{"id":19450,"date":"2026-11-13T07:48:34","date_gmt":"2026-11-13T13:48:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/?p=19450"},"modified":"2026-11-13T08:21:26","modified_gmt":"2026-11-13T14:21:26","slug":"apocalypticism-the-evolution-by-tabor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/apocalypticism-the-evolution-by-tabor\/","title":{"rendered":"Apocalypticism, The Evolution by Tabor"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">11\/11\/2026 &#8211; Dr. Tabor shared a paper he had written and an updated shorter less formal paper about the eveolution of apocalypticism during the 2nd Temple period. The papers are in the subdirectory, <em>Apocalypticism &amp; Enoch<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Tabor Apocalypse Then and Now <\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Tabor Dating and Influence Similitudes Enoch<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Claude.ai summarized both articles that were uploaded at the same time. That summary is below.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h1 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Tabor&#8217;s Timeline of Apocalyptic Belief<\/h1>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sources: (1) James D. Tabor, &#8220;Apocalypse Now and Then,&#8221; in <em>Historical Afterlives of Jesus<\/em>, ed. G. C. Jenks (2023), 155-169, cited as (Tabor 2023, page); (2) Tabor, &#8220;Some Informal Remarks on the Dating and Influence of the So-Called &#8216;Parables&#8217; or &#8216;Similitudes&#8217; of Ethiopic 1 Enoch,&#8221; cited as (Tabor, &#8220;Informal Remarks&#8221;). Tabor&#8217;s own sources are named where he draws on them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Core Thesis<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tabor argues that Daniel 2, 7, 8, 9, and 11-12, and especially the &#8220;Seventy Weeks&#8221; of Daniel 9:24-27, form &#8220;the backbone of late Second Temple Jewish apocalyptic messianism&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 159). He calls this &#8220;biblical apocalypticism,&#8221; an essentially <em>exegetical<\/em> enterprise that flourishes through interpreting a text against current events (Tabor 2023, 163-64). The &#8220;speculative engine&#8221; is the fit between text and historical context (Tabor 2023, 165).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The Timeline<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>1. The Danielic Template (167-164 BCE)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> The persecution under Antiochus IV Epiphanes and the Maccabean crisis, chronicled in 1-2 Maccabees (Tabor 2023, 157, 161).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Content:<\/strong> Tabor reduces Daniel to four elements: a ruthless conqueror invades and persecutes God&#8217;s people, the city and temple are defiled, there is unprecedented tribulation, and God intervenes with resurrection and judgment (Tabor 2023, 158, citing Cohen, <em>From the Maccabees<\/em>).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Interpretive point:<\/strong> In Daniel 2 and 7, the vision is not its own interpretation. The beasts are kings, and the &#8220;one like a son of man&#8221; represents the holy ones who receive the kingdom. The point is the transfer of sovereignty from the nations to God&#8217;s people, not the biography of a heavenly individual (Tabor, &#8220;Informal Remarks&#8221;). Daniel 2 and 7 are &#8220;variations on essentially the same apocalyptic scenario&#8221; (ibid.).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>2. Failed Consummation and Recasting (post-164 BCE)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> Antiochus was defeated, but the resurrection and final judgment in Daniel 12 never came (Tabor 2023, 161).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Development:<\/strong> Those who held Daniel to be inspired projected it forward and watched for another &#8220;Antiochus-like&#8221; figure (Tabor 2023, 161). Daniel itself seems to leave room for this (Dan 11:35, 40; Tabor 2023, 157).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Key evidence:<\/strong> 4 Ezra (2 Esdras 3-14), written after 70 CE, documents the switch of the &#8220;fourth kingdom&#8221; from Greece to Rome through its eagle vision, whose three heads likely represent the Flavian emperors (Tabor 2023, 161-62).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>3. The Dead Sea Scroll Community (first century BCE)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> The first known post-Maccabean revival of apocalyptic hope, usually identified with the Essenes. The corrupt Hasmonaean rulers, allied with gentile powers, became the new &#8220;Beast&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 164 n. 18, citing Knibb).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Development:<\/strong> The community tied the 490 years to ten Jubilees (49 x 10) and saw itself as living in the final forty-nine-year period. This likely produced the expectation of &#8220;about forty years&#8221; from their Teacher&#8217;s death to the end (CD 8:14; 4Q171; 1QpHab 7; ibid.). Their charter reads the time as the moment for preparing the way in the wilderness, combining Daniel 9 with Isaiah 40:3 (1QS 9:10; Tabor 2023, 162).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>4. John the Baptizer and Jesus (c. 27 CE)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> The prophetic clock was widely felt to be running out. Counting 490 years from Ezra&#8217;s traditional date of 457 BCE gives 34 CE, which puts the start of the final &#8220;week&#8221; at 27 CE, &#8220;quite possibly&#8221; when John and Jesus began preaching (Tabor 2023, 162).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Caveat:<\/strong> Ancient chronologies of the postexilic period varied widely. The rabbinic <em>Seder Olam<\/em> places the exile at 421 BCE, apparently by counting backward from 70 CE, so that the 490 years would not land near Jesus (Tabor 2023, 163 n. 16, citing Guggenheimer). What mattered was the shared conviction that time was short (Tabor, &#8220;Informal Remarks&#8221;).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Link to Mark:<\/strong> This setting explains the urgency of Jesus&#8217; proclamation that the time is fulfilled and the kingdom is near (Mark 1:14-15; Tabor 2023, 162; Tabor, &#8220;Informal Remarks&#8221;).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>5. Caligula&#8217;s Crisis and Paul (41 CE and the 50s)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> Caligula&#8217;s attempt in 41 CE to place his statue in the Jerusalem temple provoked apocalyptic hysteria (Tabor 2023, 164 n. 19, citing Josephus).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Development:<\/strong> Paul tells followers that &#8220;the appointed time has grown very short&#8221; and that an &#8220;impending crisis&#8221; is near (1 Cor 7:26, 29). 2 Thessalonians 2 offers a <em>pesher<\/em>-like reading of Daniel&#8217;s &#8220;little horn&#8221; as the &#8220;man of sin&#8221; in the temple (Tabor 2023, 164).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>6. Revelation (Nero through Domitian, 54-96 CE)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> Persecution from Nero through the Flavians (Tabor 2023, 164).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Development:<\/strong> Revelation recasts Daniel with direct application to events around 70 CE. The repeated 1260-day, forty-two-month, and three-and-a-half-year periods refer to the second half of Daniel&#8217;s seventieth &#8220;week&#8221; (Rev 11:3; 12:6, 14; 13:5). Tabor reads Rev 10-13 as pointing to a time just before or shortly after the outbreak of the revolt in 66 CE, with the temple still standing (Tabor 2023, 165).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>7. The Jewish Revolt and Josephus (66-73 CE)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> Josephus, a former rebel commander in Galilee, wrote from Rome in the late 70s under Flavian patronage (Tabor 2023, 158-59, citing Cohen, <em>Josephus<\/em>).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Key claim:<\/strong> Josephus says an &#8220;ambiguous oracle&#8221; in the Jewish scriptures &#8220;more than all else&#8221; incited the war, and he applies it to Vespasian (<em>War<\/em> 6.310-313). Thackeray&#8217;s Loeb note says &#8220;Authority unknown,&#8221; but Tabor identifies the oracle with Daniel 9:24-27 plus the visions of chapters 7, 8, and 11-12 (Tabor 2023, 159-60). Tacitus and Suetonius report a similar misunderstanding, and rabbinic tradition has Yochanan ben Zakkai predicting Vespasian&#8217;s rise (Tabor 2023, 159 n. 11; 160 n. 13).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Significance:<\/strong> Josephus&#8217;s testimony shows these expectations were not confined to a few fringe sectarians. The revolt was &#8220;shot through with messianic, apocalyptic fervor&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 163).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Josephus&#8217;s reading:<\/strong> The &#8220;prince&#8221; with troops fulfills Daniel 9:26, so resisting Rome meant resisting a divine decree. Tabor suspects Josephus withheld the darker implication that this figure is the &#8220;Beast&#8221; or &#8220;Antichrist&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 160-61).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>8. The Synoptic Apocalypse (c. 70 CE and after)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> Mark is usually dated around 70 CE, Matthew in the 80s, and Luke in the 90s, with Matthew and Luke offering pesher-like revisions. Tabor calls these dates approximate (Tabor 2023, 155 n. 2, citing Ehrman).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Development:<\/strong> Jesus&#8217; temple prediction triggers a &#8220;countdown&#8221; built on Daniel 11:36-12:13. Mark flags the sign, Matthew makes the Daniel reference explicit, and Luke recasts the discourse around Jerusalem&#8217;s encirclement and the &#8220;trampling by the Gentiles&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 156-57).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Delay problem:<\/strong> The &#8220;this generation&#8221; saying went unfulfilled. Because Jesus was seen as an infallible prophet, interpreters either read the fulfillment non-literally, as Hatina does, or projected it into the future (Tabor 2023, 157-58).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Son of Man:<\/strong> The &#8220;coming of the Son of Man&#8221; works as Danielic shorthand for the whole scenario, namely the overthrow of the beastly kingdoms and the vindication of God&#8217;s people (Tabor, &#8220;Informal Remarks&#8221;).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>9. Symbolization (2nd-5th centuries and beyond)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> After 70 CE the precise historical alignment that had held for over two hundred years (167 BCE to 73 CE) was gone (Tabor 2023, 165).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Development:<\/strong> Second- and third-century Christians read apocalyptic and millennial hopes more symbolically. This culminated in Augustine&#8217;s <em>City of God<\/em>, with its &#8220;heavenly&#8221; rather than &#8220;earthly&#8221; millennium, &#8220;Jerusalem above,&#8221; and the church as spiritual Israel (Tabor 2023, 166). Tabor notes that literal readings came to be associated with disparaging views of &#8220;the Jews.&#8221;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Result:<\/strong> The &#8220;Beast&#8221; became a label for rival factions, such as Protestants, &#8220;Papists,&#8221; Muslims, and heretics, projected onto whoever was seen as the &#8220;evil other&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 166, citing Moore).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>10. Modern Literalism (19th-21st centuries)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Context:<\/strong> Zionism, the Balfour Declaration and British capture of Jerusalem in 1917, two World Wars, the Holocaust, Israel&#8217;s founding in 1948, and Jerusalem under Israeli control after 1967 &#8220;reset the prophetic clock&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 166; Boyer&#8217;s &#8220;Prophecy Belief,&#8221; 167).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Development:<\/strong> Darby&#8217;s dispensationalism revived Daniel&#8217;s 490 years as a paused clock with a final literal seven-year &#8220;week.&#8221; It was popularized by Hal Lindsey&#8217;s <em>The Late Great Planet Earth<\/em> (35 million copies), LaHaye&#8217;s <em>Left Behind<\/em> series (65 million), and TV evangelists (Tabor 2023, 167, citing Shuck and Smith).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Tabor&#8217;s caution:<\/strong> He cites H. H. Rowley&#8217;s warning that those who bring the same principles and hopes afresh will prove &#8220;equally mistaken,&#8221; and says that this afterlife of Jesus is better left in the past (Tabor 2023, 167-68, citing Rowley, <em>Relevance<\/em>, 173-74).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\">The Second Article: Why the Parables of Enoch Are Not Needed<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This piece applies the same timeline to a debate over the Son of Man&#8217;s background (Tabor, &#8220;Informal Remarks&#8221;):<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Manuscript gap:<\/strong> Qumran preserves Aramaic fragments of most of Enoch, including the Book of Giants, but none of the Parables (1 Enoch 37-71). The Parables survive complete only in Ethiopic, translated probably in the fourth to sixth centuries CE, with medieval manuscripts. Early Christians such as Jude and Tertullian used Enoch but never clearly cite the Parables.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Dating:<\/strong> A pre-Christian date is a reconstruction, not a textual fact. Milik&#8217;s third-century Christian dating was effectively refuted by Knibb (1979), but that does not prove the early date.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Circularity risk:<\/strong> Following Colpe, Tabor warns against dating the Parables early because they seem Jewish, then using that date to explain the Gospels&#8217; Son of Man.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Conclusion:<\/strong> Daniel, which is documented at Qumran, in Josephus, in 4 Ezra, and in the Synoptics, already supplies the vocabulary, chronology, and sequence. The Parables may be an independent or parallel development, or even one shaped in interaction with Christianity, and the evidence does not show which direction influence ran.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Notes<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Tabor cites Mark&#8217;s opening proclamation as 1:14 in the first article and 1:15 in the second. The proclamation is the same.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Your copies have highlighting, including a red highlight on the Augustine passage. I treated the highlights as emphasis rather than as separate content, so tell me if you want any of them analyzed in more depth.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>2ndPrompt paraphrased &#8211;<\/strong> Prepare a critical analysis testing Tabor&#8217;s 27-34 CE calculation and his Josephus-Daniel 9 identification against objections.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\">Critical Analysis of Tabor&#8217;s Apocalypticism Timeline<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I [Claude.ai] cite scholarship from my own knowledge of the field, not from the texts in front of me, so verify page numbers before relying on them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Bottom line:<\/strong> Tabor&#8217;s strongest claim is the broad one, that Daniel was continually reinterpreted in late Second Temple Judaism and that the Synoptic Apocalypse is saturated with it. His weakest claims are the specific ones: the 27-34 CE calculation, the exact identity of Josephus&#8217;s oracle, and the &#8220;absolute backbone&#8221; language. The Parables article is methodologically sound in its caution but selective in what it engages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">1. The 27-34 CE Calculation<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>What it requires.<\/strong> Daniel 9:25&#8217;s &#8220;word to restore and rebuild Jerusalem&#8221; must be Ezra&#8217;s mission (457 BCE), and the 490 years must be counted in modern dates (Tabor 2023, 162).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Objections<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The starting point is contested.<\/strong> Candidates include Jeremiah&#8217;s oracle (c. 587\/586 BCE), Cyrus&#8217;s edict, Ezra 7, and Nehemiah 2 (445\/444 BCE), which yields very different endpoints. Most critical commentators (Collins 1993; Hartman &amp; Di Lella, whom Tabor cites) read Daniel 9 as written around 167-164 BCE. They take the starting point to be Jeremiah&#8217;s oracle and the &#8220;anointed one cut off&#8221; to be the high priest Onias III. On that reading the arithmetic was schematic, and the author&#8217;s Persian-period chronology was compressed.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Tabor undercuts his own precision.<\/strong> He concedes that ancient sources calculated the postexilic period differently (Tabor 2023, 162-63). If so, a 27 CE start is a modern coincidence, not something a first-century reader would have computed.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>There are two competing placements of the final &#8220;week.&#8221;<\/strong> Tabor places it at 27-34 CE, but also treats the Roman &#8220;prince with troops&#8221; as arriving in the final seven years (Tabor 2023, 160). The Revolt (66-73 CE) spans exactly seven years, and Revelation&#8217;s three and a half years fit the war (Tabor 2023, 165). A scheme that can be anchored in two places 40 years apart risks being unfalsifiable. Tabor&#8217;s reply would be that the real point is the conviction that the clock was running out, and that is the defensible version of his claim.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The Qumran link is inferential.<\/strong> The Damascus Document&#8217;s opening is usually explained through Ezekiel&#8217;s 390 years (CD 1:5-11). The stronger jubilee-based Daniel 9 witnesses are 11QMelchizedek and 4Q180-181. The &#8220;about forty years&#8221; statement is normally cited as CD 20:13-15, not CD 8:14.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The <em>Seder Olam<\/em> motive is speculative.<\/strong> Tabor says the rabbis shortened the Persian period partly so that the 490 years would not land near Jesus (Tabor 2023, 163 n. 16). The simpler explanation is that they were fitting Daniel 9 to the destruction of the second temple in 70 CE, and an anti-Christian motive is hard to demonstrate.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Mark 1:15 is not obviously Danielic.<\/strong> The NRSV reads &#8220;The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near.&#8221; That is a plausible echo, but &#8220;kairos&#8221; language was general in eschatological writing, and the verse may reflect Mark&#8217;s own post-70 summary rather than Jesus&#8217; preaching.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>What survives:<\/strong> the &#8220;atmosphere&#8221; thesis, not the arithmetic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">2. Josephus&#8217;s &#8220;Ambiguous Oracle&#8221; and Daniel 9<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Strengths<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Josephus links Daniel to Roman devastation explicitly elsewhere (<em>Ant.<\/em> 10.276), and in 10.210 he declines to explain the stone of Daniel 2. This supports Tabor&#8217;s point that he was cautious about revealing what Daniel implied.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Tabor is right that Thackeray&#8217;s &#8220;Authority unknown&#8221; invites a source search (Tabor 2023, 159).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Objections<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The content does not match.<\/strong> Josephus&#8217;s oracle says that one &#8220;from their country would become ruler of the world&#8221; (<em>War<\/em> 6.312). Daniel 9:26 (ASV) speaks of &#8220;the people of the prince that shall come&#8221; who &#8220;shall destroy the city and the sanctuary.&#8221; That is a destroyer, not a ruler arising from Judea. Tabor&#8217;s solution, that the oracle was ambiguous between a Jewish Messiah and a Roman prince, is ingenious but goes beyond the text.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Other candidates fit better.<\/strong> Numbers 24:17 (ASV): &#8220;there shall come forth a star out of Jacob, and a sceptre shall rise out of Israel.&#8221; Qumran used it messianically (4Q175; CD 7), and it is commonly proposed for this passage. Daniel 7:27 (ASV), &#8220;the people of the saints of the Most High,&#8221; also fits the world-rule language. Tabor&#8217;s &#8220;no other text fits&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 160) is overstated.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The &#8220;four-square&#8221; link is conjecture.<\/strong> Connecting it to Daniel 9:25&#8217;s <em>rechov<\/em> and <em>charuts<\/em> is Tabor&#8217;s inference, not Josephus&#8217;s.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Josephus is an apologist.<\/strong> He blames a misread oracle to deflect responsibility from the Jewish elite. Tabor acknowledges he is &#8220;tendentious&#8221; but then relies on his causal ranking (Tabor 2023, 163). Scholars stress economic, political, and ethnic causes: Goodman (1987) on the ruling class, Horsley &amp; Hanson (1985) on popular movements. Saying Josephus was &#8220;in a place to know&#8221; cuts both ways, since he was also in a place to shape the story.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Verdict:<\/strong> the Daniel 9 identification is plausible but unproven. A composite oracle tradition is safer than a single-text identification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">3. &#8220;Backbone&#8221; and &#8220;Essentially Exegetical&#8221;<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Messianism was plural.<\/strong> Collins (2010) argues that expectations ran along several lines: Davidic, priestly, prophetic, and angelic. <em>Psalms of Solomon<\/em> 17, written in response to Pompey, is Davidic, not Danielic. Daniel itself has no Davidic king, and its &#8220;anointed one&#8221; is probably a high priest.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Enochic apocalypticism is revelatory.<\/strong> The Book of Watchers rests on heavenly journeys and is likely older than Daniel. That is a counterexample to defining apocalypticism as &#8220;essentially an <em>exegetical<\/em> enterprise&#8221; (Tabor 2023, 163, following J. Z. Smith). Tabor&#8217;s footnote restricts the claim to &#8220;biblical apocalypticism,&#8221; which helps but does not fully answer the point.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">4. The Parables of Enoch Article<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Strengths:<\/strong> the circularity warning (Colpe 1972) is well taken, and Tabor is fair to Milik (1976) and Knibb (1979).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Objections<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Qumran silence is weak evidence.<\/strong> Qumran preserves one community&#8217;s library, and the Parables may come from a different circle.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Double standard on dating.<\/strong> Tabor calls internal dating &#8220;reconstruction,&#8221; yet he dates Revelation 10-13 by text-to-history fit (Tabor 2023, 165). The Parables&#8217; proposed allusions, to the Parthian invasion (1 Enoch 56:5-7) and to Herod&#8217;s hot springs (67:5-13), are the same kind of evidence. They are contested, but Tabor does not engage them. See Nickelsburg &amp; VanderKam (2012) and the essays in Boccaccini (2007).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Daniel 7 does not interpret the humanlike figure.<\/strong> The angel interprets the beasts and the &#8220;holy ones&#8221; (7:17-18, 22, 27) but never says outright that the figure <em>is<\/em> the saints. That is an inference. Collins (1993, 304-10) argues the figure is a heavenly being, probably Michael, with the &#8220;holy ones&#8221; read as angelic, though Hartman &amp; Di Lella read them as faithful Jews. If the figure is already individualized in Daniel, Tabor&#8217;s &#8220;collective only&#8221; reading weakens.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Evidence for individualization without the Parables.<\/strong> 4 Ezra 13 (post-70, non-Christian) has a messianic &#8220;man&#8221; from the sea, and 4Q246 uses Danielic language of an individual (its meaning is debated). This supports Tabor&#8217;s thesis that the Parables are not <em>needed<\/em>, but it undercuts the collective reading.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Possible Gospel parallels.<\/strong> Matthew&#8217;s &#8220;throne of his glory&#8221; (Matt 19:28; 25:31) resembles 1 Enoch 62:5 and 69:27-29. Whether that is dependence is exactly what Tabor says cannot yet be assumed, so the parallel strengthens his call for caution about direction of influence.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">5. Citation and Text Slips in the Chapter<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>n. 19:<\/strong> &#8220;Josephus, <em>Jewish War<\/em> 28.257-309&#8243; cannot be right, since <em>War<\/em> has only seven books. The Caligula crisis is in <em>Ant.<\/em> 18.257-309 (and <em>War<\/em> 2.184-203).<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>n. 18:<\/strong> &#8220;<em>Jewish War<\/em> 119-161&#8243; should be <em>War<\/em> 2.119-161.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>n. 5:<\/strong> &#8220;Mark 13:28-47&#8221; should be 13:28-37.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Authenticity of Mark 13:<\/strong> Tabor attributes the &#8220;countdown&#8221; to Jesus (Tabor 2023, 156) while dating Mark&#8217;s discourse to c. 70 CE with later pesher-like revision. The &#8220;afterlives&#8221; framing partly handles this, but he does not say how much he assigns to the historical Jesus.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Dating of Revelation:<\/strong> a layered, partly pre-70 composition is defensible but a minority view. The majority date is c. 95 CE (Collins 1984).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Where This Leaves Tabor<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Defensible core:<\/strong> Daniel was foundational, the failure of Daniel&#8217;s predictions drove reapplication from Greece to Rome, Josephus and 4 Ezra document that, and the Synoptic Apocalypse is Danielic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Vulnerable specifics:<\/strong> the 27 CE computation, the single-text identification of the oracle, &#8220;absolute backbone,&#8221; and the selective skepticism toward the Parables&#8217; internal dating.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I can turn this into a point-by-point table, a draft rebuttal in Tabor&#8217;s voice, or a short annotated bibliography of the sources above if you want to pursue any of it further.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>11\/11\/2026 &#8211; Dr. Tabor shared a paper he had written and an updated shorter less formal paper about the eveolution of apocalypticism during the 2nd Temple period. The papers are in the subdirectory, Apocalypticism &amp; Enoch. Claude.ai summarized both articles that were uploaded at the same time. That summary is below. Tabor&#8217;s Timeline of Apocalyptic [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[131,61,202,91,160],"tags":[435,436],"class_list":["post-19450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biblescholarship","category-christianity-origins","category-end-times","category-judaism","category-pre-christian","tag-apocalypticism","tag-enoch"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19450"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19450\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19458,"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19450\/revisions\/19458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theway.davisinterests.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}