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This is after all the purpose of this thread. However, your case rides on the combination of ignorance and chosen facts.
No, it rests on knowing things that you don't want known. That's not ignorance.
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You can read more on the details of the findings here: Loading...
As you will see, we are not only looking at a simple piece of rock as some would contest.
There's nothing there that contradicts my point.
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As for Daniels writings, The Encyclopedia Britannica acknowledges that the book of Daniel was once generally considered to be true history, containing genuine prophecy. The encyclopedia claims that in reality, however, Daniel was written in a later time of national crisis when the Jews were suffering severe persecution under Antiochus IV Epiphanes. It dated the book between 167 and 164 BCE. This same work asserts that the writer of the book of Daniel does not prophesy the future but simply presents events that were past history to him as prophecies of future happenings.
WHich is the view of mainstream scholars. So your assertion that the Book of Daniel was completed far earlier is one that has been rejected by informed experts.
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We have much at stake here. We are not just talking about the reputation of this ancient book but also the future that is involved. If the book of Daniel is a fraud, its promises for mankind’s future would end up as hollow words at best. But if it contains genuine prophecies then everything changes.
Unfortuantely for you it says nothing about out future. The time of Antiochus is Daniel's "End Times". The Book of Daniel promises nothing to us.
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Daniel wrote that Belshazzar, son of Nebuchadnezzar, was ruling as king in Babylon when the city was overthrown(Daniel 5:1, 11, 18, 22, 30). Critics long assailed this point, since Belshazzar's name was nowhere to be found outside the Bible. Instead, ancient historians identified Nabonidus, a successor to Nebuchadnezzar, as the last of the Babylonian kings.
And they were correct. The historical Belshazzar was never King. Nabonidus - who Daniel does not even mention - was the last ruler.
And pardon me if I don't trust your assertions about what the critics said. Christian apologists have a tendancy to misrepresent - or even fabricate - the positions of anyone who disagrees with them. So bear in mind that if you are using apologetic sources they are highly unreliable.
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Nabonidus, it seems, married the daughter of Nebuchadnezzar. That would make Belshazzar the grandson of Nebuchadnezzar. Neither the Hebrew nor the Aramaic language has words for grandfather or grandson(son of) can mean "grandson of" or even "descendant of".
Where is the evidence that Nabonidus married the daughter of Nebuchadnezzar, that Belshazzar was a child of this woman - and that the author of Daniel intended to reprsesent the relationship as anything more than a straightforward father-son relationship ? After all Nabonidus is not mentioned by Daniel although he reigned for 16 years.
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So Daniel’s mention of Belshazzar is not evidence of badly garbled history. On the contrary, Daniel offers us a more detailed view of the Babylonian monarchy than such ancient secular historians as Herodotus, Xenophon, and Berossus. Why was Daniel able to record facts that they missed? Because he was there in Babylon. His book is the work of an eyewitness, not of an impostor of later centuries.
You must be joking. Leaving out Nabonidus is hardly a mark of a detailed account !
And let us note that you provide not one solid piece of evidence for an early dating. All you have is conflicting opinions.
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As I said earlier, it can be no other way. Even if we would of exhumed a corps with a sign saying "King David was here", we would be dealing with charges of fraud, inaccuracy and the likes. This is the nature of the beast. No matter what we unearth or discovery, we will(must) always face free choice in matters. Behold the power of human nature!
You're right it can' be any other way. THose determined to prove the accuracy of the Bible will twist, distort and misrepresent the evidence to "prove" their beliefs. Well I'm not falling for it.