30. The “Jaddua” of Chronicles and of Josephus Not Necessarily the Same

The “Jaddua” of Chronicles and of Josephus Not Necessarily the Same That the mention of Jaddua as high priest renders this date impossible, cannot be maintained for the following reasons: First, it is supposed that the Jaddua mentioned in Nehemiah 12:11, 22 is the same as the Jaddua mentioned by Josephus as having been high priest when Alexander came up to Jerusalem in 336 B.C. But the critics themselves assert that this account of Alexander’s visit is utterly unreliable. Why then should they consider the name and the time of the high priesthood of Jaddua to be the only valid date of the account given by Josephus and that they alone are reliable enough to overthrow the accepted date of Chronicles?

Besides, there may have been two high priests of the name of Jaddua, just as, between 300 and 100 B.C., there were two or three of the name of Simon and six of the name of Onias. Or the same Jaddua may have been high priest at 400 B.C. and also in 336 B.C. Josephus says he was very old, and men in such positions not infrequently reach ninety, or more, years of age. I, myself, had a great-grandfather and a great-uncle who lived to be over a hundred, a great-grandmother who was ninety-nine, one great-uncle ninety-four, another ninety-two. Besides, my mother died at eighty, and half a dozen uncles and aunts between eighty and ninety years of age. Every one of these was old enough and active enough to have been high priest for sixty-five years, and several of them for eighty years, had they lived in the times of the Chronicles, and been eligible to the office.