Biblical Dating Conflicts

Why Don't they Agree?

The Two Major Conflicting Types of Bible Dating Systems

The divisive issue is belief in Scripture!

Believers: The Bible contains many statements of authorship and many references to dated events, nations, kings, etc. Very good dating is generally well supported directly from the pages of Scripture. Generally accepted systematic dating of biblical period events has been established by Ussher in 1658, and was not broadly disputed by secular interests until 1878.

Unbelievers: The conflict arises from unbelieving "scholars" who have gone to great pains to basically refute Scripture by means of Darwinian dating in denial of the creation and the flood, and by attacking authorship and dating of the Pentateuch and other books such as Isaiah and Daniel.

First - Creation and Flood vs Evolution and Ice Age The rejections of the biblical accounts of both the creation, and of the world-wide flood. The two of these together cause all kinds of disjunction with biblical accounts, as "science" must have a much older planet, and an ice age instead of a flood. I'll leave this topic alone, except to say that Christians have great resources in Creation Science which go to great lengths to prove the viability of the scriptural accounts, and also to note that the conflict between unbelivers (Darwin/Ice Age) and believers (Creation/Flood) is one of the two major impacts on biblical-period dating. If you want more information here are the outlines from my 9-week study on Creation Science.

Secondly - Moses vs JED&P This attack on biblical dating is based in an attack on biblical authorship, which generally started with Julius Wellhausen in 1878. His work has come to be called the "documentary hypothesis", or "critical dating", and is most infamous for replacing Moses' authorship of the pentateuch 4,000 years ago, with generic authors refered to as J, E, D, and P, who wrote from the 2,500 - 2,900 years ago. This would put the writing of the Law during the Kingdom age.

This theory violates all Scripture citing Moses as the author, including the words of Jesus Christ, and makes the Law an invention of the the kings of Israel.

This dating has NO PLACE for acceptance in ANY CHRISTIAN REFERENCE!

The Book of Isaiah is another example of a Bible book which has been subject to authorship theories and dating which refutes Scripture. The Book of Isaiah is clearly presented as the words of Isaiah, Jewish tradition identifies Isaiah as the author, and we also have New Testament Scriptures which identify Isaiah as the author from the writings of Matthew, Luke, John, and Paul, attributing portions from Isaiah chapters 6-10, 53, and 65 to the prophet. Conversely, secular theories separtate Isaiah into the works of 2, or even 3 separate authors, espeically separating chapters 40+ to a later writer, a "deutero-Isaiah." These theories deny New Testament inerrancy and are dated so as to refute the possibiliy of Old Testament prophecy by Isaiah.

The Book of Daniel is a third example of a Bible book under attack by unbeliving "scholarship." The Book of Daniel, written in Babylonian captivity by Daniel, the book has a geat deal of prophecy which was fulfilled in world history in very obvious ways. Critical dating mandates a much later date for the authorship of Daniel, so that the "prophecies" may be be dismissed as fradulant. This rejection of inerrancy requires puposeful deception on the part of biblical authors, and should not be considered as a possibility by Christians. It is worth noting that this attack has been defended strongly by archeological proofs.

What remains is for Christains to identify those references which are conservative, faithful works of study, versus those works which have intentionally or indiscriminately included this malicous scholarship.

The litmus test of a reference book such as a Bible dictionary or Bible encyclopedia can be the dating of the books of Genesis, Isaiah, and Daniel. Genesis should be from about 1400 B.C., NOT 500 BC, Isaiah should be approcimately 790-680 BC, not 550 BC or later, and Daniel should be from about 500-600 BC, NOT 160 BC. Also, none of these books should be described as having multiple authors!

Those who DO NOT Believe the Bible

Proponets of Anti-biblical Dating

• The Zondervan Pictorial Encylopedia of the Bible (5 Vol) - Clearly promote critical dates for Genesis, but does accept the conservative (biblical) dating for Daniel, referencing archeological refutation for the critical dating of Daniel. It discusses both views of Isaiah as having equal merit, and seems to strongly favor the secular view of a deutero-Isaiah.

• Harper's Bible Dictionary - Clearly promotes critical (secular) dates for Genesis, Isaiah, and Daniel.

• There are many others - next time you're in a Christian bookstore or library, pick up a Bible dictionary and see what it says about the authorship of Genesis, Isaiah, or Daniel!

Those who DO Believe the Bible

Some Proponets of Biblical Dating

• The Annals of the World - by James Ussher (1658)

• Unger's Bible Dictionary - Probably the best Bible Dictionary out there - Listen to this quote from the entry on Genesis, "This documentary theory...is based on false literary criteria, unsound philosophic presuppositions, and a manifest enmity against the miraculous and the prophetic elements that constitute the foundation of the Pentateuch."

• Talk Thru the Bible aka The Bible Handbook by Wikinson & Boa

• The Bible Knowledge Commentary by Walvoord & Zuck

• New Testament History by F.F. Bruce

• Chronological Aspects of the Life of Christ by Harold Hoehner

Other Notes on Christian Period Dating

Before the Time of Abraham

Those who depend upon the words of Scripture to establish dates and authors still vary to a significant degree when dating the accounts of Scripture before the time of Abraham. This is the periods of the creation, the flood, and tower of Babal, especially the dating of creation. I have seen conservative dates from Ussher's standard date of 4,000 BC to 10,000 BC (a reasonable earliest-date limit) for the creation account.

A few theories worth are worth mentioning.

• First is a creation date of 6,500 BC, based on Christian perspective of Egyptian archeology making a decendent of Noah a founder of egypt. Who knows? I don't think we can be too dogmatic about 4004 B.C. (Ussher) or 3760 B.C. (Rabbinic tradition).

• Second is Scofield's "gap" between Genesis 1:1 (God created heaven and earth) and Genesis 1:2 (Earth empty and void). The implication was that a huge gap of time was between the verses. This theory is speculative conjecture aimed at meeting "scientific" geological aging. The biggest problem with his theory is Genesis 1:3-17, the creation of stars, sun, moon, and atmosphere - after the "gap." The whole idea cannot be taken seriously, except that it was printed in the Scofield Study Bible, which has a well-earned excellent reputation for sound conservative theological notes - just, not this one.

• Third is the idea that Genesis "days" were more than 24 hours - more like periods of many years each. This must be refuted. Without addressing the concept of the creation sequece being unduly strained by this theory, Scripture clearly states "evening and morning" as a discriptor for each "day" in the creation account. To redefine these days after being so specified is clearly dishonest.

The point of historical accountability is really from the time of Abraham forward. Before this time, we're basically working backwards, guessing years based on generations and references to names of people or cities, and making estimates based on sources external to Scripture. Christians should not be too concerned about actual dating of Scripture before (about) the time of Abraham, but cannot buy-in to dating based on the mythologies of evolution and ice age, or by blatant misinterpretation of God's Word.

Starting with the Time of Abraham

After the time of Abraham, dates are fairly uniform.

The most historically significant chronological framework based on biblical accounts is from the work of James Ussher (1581-1656). Ussher was Archbishop of Armagh who's dates were published in King James Version Bibles for many years. It is his dating system which has been, and still is, the defacto standard for conservative Christians, including both Catholics and Protestants. His book, "The Annals of the World" is still available (and on my shelf).

New Testament

Ranges for the life of Christ also span a few years of variance. This date is important enough to merit endless debate. Just remember that a 2 years dating variance for an event 2,000 years ago is a variance of 1/10 of 1%. The bottom line is that some variance is to be expected. Dating varies for the entire New Testament, including both when described events occur, and when the books where written - but not by more than a few years in most cases.

The most relevant concerns in New Testament dating concern whether the entire work was completed before AD 70, or else, extends to around AD 100, and concerns regarding the sequence and dating of the individual Books in context of the historical framework given in the Book of Acts.

The Entire New Testament The first issue concerns whether all the epistles were written before the destruction of the Temple in AD 70, which is generally a likely possibility. This is, however, sometimes presented dogmatically, which does not seem warranted. Conversely, later datings which take New Testament authorship past AD 100 is not justified and seems artifically presented in order to justify identifying ancient church persecution as the tribulation period described in the Book of Revelation - a view of historic Roman Catholic amillenialism. Realistically, The entire New Testament, as a whole, should be dated as being written in the second half of the first century.

[Original Writings of the New Testament] - Dates and authors (pdf)

Individual Books The second issue, dating and sequencing the individual Books of the New Testament is not absolutely resolvable, but is important for contextual understanding of the individual epistles. There is great benefit from studying these books in context with the Book of Acts. While some books are almost impossible to definitavely place, like the Book of Jude, other books, like Galatians, are obviously placed sequentially and will only vary in dating based on the date spans used for the events of the Book of Acts.

The Gospels An additional note must be made regarding the dating, or sequence, of the Gospels. In particular, there are two schools of thought on the primacy of Matthew or of Mark, as the first Book written. Many biblical references cite Mark as being the first written, and thus being a source for Matthew and Luke, and to a lesser degree, for John, but most conservative scholarship maintains the primacy of Matthew. In consideration of these two views, I hold to the latter and offer the following:

• Matthew was traditionally held to be the first gospel written, with this tradition not being challenged until 18th Century critical scholarship.
• The purpose of Matthew is based on proving Jesus is the Messiah to the Jews, seqentially a first concern.
• Matthew was one of the disciples and was at the church in Jerusalem - no reason for any earliest date restriction.
  
  
• Mark's brevity is no indication of being a source for the synoptic Gospels, but rather, there is no reason to assume that Mark did not source material from both Matthew and Luke.
• The purpose of Mark is based on presenting Jesus to the Gentiles, seqentially a later concern, presumably a response to his missionary experiences among the Gentiles
• Mark traditionally wrote under the apostolic authority of Peter, but they are not Scripturally shown together before AD 45. Since Mark's Gospel targets the Gentiles, it can be assumed that his Gospel was written not written before his first missionary journey about a year later (AD 46), but could have been written any time afterwards. His later time with Peter is around AD 62-64, this should be seen as the latest Scripture-based dating for Mark's Gospel.

So Which Dates do I Use?

Personally, I use the books I've listed in the section above as my primary sources, and recommend them. Note that these references do not completly agreee with one another, but they are best-guess dates given in harmony with scriptural statements and evidences. Primarily, I use:

• The Annals of the World - by James Ussher (1658)

• Unger's Bible Dictionary

• Talk Thru the Bible aka The Bible Handbook by Wikinson & Boa

Here is the table which I have put together for the general date periods - it is not detailed, but gives the basic chronological framework:

General Dateline of Bible Periods (Table)

(C) Copyright 2012 Dainel Stanfield, this document may be distributed freely, but may not be sold or modified.