CREATION’S CHRONOLOGY 1 (of 4)

From an old flat earth booklet

In THE SABBATH OF CREATION for December, 1902, I promised, God willing, to bring forward some of the evidence we have for Bible Chronology, and the fact that the Seventh Day Sabbath has come down to us from the Creation of the World in an unbroken line of weeks through All Past Time. This is a great subject, and one that needs close application and a good state of health for a comprehensive study and elucidation; so that with dyspepsia, writer’s cramp, and other infirmities, I should hesitate to approach the subject did I not look for help and guidance from the great Author of all created beings. It must however be pleasing to the Creator that His creatures should study His marvellous works; yet in this particular branch Chronology I have been surprised to find how few Christians there are who are sufficiently interested therein to take the necessary pains to acquire an intelligent and general view of the subject. I write therefore with a view to stimulate others to take an interest in this great theme, and not with any idea of exhausting the enquiry; and I trust that, while many may be helped with the few articles I propose to give in THE SABBATH OF CREATION, some one or other may be raised up to pursue the subject further until we have the light of chronological truth shining upon the pages of Inspiration as clearly as that which we have already obtained upon their cosmological teachings, and as now set forth in our other paper, entitled THE EARTH, and formerly in The EARTH (not a globe) REVIEW.

In studying this subject I have also been surprised to find so many definite dates. given in the Bible, and many of these dates capable of being scientifically tested by the solar cycles; and the conviction has grown stronger in my mind that the Bible is a much more scientific Book than the general reader, or even the general student is aware. No forger of historical writings, and even no honest, but haphazard, and uninspired, writers could venture to give so many historical dates without sooner or later, and probably sooner than later, being found out as unreliable. But the Bible has withstood every truly scientific test that has been applied to it, both in its Cosmogony and its Chronology; so that we can now intelligently subscribe to the emphatic words of our blessed Lord when He said:

“THE SCRIPTURES CANNOT BE BROKEN.”

Even as a youth of twelve years of age the Lord Jesus shewed such understanding of the Sacred Writings as astonished the Doctors or Jewish Rabbis, in the study of divine things He was an example to us and to our youth, shewing how we should early lead our children into the knowledge of these  mysteries. And we have found that when the Bible is honestly and intelligently studied, apart from sectarian creeds and commentaries, it is not only the most instructive book in the world, but one of the most, if not the most, interesting. As the Psalmist writes, “The entrance of Thy Word giveth light; it giveth understanding unto the simple.” Psa. 119:130.

Proceeding at once to our subject, I shall give in tabulated form the years of the lives of the Antediluvian Patriarchs from father to son. This table will show how many years, according to the Bible, elapsed between the creation of Adam in the year nought (o), to the year of the Universal Deluge.

According to the following Table Adam was created in the year o. We must not call his first year our year one of Creation, until that year was complete; otherwise we shall be confused with subsequent additions. We must reckon the years of Creation as we do the years of a person’s life, counting the first year nothing in years until it is ended; and so on in all subsequent years. If we look at the first line and fourth column of the Table we find that Adam was 130 years old at the birth of his son Seth; Seth therefore was born in the A.M. year or Anno Mundi (year of the World) 130, as shown in the second line and first column.

Again, Seth was 105 years of age according to the Text given in the third column, when his son Enos was born. Add therefore, 105 years to the 130, and we obtain 235 AM. as the year of the World when Enos was born. Proceeding in the same way, through the patriarchal line, we find that the year of the Universal Deluge was the year of the World 1656, that is, so many years from the Creation of the World.

The A. M. dates of the deaths of the Antediluvian Patriarchs, as given in the seventh column of the Table, are also interesting, as shewing with whom they were severally contemporary; but as these dates are not directly connected with our Line of Time from Creation we shall leave them for the comparison of the intelligent reader. It will be seen that as Adam died in the A.M. year 930, he lived almost to the time of the translation of Enoch (A. M. 987) who was the seventh from Adam, and who prophesied of the Lord’s Second Coming, as recorded by Jude. It will also be noticed that Methuselah died during the Flood year.

In our investigations we shall deal principally with A. M. years, as they will supply us with a continuous Line of Time from the Creation of the World down to the present; especially as this Line of Time can be tested by the Cycles of Eclipses which have already taken place, and the various individual Eclipses which are now actually taking place. Thus the Works of God will be seen to harmonise with, and to support, the Word of God. To Him, therefore, be all the praise and glory.