Why did a phoenix live 500 years?

Magraret Barker says that the Qumran Melchizedek text refers many times "to the Jubilee oracle in Isaiah 61: '...the Lord God has anointed me...to proclaim liberty to the captives'"
Barker states:
Daniel's seventy weeks of years were reckoned from this time 'when the word went forth to restore and rebuild Jerusalem' (Dan.9.25), and the seventy weeks of years were to end when transgression, sin and iniquity were finally removed and Jerusalem was destroyed (Dan.9.24,26). The Day of Atonement was also the Day of the LORD, the Day of Judgement13. The description indicates a final Day of Atonement when prophecy and visions are fulfilled and the Anointed One appears.
The seventy weeks of years, 490 years, were ten Jubilees, and the alternative way of reckoning this period was as ten Jubilees. Jewish tradition remembered that the 490 years ended in 68CE; calculation from the second temple Jubilee sequence beginning in 424BCE gives 66C

It the Phoenix is a symbol of the Christ, as suggested by Clement 1 in his Epistle to the Corinthians, Chapter 25, then perhaps this has something to do with the 500th year (like the 50th year of the Jubilee) being the year in which the Messiah would come to set at liberty the captives of Israel.

First answer by ID1197600059. Last edit by ID1197600059. Question popularity: 3 [recommend question]