resolved by astronomical proof – the lunar eclipse on 29 December 1 BCE, several months before the death of King Herod before Passover in 1 CE. This also refutes all the speculations about an earlier birth of Jesus Christ, which are promoted by the proponents of various supposed Stars of Bethlehem. Therefore, there is no ground to the claim that Jesus must have been born before 25 December 1 BCE.

The eclipse of the Moon on 29 December 1 BCE, which the astronomer John P. Pratt drew attention to only recently in 1990 and which corresponds to the description that Josephus gives of the lunar eclipse preceding Herod’s death in Ant XVII-vi-4-165-167. John P. Pratt writes (quotation): If December 29, 1 B.C. is correct, then Herod died in early A.D. 1 rather than early 1 B.C.

Figure 1. The proposed eclipse. The lunar eclipse of Dec. 29, 1 B.C. as it would have been seen from Jericho rising in the east at an altitude of 3° about 20 minutes after sunset On the other hand, the eclipse of December 29, 1 B.C. fits this criterion very well. The full moon was nearly half eclipsed when it could first be seen rising in the east above the distant mountains about twenty minutes after sunset (See Fig. 1). It would not have been seen much before that time, even without the mountains, due to sky brightness.[17] At first the eclipsed half of the full moon would have been invisible, then it would have appeared dimly lit, and finally the characteristic reddening of the eclipsed portion would have become noticeable. The umbral phase continued for about an hour after first visibility. Note that a partial eclipse is more easily seen at moonrise than a total because totality delays first visibility (the entire moon is in the “invisible” portion) and the shape of the missing portion would have made it obvious that it was an eclipse, especially to the Judeans who used the moon to indicate the day of the month and who expected a full moon. Of the candidates to be Herod’s eclipse, the December 29, 1 B.C. eclipse was the most likely to have been widely observed. (Pratt, John P. Yet Another Eclipse for Herod. Reprinted from The Planetarium, Vol. 19, No. 4, Dec. 1990, pp. 8–14. Web.) Josephus writes in Ant XVII-vi-4-165-167 (eclipse 167):

(165) “Now it happened, that during the time of the high priesthood of this Matthias, there was another person made high priest for a single day, that very day which the Jews observed as a fast.” (166) “The occasion was this: This Matthias the high priest, on the night before that day when the fast was to be celebrated, seemed in a dream, to have coversation with his wife; and because he could not officiate himself on that account, Joseph, the son of Ellemus, his kinsman, assisted him in that sacred office.”

26 December 1 BCE in the Julian calendar, Sunday = 10 Tevet, Jewish year 3761, “that day when the fast was to be celebrated” (CCJW)

(167) “But Herod deprived this Matthias of the high priesthood, and burned the other Mathias, who had raised the rebelion, with his companions, alive. And the very night there was an eclipse of the moon.”

29 December 1 BCE in the Julian calendar, Wendesday = 13 Tevet, Jewish year 3761, eclipse of the Moon (CCJW)

This is followed by the events of Ant XVII-vi-4-168 to viii-1-193: “When he had done these things, he died, the fifth day after he had caused Antipater to be killed; having reigned, since he had procured Antigonus to be killed, thirty-four years; but since he had been declared king by the Romans, thirty-seven.” (192) “… continued his life until a very old age.”

Herod died before Passover 1 CE, around 20 March.

King Herod in the works of Flavius Josephus, Emil Schürer, and Jan Pouč

Dates of Flavius Josephus Calculations of Jan Pouč Dating of Emil Schürer

Simon murdered 1 Mac 16,14, SE 177 Shebat Hyrcanus I avenged Simon by SE 178/179 from Feb. to Sep. = to 1 Tishri SE 178

Feb. 134 BCE Sabbatical year 134/133 BCE fixed point in history (Bible)

Feb. 135 or 134 BCE 135/134 or 134/133 BCE no fixed point here

Pompey took Jerusalem, 10 Tishri in 63 BC 21 Sep. 63 BCE fixed point in history

63 BC, 10 Tishri to late autumn fixed point in history

Hyrcanus II ruled 24 y. from 21 Sep. 63 BCE + until Pentecost = 24y + 8m

to 21 Sep. 39 BCE until 14 May 38 BCE

has Parthians in the Middle East, capture of Hyrcanus and Herod’s appointment all in 40 BCE

Herod appointed king - to Rome after Pentecost and appointed - in Olympiad 184 (until 30 June 40 BCE)

Dec. 38 BCE (does not acknowledge)

In 40 BCE Antonius was in Rome for about a year, then left for Athenes in late 39 BCE. Appointed Herod in this period. Acknowledges appointment in 40 BCE. (does not acknowledge)

Antigonus ruled 3y 3m = from Pentecost 14 May 38 BCE to Sep. 35 BCE (does not mention any dates)

Herod conquered Jerusalem - in the 3

rd year from his appointment

- in Olympiad 185 - in Olympiad 186.2, in the 3

rd month

- on the same feast day as Pompey - 27 y. after Pompey’s siege = - in a Sabbatical year

Sep. 35 BCE from Dec. 38 BCE (does not acknowledge) Sep. 35 BCE 10 Tishri = 11 Sep. 35 BCE 10 Tishri 63 BCE – 10 Tishri 35 BCE is 28 Jewish years, but only 27y 11m 20d acc. our era 35 BCE was a Sab. year; check: 133 - 35 = 98 : 7 = 7 hebdomads 63 - 35 = 28 : 7 = 4 hebdomads fixed point in Bible chronology

37 BCE from Dec. 40 BCE (does not acknowledge) 37 BCE July? – because Greek months are not numbered, it cannot be the 3

rd month of the

Olympiad; does not agree, but adopts with ? agrees, notes dispute reg. feast day note 11, p. 285: Gumpach & Caspari until 36 BCE. Others think Josephus wrong, should have written 26 instead of 27 y. H. conquered Jerusalem in a Sab. y., Schürer thus presumes 37 BCE is a Sab. y. and does not verify with Bible, nor with other Sab. years.

Battle of Actium, 2 Sep. 31 BCE in the 7

th y. from appointment as king =

fixed point in history 6y 8m from Dec. 38 BCE

fixed point in history counts only 6th y. (5y 8m), but erroneously from 37 BCE; from 40 BCE it would be in the 9th y. (8y 8m) – note 165, p. 327

Death of Herod, about 70 years old - 37 years from his appointment as king - 34 years from the execution of Antigonus

it is 37y 3m from Dec. 38 BCE to the death of Herod in March 1 CE it is 34y 6m from Sep. 35 BCE to the death of Herod in March 1 CE

does not mention in the calculation in note 165, but it is 35y 3m from Dec. 40 BCE to March 4 BCE it is 32y 6m from the conquest of Jerusalem in July? 37 BC, but Sch. writes that using the “years of reign from Nisan to Nisan” the 34th y. began from 1 Nisan in 4 BCE until the death of Herod before 14 Nisan -4

Lunar eclipse, does not give date - several months before Herod’s death - after a day of fasting

writes: has yet to be discovered

13 Mar. 4 BCE – less than a month before Herod’s death before Passover 11 April 4 BCE – regards as astronomical proof. there is no day of fasting before it, neither in Nisan (March), nor Adar (Feb./March)

Astronomical proof several months before the death of King Herod in March 1 CE: The lunar eclipse on 29 December 1 BCE was announced by the astronomer J. P. Pratt in 1990. 26 December 1 BCE in the Julian calendar was the fast of 10 Tevet, the high priest Matthias could not conduct the ritual. “Herod deprived him of the high priest-hood, and burned the other Mathias, who had raised the rebelion, with his companions, alive. And the very night there was an eclipse of the moon.” (see Ant XVII-vi-4-167) The eclipse was Wednesday 29 December 1 BCE.

Regarding the year 40 BCE (page 250/1)

Commentary: Josephus writes that Hyrcanus II ruled 24 years and was captured by the Parthians

on Pentecost. From his appointment by Pompey on 10 Tishri, our 21 September 63 BCE, 24 years

later is 10 Tishri 39 BCE, adding the time until Pentecost on 14 May 38 BCE makes it 24 years and

about 8 months in total. Josephus rounds the number of years down and rarely notes any surplus

months. After Pentecost Herod travelled to Rome and was appointed king in December 38 BCE.

Opponents write that Herod was appointed king in our year 40 BCE. That is not possible

because the Parthians did not cross the Euphrates until the spring of our year 39 BCE, after which

they conquered the whole of Syria and Phoenicia and, having spent some time in Galilee,

negotiated with Jerusalem via messengers. The year 38 BCE for Herod’s appointment is a fixed

point; it happened around 20 December, when winter sets in. It was in the Olympiad 185.3, which

was their year 739 from the beginning. (Pouč ch. 33)

Regarding the year of King Herod’s

Regarding the calculations of Flavius Josephus acc. Schürer

Commentary: Did King Herod die before Passover in 4 BCE, or 1 CE?

Emil Schürer objects to the dating of Josephus Flavius (note 165 on p. 326, see excerpt above). “Since Josephus states that he reigned 37 years from the date of his appointment (40 B.C.),

34 years from his conquest of Jerusalm, 37 B.C., […] it might appear as though he died in 3 B.C.”

Counting 37 years from his appointment as king in December 40 BCE gives December 3 BCE. Because Herod died before Passover, that would mean that he would have had to have died before Passover in 2 BCE and not 4 BCE.

“But we know that Josephus reckons one year too many – according to our method of counting: e.g. 27 years from the conquest of Jerusalem by Pompey to its conquest by Herod, […] whereas it is only 26...”

This objection is incorrect: Pompey conquered Jerusalem in the Sabbatical year 63 BCE, and Herod also took the city in a Sabbatical year. In Ant XIV-xvi-4, Josephus writes “after 27 years”, that is more than 27 years later. He does not write “27 years from Pompey”, which would mean exactly 27 years. - Sabbatical years (hebdomads, sevens of years) are spaced regularly by multiples of 7, and so the correct number is 28 Jewish years from 10 Tishri 63 BCE to 10 Tishri 35 BCE (28 : 7 = 4). In our years that is 27 years, 11 months, and 20 days from 21 September 63 BCE to 11 September 35 BCE. - Schürer ignores the Sabbatical years and does not corroborate them with the Bible. That is why he considers his calculation of 37 BCE to be correct, although it is not a Sabbatical (37 : 7 = 5.28). - The 26 years that he claims to be correct are also not a multiple of seven from 63 BCE (26 : 7 = 3,7).

“… 107 years from the conquest by Herod to that by Titus, […] whereas it is only 106…” Although this objection is formally correct, it errs in the facts. Counting from 37 BCE to 70 CE does give 106 years, but that is when using the erroneous year of Herod’s conquest of Jerusalem, 37 BCE.

- Jan Pouč deems Josephus’ “107 years” to be one of the fifteen places in Antiquities that was altered at some later date. - The correct time period is 104 years from the correct year of the conquest by Herod in 35 BCE.

“He counts the spring of 31 B.C. as Herod’s seventh year, […] whereas it was only the sixth from July 37 B.C.”

This objection is mistaken in three ways: 1) Instead of his own erroneous year of Herod’s appointment as king, he uses the year of the conquest of Jerusalem 37 BCE, counting the sixth year until spring 31 BCE. 2) From 40 BCE to the Battle of Actium on 2 September 31 BCE makes it 8 years and 8 months. 3) However, the correct dating from Herod’s appointment in December 38 BCE to 2 September 31 BCE gives 6 years and 8 months, which is rightly the seventh years.

“From this it is evident that he reckoned the portions of a year as full years, and probably counted regnal years (as the Mishnah suggests, from Nisan to Nisan [...]).”

The objection is false: Jan Pouč calls the notion of “regnal years from Nisan to Nisan” a figmentum used by some authors to help them achieve the calculations they needed. Josephus did not use instruments.

“If this be the case, Herod’s 34th year began on 1 Nisan of 4 B.C., and since he died before Passover, his death must have taken place between 1 and 14 Nisan 4 B.C.”

Those few days between 1 and 14 Nisan would have to have been counted as his 34th year! Schürer forgot to mention that.

“This reckoning is confirmed by an astronomical datum and the chronology of Herod’s successors.”

The objection is false: The lunar eclipse on 13 March 4 BCE, which Schürer mentions, does not confirm the death of Herod in March 4 BCE as it did not happen several months before Herod’s death and it could not have been preceded by the events described by Josephus. The chronology of his successors is based on the erroneous designation of 4 BCE, and thus is also in error.

37 years and 34 years… (Pouč ch. 36, quote): “It would be a good fake if Josephus counted according to the Julian calendar, the boundary of which is between

31 December and 1 January. But they did not care for the Julian calendar in Asia. And Josephus wrote according to the Olympiads, which lasted from July to the following year. There the given time period does not offer two parts of a year, one ahead and one behind, for the contortionists to stretch out to two whole years. Let us count according to Josephus and the Olympiads.

Herod was appointed king in the Olympiad year 739 in the month VI (counting from July), that is December. Thirty-seven whole years later it was the Olympiad year 776, month VI, December. But Herod did not die in

December, he died shortly before Passover, around 20 March. Passover was on 27 March that year. Thus he died already in the Olympiad 776 in month IX. Thus Herod ruled for 37 years and 3 months. But the number of years did not increase, because the Olympiad year 776 continued until the end of June.

The Olympiad year 776 lasted from 1 July of our year -1 to 30 June of our year 1. This proves that Herod died in the year 1, not in -4.”

Regarding the lunar eclipse before Herod’s death

Commentary: 13 March 4 BCE – less than a month before the death of Herod before Passover (11 April

4 BCE) – Schürer considers that to be astronomical proof. And yet it did not occur several months before

Herod’s death and it was not preceded by the events described by Josephus in Ant XVII-vi-4-167.

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Ant = Antiquities of the Jews War – War of the Jews The History of… The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ BCE – Before Common Era (equal to BC, Before Christ) CE – Common Era (equal to AD, Anno Domini) SE – Seleucid Era AUC – Ab urbi condita, from the founding of Rome OE – Olympiads, the Greek era Jew – the Jewish era

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