This article is a response to a blog by a new friend I have made in the blogosphere, Judah Himango at judahgabriel.blogspot.com
We had an interesting exchange here on this blog. Judah helpfully pointed out that it was possible to get the Complete Jewish Bible on biblegateway.com (and progress has been made in getting this done, by the way, so I hope it won’t be long). Then, he posted an article that was not exactly positive toward the Jewish calendar. I felt I needed to stand up for the Jewish calendar and answer Judah’s criticisms. So here goes . . .
I am thankful that Judah Himango brought up some issues with the Jewish calendar. This is a discussion well worth having. Specifically, Himango feels the following items are problematic with regard to the Jewish calendar:
1. The names of some of the months are of pagan origin, especially Tammuz (a.k.a. Dumuzzi) the Babylonian god who corresponds to Adonis in the Greek pantheon. This is true, but see below.
2. All of the names of the months in the Jewish calendar are adopted from the Babylonian calendar. This also is true, but see below.
3. The Jewish calendar erroneously makes the first day of the Seventh month the new year, Rosh HaShanah. The exact quote from Himango is,
