400 Years of Enslavement Contradiction

[WhoIsLikeGod?]

Some believe a complete chronology from creation to present can be made using the Bible. I attempted to make such a chronology, but ran into a problem when I got to Jacob and his twelve sons.

Using the genealogies of Adam and Shem found in the Book of Genesis, it's clear to see that it was 1880 years from Adam to Terah, Abraham's father. According to Gen. 12:4 and Acts 7:4, Terah was 130 when he begat Abram. Abraham was 100 when he begat Isaac (Gen. 21:5), and Isaac was 60 when he begat Jacob (Gen. 25:26). The Bible does not directly say how old Jacob was when he begat Joseph or his brothers, but here is the logic for figuring it out:

Joseph was 30 when he entered the service of Pharaoh (Gen. 41:46). Then there were seven years of plenty (Gen. 41:47), followed by seven years of famine (Gen. 41:54). Jacob was 130 when he went to Egypt (Gen. 47:9). His arrival was the second year of the famine (Gen. 45:6), so Joseph was 39 when Jacob was 130. This means that Jacob was 91 when Rachel gave birth to Joseph. But Leah, Jacob's other wife, already had seven children before Joseph was born (Gen. 30:20–24). Reuben, Jacob's firstborn, was born at least seven years before the birth of Joseph.

Here is a short chronology of Jacob's life:

Jacob's Age Event Lifespan
84 Reuben born to Leah
85 Simeon born to Leah
86 Levi born to Leah........................................................Lived 137 years
87 Judah born to Leah.....................................................Lived 126 years
87 Dan born to Bilhah
88 Naphtali born to Bilhah
88 Gad born to Zilpah
89 Asher born to Zilpah
89 Issachar born to Leah
90 Zebulun born to Leah
91 Dinah born to Leah
91 Joseph born to Rachel.................................................Lived 110 years
108 Joseph sold into Egypt at 17
130 Jacob goes to Egypt:
starts 430 years of Israelites living in Egypt (Ex. 12:40)
147 Jacob dies

Herein lies the problem: pretty much everyone knows King Saul reigned from 1050–1010 BC. According to Acts 13:20, it was about 450 years from the conquest of Canaan until Samuel the Prophet. When you add up the lengths of all the judgeships in the Bible, it comes out to 432 years, but this does not include the judgeships of Samuel, Shamgar (Judg. 3:31), or the elders that judged after Joshua (Judg. 2:7). These three judgeships could easily add up to 18 years. So we're at 1500 BC. The conquest of Canaan took seven years according to the age of Caleb (Deut. 2:7; Deut. 2:14; Josh. 14:10). So we're at 1507 BC. The Israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years after the exodus (Num. 32:13). This places the exodus at 1547 BC. The Israelites lived in Egypt 430 years (Ex. 12:40). This puts Jacob in Egypt in 1977 BC. But for 400 years the Israelites were also "strangers in a country not their own and they were enslaved and mistreated there (Gen. 15:13)." So the enslavement began in 1947 BC. Seemingly non-contradictory, right? But wait...

If Levi was 44 when Jacob went to Egypt (130-86=44), he lived another 93 years before he died (137-44=93). If Jacob went to Egypt in 1977 BC, then Levi died in 1884 BC. The enslavement began in 1947 BC, but Exodus 1:6–11 says, "Now Joseph and all his brothers and all that generation died, but the Israelites were exceedingly fruitful; they multiplied greatly, increased in numbers and became so numerous that the land was filled with them. Then a new king, to whom Joseph meant nothing, came to power in Egypt. 'Look,' he said to his people, 'the Israelites have become far too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country.' So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh."

So if the enslavement began in 1947 BC, but Levi died in 1884 BC, then not all of Joseph's brothers died before the enslavement. In fact, it is unlikely that any of them died.

Where did I go wrong????

 

[Tolworth John]

Where did I go wrong?

No idea, may I suggest comparing your calculations with Bishop Usshers, a time line chart is available here:-
https://answersingenesis.org/bible-history/real-history-the-timeline-of-the-bible/

 

[Resha Caner]

Some believe a complete chronology from creation to present can be made using the Bible. I attempted to make such a chronology, but ran into a problem when I got to Jacob and his twelve sons.

You're going to run into a lot of issues with trying to create a Biblical timeline when applying Western concepts of time to a text written per Semitic concepts of time.

And while Bishop Ussher is an interesting historical reference, I wouldn't rely on it.

My son just came back from a medical mission trip to Africa, and he talked about how several Africans would joke with him about how he needed to adjust to "African time". They didn't mean jet lag.

 

[WhoIsLikeGod?]

You're going to run into a lot of issues with trying to create a Biblical timeline when applying Western concepts of time to a text written per Semitic concepts of time.

And while Bishop Ussher is an interesting historical reference, I wouldn't rely on it.

My son just came back from a medical mission trip to Africa, and he talked about how several Africans would joke with him about how he needed to adjust to "African time". They didn't mean jet lag.

The Hebrew calendar is a lunisolar calendar whose lunar year is about 11 days shorter than the solar year and uses the 19-year Metonic cycle to bring it into line with the solar year, with the addition of an intercalary month every two or three years, for a total of seven times per 19 years. Every 19 years, the Hebrew year catches up with the tropical year. With a difference of about 11 days, the Western concept of time is close enough to the Hebrew concept of time to not make much of a difference.

 

[Resha Caner]

The Hebrew calendar is a lunisolar calendar whose lunar year is about 11 days shorter than the solar year and uses the 19-year Metonic cycle to bring it into line with the solar year, with the addition of an intercalary month every two or three years, for a total of seven times per 19 years. Every 19 years, the Hebrew year catches up with the tropical year. With a difference of about 11 days, the Western concept of time is close enough to the Hebrew concept of time to not make much of a difference.

This is not what I meant. You're viewing time as some irrefutable reference, and therefore one culture's calendar can be mathematically converted to another. I see the same problems when people approach language. They want to know, "What is the German word for 'like' or 'welcome'", and fail to realize that the English and German languages express different concepts that can't be so directly translated.

So, what I referred to is more something like this: How Different Cultures Understand Time.

 

[WhoIsLikeGod?]

This is not what I meant. You're viewing time as some irrefutable reference, and therefore one culture's calendar can be mathematically converted to another. I see the same problems when people approach language. They want to know, "What is the German word for 'like' or 'welcome'", and fail to realize that the English and German languages express different concepts that can't be so directly translated.

So, what I referred to is more something like this: How Different Cultures Understand Time.

I fail to see how this makes a difference.

 

[Shane R]

Trying to set definitive dates to anything prior to the United Kingdom period is an exercise in futility and historical speculation.

 

[Resha Caner]

I fail to see how this makes a difference.

That's too bad.

There are similar problems with other chronologies. I think I have a paper floating around at home somewhere from an expert on Egyptian history that discusses all the problems with trying to date the Pharaohs.

I'll just note for you that I have an M.A. in history and I'm a strong advocate of Biblical historicity. IOW, I go all the way to accepting Adam & Eve as real people - to reading all of Genesis as history. And I'm the one telling you this is an exercise fraught with difficulty. You're not going to just pull out your Bible, read some entries on Wikipedia, and discover a chronology no one has ever been able to put together. There are people who spend their entire career as a historian on such things.

If you're interested in good, solid historical work on Biblical chronology, I can give you some resources.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

I fail to see how this makes a difference.

Perhaps out of 2000 scholars or researchers or educated ones,
only 2 or 3 "get it right", if that many.
Perhaps even 200 or 300, who knows ?

Online, various sites, perhaps only 2 or 3 that can be found, and they are not accepted nor recognized by others.

It may completely rely on who you trust, who you put your faith in,
and
even then, most of the population is far far in error, wrong on purpose.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

The Hebrew calendar is a lunisolar calendar whose lunar year is about 11 days shorter than the solar year and uses the 19-year Metonic cycle to bring it into line with the solar year, with the addition of an intercalary month every two or three years, for a total of seven times per 19 years. Every 19 years, the Hebrew year catches up with the tropical year. With a difference of about 11 days, the Western concept of time is close enough to the Hebrew concept of time to not make much of a difference.

This is the modern Hebrew calender, which was only established on mathematical models by Maimonides in the 12th century AD. Prior to that, intercalation occured haphazardly, depending on observed new moons in Palestine and correlating this with the ripening of crops for the solar year.
It is far more complicated than just correlating our years to theirs by mathematical formulae, therefore.

 

[Dirk1540]

If you're interested in good, solid historical work on Biblical chronology, I can give you some resources.

I’m interested, please post the resources if you get a chance. Thanks

 

[Dirk1540]

I see the same problems when people approach language. They want to know, "What is the German word for 'like' or 'welcome'", and fail to realize that the English and German languages express different concepts that can't be so directly translated

I was shocked to recently read that only something like 120 words have an exact match in all the world’s languages. That is a very small number considering how many words each language has.

 

[Resha Caner]

I’m interested, please post the resources if you get a chance. Thanks

I think a good starting point is:
* From Abraham to Paul: A Biblical Chronology by Andrew E. Steinmann, Concordia Publishing House, 2011.
* On the Reliability of the Old Testament by K. A. Kitchen, Eerdmans, 2003.
* The New Testament Documents: Are They Reliable? by F. F. Bruce, Eerdmans, 2003.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

People must remember that history is not written in the same way by everyone. The Bible is written with a different paradigm in place.

To explain, in the mediaeval period there was little concept that the past was different from the present. This is why Alexander the Great was said to have invented Chivalry, the Nine Worthies (nine figures from radical different traditions like Julius Caesar, David or Arthur) are treated as similar, or the ancients depicted in mediaeval dress or armour.
Only in the Renaissance, with proper examination and attempts to reconstruct the Ancient world, did the idea of the past as substantially different arise. This is why frankly ludicrous things like Monmouth's history of the British Kings, Brutus of Troy founding Britain, Pharoah's daughter Scota giving her name to Scotland, the Donation of Constantine, etc. were widely believed then. Within one text they might say the ancients were Pagan, but then describe something as happening 'as they went to Mass'.

So to get to the Bible, this was a source before the historical tradition arose. Such sources, like Ferdowsi's Shahnameh or the Aboriginal Dreamtime, tend to throw things into broad epochs, not linear annals. Think of a popular movie about King Arthur or Robin Hood for something similar, a mix of dress, weaponry, armour and concepts from more than a thousand years of history (unless one that attempts an affectation of historic 'accuracy').
Teasing an annal structure from such a prose and poetic rendition is well-nigh impossible. It was really not at all what they were thinking about. This is why you'll see genealogies are highly symbolic, with sets of generations between events, marking such epochal thinking. Literary connections between events are common, and ideas of 'contradiction' are frankly anachronistic to the text. The long life spans are a dead give away that we are working with a aetiological and polysemous narrative, not a historic annal. It probably has quite a bit of historic detail, but the goal was not to give that information, but make a different point entirely (God's relation to man in this case and address moral concepts such as Sin). Keeping ages and such straight was beside the point, often probably subjugated to narrative needs, as can be seen in differences between the LXX and the Masoretic text.

 

[WhoIsLikeGod?]

People must remember that history is not written in the same way by everyone. The Bible is written with a different paradigm in place.

To explain, in the mediaeval period there was little concept that the past was different from the present. This is why Alexander the Great was said to have invented Chivalry, the Nine Worthies (nine figures from radical different traditions like Julius Caesar, David or Arthur) are treated as similar, or the ancients depicted in mediaeval dress or armour.
Only in the Renaissance, with proper examination and attempts to reconstruct the Ancient world, did the idea of the past as substantially different arise. This is why frankly ludicrous things like Monmouth's history of the British Kings, Brutus of Troy founding Britain, Pharoah's daughter Scota giving her name to Scotland, the Donation of Constantine, etc. were widely believed then. Within one text they might say the ancients were Pagan, but then describe something as happening 'as they went to Mass'.

So to get to the Bible, this was a source before the historical tradition arose. Such sources, like Ferdowsi's Shahnameh or the Aboriginal Dreamtime, tend to throw things into broad epochs, not linear annals. Think of a popular movie about King Arthur or Robin Hood for something similar, a mix of dress, weaponry, armour and concepts from more than a thousand years of history (unless one that attempts an affectation of historic 'accuracy').
Teasing an annal structure from such a prose and poetic rendition is well-nigh impossible. It was really not at all what they were thinking about. This is why you'll see genealogies are highly symbolic, with sets of generations between events, marking such epochal thinking. Literary connections between events are common, and ideas of 'contradiction' are frankly anachronistic to the text. The long life spans are a dead give away that we are working with a aetiological and polysemous narrative, not a historic annal. It probably has quite a bit of historic detail, but the goal was not to give that information, but make a different point entirely (God's relation to man in this case and address moral concepts such as Sin). Keeping ages and such straight was beside the point, often probably subjugated to narrative needs, as can be seen in differences between the LXX and the Masoretic text.

Actually the Bible presents the ages of Adam's descendants as facts. It says precisely how old they were when they had children and when they died. Note that the super old ages predate the flood, when the atmospheric pressure and the climate were much, much different. Exposure to the sun would have been nearly non-existent. Genesis 6:1–3 says, "When human beings began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. Then the Lord said, 'My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.'"

 

[Dirk1540]

From my understanding the exact ages are not stated as facts, but instead are to be interpreted like this (and I would love to know if @Quid est Veritas? can tell me if I’m accurate here)...

When John had lived 38 years he became the father of ‘The line that would give way to Joe’

Joe could be the direct son of John (which then obviously would satisfy giving way to him), but Joe could also be 8 generations away from one of John’s immediate sons. John could have had 8 sons, and his son Phil is the son ‘Who’s line’ would eventually beget Joe.

 

[Hawkins]

The fundamental question is when it is said that, say Adam lived more than 900 years what calendar was used (especially while Adam was still living)?

To me, genealogy doesn't serve the purpose of year calculation. It only serves the purpose of standing witness (human accounts) that Jesus is from David and Adam.

 

[WhoIsLikeGod?]

From my understanding the exact ages are not stated as facts, but instead are to be interpreted like this (and I would love to know if @Quid est Veritas? can tell me if I’m accurate here)...

When John had lived 38 years he became the father of ‘The line that would give way to Joe’

Joe could be the direct son of John (which then obviously would satisfy giving way to him), but Joe could also be 8 generations away from one of John’s immediate sons. John could have had 8 sons, and his son Phil is the son ‘Who’s line’ would eventually beget Joe.

This shouldn't matter because by the time we get to Abraham, he only lives 175 years. My question is regarding the length of the enslavement of the Israelites in Egypt, when people are living to be 147 at the most.

This is an interesting theory but we know that Seth was Adam's direct son, and Adam begat him when he was 130. Then the Bible goes on to say, "After Seth was born, Adam lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters. Altogether, Adam lived a total of 930 years, and then he died."

Why is it so hard to believe that they could have lived so long? Just because we don't live 900 years now, doesn't mean it was impossible then. A lot has changed since then: for one, the flood. If we believe that God can raise a dead man from the grave but don't believe He can shorten the years of a man's life, then who are we kidding? Supposing we live to be 100 years old, then we've only lived 1.6% of the total age of the Earth. Can you imagine how limited of worldview we all have?

 

[WhoIsLikeGod?]

The fundamental question is when it is said that, say Adam lived more than 900 years what calendar was used (especially while Adam was still living)?

To me, genealogy doesn't serve the purpose of year calculation. It only serves the purpose of standing witness (human accounts) that Jesus is from David and Adam.

The oldest calendar goes back to Ancient Babylon and it is a lunisolar calendar nearly identical to ours today.

The writings of Ancient China say that their ancestors lives hundreds of years as well, at about the same time, before the flood. Just because we don't see it today doesn't mean it didn't happen in the past.

 

[Quid est Veritas?]

From my understanding the exact ages are not stated as facts, but instead are to be interpreted like this (and I would love to know if @Quid est Veritas? can tell me if I’m accurate here)...

When John had lived 38 years he became the father of ‘The line that would give way to Joe’

Joe could be the direct son of John (which then obviously would satisfy giving way to him), but Joe could also be 8 generations away from one of John’s immediate sons. John could have had 8 sons, and his son Phil is the son ‘Who’s line’ would eventually beget Joe.

This is a well known Jewish usage. You see it with Son of David for someone descended from David for instance, as used for Christ and the royal house of Judah. It is also used for descendants of Omri of the Northern kingdom. Jehu is also termed son of Omri in Assyrian texts, though the Bible has him as outside Ahab's dynasty. Many theorise that he might be from a collateral line descended of Omri therefore.
Another good example are the Hasmonaeans. They are termed sons of Hasmon or Mattathias, refering back to Mattathias ben Hashmon who started the Maccabean revolt in the first place, and from whence the Greek term Hasmonaean is derived.

So such a reading is certainly plausible and accords well with known usage in the Second Temple period.