Dating methods and pivotal dates

Introduction

The timeline is cut in to several parts by four or five key pivotal dates which occur at important biblical events such as: the Flood; the entry into Egypt of Jacob (Israel); the Exodus; the building of the temple by Solomon; and the invasion of Judah by Sennacherib. The term 'biblical years' refers to the dating method employed using the system that would start from the year 1 upon the birth of Adam and increasing with the years given in the chronology of the bible. Four of the pivotal dates cut the timeline in to four parts: the Flood, dated to 1656 biblical years, separates the antediluvian from all the rest of the timeline, and includes Adam to Noah; from the Flood to the entry into Egypt by Jacob, dated to 2238 biblical years, separates Shem to Jacob; the Exodus in 2668 produces the third group consisting of only Moses and Joshua; and finally the kings of Israel and Judah make the last group, and is positioned due to the dating of the building of the temple in 3148 in respect to the Exodus, the temple being built 480 years after the Exodus 1 Kings 6:1.

The last (fifth) pivotal date, associated with Sennacherib's invasion of Judah, is the most crucial for linking the biblical dates with the standard chronological dates of the present using the AD and BC (or CE and BCE) notation, since it is generally thought to have occurred in 701BC.

Adam to Noah

The first of these events is the flood, and this creates the section that is made up from Adam to Noah. These are represented on the chart by red bars, which represent their live spans. The time line is worked out by adding up all the individuals' life spans up from their birth up until they fathered their principle son. This is a serial process were the dates of one individual is dependent on the dates given from the previous individuals.

Everything is fairly straight forward until we reach Arpachshad whom we are told was born two years after the flood. So looking back at the two previous generations, Noah, according to the biblical reckoning, was born in 1056 and lived 950 years until the biblical year of 2006. We are told that Noah is 500 years old when he fathered Shem, Ham and Japheth (Genesis 5:32) giving a date of 1556, and that the flood occurred in the six hundredth year of Noah's life (Genesis 7:11) so giving a date of 1656 for the flood. Shem fathers Arpachshad when he was 100 years old (Genesis 11:10), so since Shem was born in 1556 this would be 1656 which is the same date as the flood itself. This however does not tally with Genesis 11:10 that says Arpachshad was born two years after the flood in 1656, so giving 1658 as the year of birth of Arpachshad. Either Noah was five hundred and two when he fathered Shem or Shem was hundred and two when he fathered Arpachshad or the flood happened when Noah was 598 years old. Some authorities give Shem's birth as 1558 and this would then make the calculations right, and this could be reflected in the comment 'after Noah was five hundred years, Noah became the father of Shem, Ham, and Japheth' (Genesis 5:32).

Initially I decided to assume that Shem was 102 years old when he fathered Arpachshad, so Arpachshad's life was 1658 to 2096, while Shem's life spans 1556 to 2156, but I had a change of mind and decided to stick with the pack and say that Noah was 502 when he fathered Shem and so Shem's life span is from 1558 to 2158. Considering the numbers of years involved here, a two year error won't place things too much out of kilter. It doesn't matter which decision is made since Arpachshad's life span is reset to starting two years after the flood, so the timeline is corrected at this point.

Shem to Joseph

This section ends with the entry of Israel in to Egypt; which I have taken to be the arrival of Jacob, also called Israel, with his sons to meet Joseph. This is said to have taken place when Jacob was 130 years old (Genesis 47:9), and by the working out of the prior chronology this is placed at a date of 2238 biblical years. The bars are coloured yellow on the chart and again represent the life span of the individuals concerned. Originally I had some difficulty finding the age of Jacob when he became the father of Joseph but after receiving an email from Nathan who kindly explained how to work this out I now believe that Jacob was 91 years old so this would place the death of Joseph to the year of 2309.

Exodus

The Exodus, which we are told tales place 430 years after the entry of Israel in to Egypt exact to the day (Exodus 12:40-41), creates the third section which consists only of Moses and Joshua. The lives of these two men are represented by blue bars on the chart and they lie totally isolated from the rest of the graph as a small blue island. It has already been mentioned that the entry of Israel (or Jacob) is calculated to be in the biblical year of 2238, and so the date of Exodus has got to be the summation of 2238 and 430, which is the year 2668. In Josephus and Exodus 7.7 we are told that Moses was 80 years old when the Exodus took place, and that Joshua led Israel 25 years after the death of Moses, this allows the possibility that the lives of Moses and Joshua can be fixed in the timeline. It would not really matter if the age of Moses, mentioned in Josephus and Exodus, were to be found to be wrong as nothing else depends on the death of Moses or Joshua; it's only the dating of the Exodus from the entry of Israel (Jacob) in to Egypt that matters. This also should indicate that the actual time of Joseph's birth would not affect the timeline.

Josephus puts the time from Jacob's move into Egypt to the Exodus as two hundred and fifteen years (Josephus Book 2 Chapter XV 318), this is different than the four hundred and thirty years mentioned in Exodus 12:40-41. This would alter the date from 2668 to 2453 for the Exodus. It is also worth pointing out that the ages at which some of the patriarchs became fathers is also a hundred years later in Josephus, so Adam in Genesis is one hundred and thirty years old when he fathers Seth (Genesis 5:5) but in Josephus' account he is two hundred and thirty years old (Josephus Book 1 Chapter II 67). I have decided to stick to the 430 years difference between the Exodus and the Israeli entry into Egypt.

The Building of the Temple

The building of the temple is said to have been built in the fourth year of King Solomon's reign 480 years after the people of Israel came out of the land of Egypt in the Exodus (1 Kings 6.1). This date allows us to link the Exodus with the building of the temple but more importantly the fourth year of Solomon's reign. The latter allows us to build up the rest of the timeline from the rest of the reigns of the kings of Israel and Judah. From this date the chronology on the chart is no longer given by the lengths of an individual's life but by the length of their reign as a king or queen, this is in contrast to the other sections in which we are concerned solely with how long a person lives, and when their offspring is born.

Working backwards from the fourth year of Solomon's reign it is possible to mark out David's and Saul's reigns. David and Solomon are both said to have reigned for 40 years, as I think was Saul, this similarity may lead one to disbelieve the accuracy of this data, but it doesn't matter about the length of the reigns of Saul and David as the important date is the fourth year of Solomon's reign which is given as 480 years after the Exodus. Since we have already dated the Exodus as being in the biblical year of 2668, then the fourth year of Solomon's reign is in 3148.

Sennacherib invades Judah 701 BC (3453)

The major pivotal date which links this biblical chronology with the AD and BC notation of modern times is the date of the invasion of Judah by Sennacherib king of Assyria, who invaded in the fourteenth year of the reign of Hezekiah. This is widely suggested to be around 701 BC, and so I have tied the year 701 BC with the fourteenth year of Hezekiah. This assumes that the siege of Judah did occur at this date, which it might not have done, and instead may have taken place several years before or after this date.

Another assumption I have made is that the illness that Hezekiah has in his fourteenth year of his reign is the same illness that wipes out many of Sennacherib's army. This would place the illness of Hezekiah and the sun's retrograde motion on the dial of Ahaz with the date 701 BC which in biblical time I have worked out to be 3453.

Dating of Events using 701 BC to be the biblical year 3454

If we accept that 3453 is the year 701 BC, give or take a few years, then it is possible to work out all the other dates relative to this date. Firstly if we want to work out some more recent dates in biblical years:-

1. Adding 701 to 3453 to get at the year zero this would give 4154. This would be year zero in the AD/BC, but since there was no year zero in the AD/BC system I have taken this to be the year 1 BC. Though I had originally had this at 1 AD but had a change of mind, but I am still not sure if I should change it back to 1 AD. I would then have to change all the key dates by one year, but I would do this if need be. Please let me know what you think.
2. The year 2000 AD would be 2000 years added to 4154 and this would be 6154 biblical years.
3. The year 2010 would 10 years added to 6154 and this is 6164 in biblical years.

Going back in to the past, from 701 BC (3453) to the biblical year zero (The Creation), it is necessary to subtract the year of an event from 3443 and then add 701.

1. The building of the temple occurs in 3148, and this subtracting from 3453 is 305, and 305 plus 701 gives 1006 BC for the start of the construction of the temple.
2. The Exodus is in the biblical year 2668 so subtracting this from 3453 is 785, and this adding 701 gives 1486 BC.
3. The settlement in Egypt is given as 2238 biblical years, so subtracting this from 3453 equals 1215, and adding 701 gives 1916 BC.
4. The Flood dates to 1656, subtracting from 3453 leaves 1797 and adding 701 would equal 2498 BC.
5. Year one of Creation would be 4154 BC, and originally on the Chart, I had labelled that year zero but changed my mind and put year 1 instead.

There are more issues to be dealt with when considering dating and these will be discussed in the problems section.