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Patriarch Abraham
 
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“THE EARTH IS THE LORD'S AND THE FULNESS THEREOF” Psalm 24:1.
blue pinAll data subject to continuing refinement.
 
Eber
the Ancestor
Eber is head of a family-group after the division at Babel which bears his name in the English form 'Hebrew'.
 
In the structure of the text (Gen.10:21-25) Abraham's ancestor Heber/עבר (B5 at the Babel Division in the graph on the previous page) is presented as the origin of the people-group called Hebrew, of whom "Abram the Hebrew" is its most famous representative. This affirms the genealogy's purpose as specifically Abrahamic history, and that it is not a time-measure for general chronological purposes as it has sometimes been unfortunately used.
Dispersion
Note:
 
Proto-Indo-European
See c.5600 BC below
Concerning the dispersion of the human race after Babel, language often provides a reflection of movements of populations. For instance –
  • The Latin 'ignis' (fire) is related to the Indian Sanskrit goddess of fire 'Agni' (modern Urdu for fire 'ag', is derived from this).
  • The Biblical Hebrew word for Greeks, sons of 'Javan' (Gen.10:4), is related to the name 'Ionian' for the earliest Greeks.
 e.g. 'Father' is
in Roman Latin  – 'Pater'
in Indian Sanskrit  – 'Pitár'
So please
remember –
 
 
Chronology is not the purpose of Abraham's genealogy. This is affirmed by its stylised structure in the Genesis record (10–FLOOD–10). That is, the stylised nature of the Abraham's ancestral genealogy means that the number of generations cannot be used for chronological purposes as it does not necessarily include all generations ('father of...' = ancestor of...). An understandably negative reaction to evolutionary theory should not be allowed to colour our approach to precious Holy Scripture.
See:
Postulated Creation Dates
The
New Testament (in Luke) shows us that our existing Hebrew copies of Genesis have lost one generation from this Genesis genealogy, which has unfortunately helped hide its stylised structure, and it has also lost the age factor of that particular ancestor ('Cainan').
 
This irregular use of dateing is indicated in the Israel Time-line by the use of "?" after a date. ('c.' abbreviates 'circa' meaning 'about', i.e. approximately).
BC/BCE c.18,000 Migration fvrom Asia (Siberia) to North America (Alaska) via Beringia.  
Asia-America landbridge
~15,000 BC

Asia-America landbridge ~15,000 BC
The Kennewick Man skull opposite is of the earliest human inhabitant of North America discovered to date.
c.12,700
An abrupt warming period begins (according to Greenland ice-core analysis).
Kennewick Man Skull
North America
11,013?
HAROLD CAMPING's ('Family Radio') date for Creation from which he then calculates the end-of-the-world to be AD/CE 2011 using a variation of the Great Week myth of history as a basis from Noah's Flood.
c.10,900
The warming period ends, beginning the Younger Dryas cold spell or Big Freeze, lasting about 1,300 years.
(Greenland ice core GISP2 indicates that its summit was ~15°C colder during Younger Dryas than it is today).
c.10,000
Hilazon Tachtit, in Israel's Galilee, a cave grave of a 45-year-old female Shaman from this time is later found in 2008.
c.9700
Warming period begins again, and the Ice Age ends. Bristlecone Pines begin to grow near the California-Nevada border.
c.7300
Mt. Mazama, in America's Pacific North West, erupts violently leaving ash deposits over stone tools of the earliest inhabitants. These help to date the earlier caucasian Ainu-type (Jomon) 'Kennewick' man's remains from that area. Later a fragment of his fifth left metacarpal, analysed by (AMS) radio-carbon dating, was shown to have an isotopically-corrected age of 8410 +/- 60 Before Present.
c.7000
In the Arabian perninsula, the neolithic al-Maqar civilization uses domesticated horses.
c.6300
Glacial ice-cores on Kilimanjaro indicate the beginning of a 500 year drying period of the lakes of Africa.
  c.6200
Greenland ice-core indicates an abrupt century-long cold event.
See: Earth's Weather
  c.6000 Britain becomes an island as the sea level rises.  
Not Noah's Flood! c.5600
The Mediterranean Sea breaks through with devastating force to fill the Black Sea basin (~50 cubic km per day). This shift of water-mass helps trigger earthquakes throughout the region. The catastrophic drowning of such a large area causes vast human migrations. (See 2715 BC also). (The ancient shoreline of its old freshwater lake now lies some 168 metres below the 1999AD/CE sea level).

See
National Geographic Report.
Egypt forms The
Nile river changes its course, from feeding the North African lakes, to flowing into the Mediterranean, thus creating Egypt along its watered valley.
The original course of the Nile can be traced in sattelite photos of the region.
World
sea level at this time is still about 50 feet below present levels. (Holocene Optimum).
5329?
Date of Creation on the best manuscript evidences if we misuse/abuse the Bible. (See Genealogical Table)
5198?
Date of Creation according to eighth century AD Welsh historian NENNIUS (1-4, as translated by Morris).
'Erech' c.5000
In Mesopotamia – The city of Uruk (Erech/ארך) is founded in southern Mesopotamia by Nimrod (נמרוד) on the fertile alluvial plain beside the Euphrates river.
In Egypt – A decimal number system is in use.
In Mesoamerica – The planting of maize begins on forest-cleared land.
Genesis 10:8-10
4156?
Date of Creation or later, according to Mrs ELLEN G. WHITE, principal teacher of the Seventh-day Adventist movement (based ultimately on the 'Great Week' myth, originating in the second-century AD/CE from the pseudo Letter of Barnabas).
  4026?
The Jehovah's Witnesses 'Watchtower Society' statement –
"According to reliable Bible chronology Adam was created in the year 4026 BCE, likely in the autumn of the year, at the end of the sixth day of creation." (1975).
  4004?
October 23: Date of Creation, according to Anglican Bishop USSHER, mistakenly using genealogy as chronology.

Ötzi, the Alpine shepherd,
accurately reconstructed.
(Museum Bélesta, Ariège, France)
3961? Date of Creation according to MARTIN LUTHER, ditto.
3952?
Date of Creation according to Abbot BEDE (703 AD/CE, Northumbria, Britain), ditto.
  3761?
Date of Creation, according to rabbinic Judaism (See also: Judaism's 9th century AD/CE dating system origin), ditto.
  c.3500
A period of significantly higher Nile floods begins, continuing until c.2500 BC.
Uruk city-culture begins to spread across Mesopotamia and eventually as far as Anatolia (modern Turkey) by traders and colonists.
c.3400
In Egypt – The first symbols for numbers and simple straight lines are used.
3337?
The Great Flood of Noah ends (if mistakenly using genealogy as chronology).
3335?
Birth of ARPHAXAD, father/ancestor of CAINAN (See Table 1).
c.3300
The ancient Egyptians begin to develop mummification of the dead. (See: mummification).
World's oldest unsolved murder
Chalcolithic (copper age) ÖTZI, victim of the world's oldest unsolved murder, dies age c.45 in the Ötz valley of the Italian Alps.
Chalcolithic murder victim
Ötzi's corpse on Schnalstal glacier
Oetzi's flint knife
Ötzi's flint knife ~3300 BC,
the same period as the ivory-handled Gebel el-Arak flint knife, of predynastic Egypt.
Ötzi was also equipped with a bow and flint tipped arrows as in the reconstruction (right).
  3200?
Birth of CAINAN, father/ancestor of SHELAH.
Glacial ice-cores indicate the beginning of a hot dry period collapsing many nomadic cultures.
c.3200-3100
The first-known political state in history forms – known as the 'Uruk expansion'.
World sea level now stabilizes to near its present level.
  3114
August 11: Starting point of the Mayan calendar (in Mesoamerica).
  3102
February 18: Hindu mythology date for the beginning of the Kali era (in India).
c.3100
In Egypt – King MENES (Hor-Aha) unites the kingdoms of Upper (south) Egypt and Lower (the Delta) Egypt with his capital at Memphis.
An earliest form of writing appears on clay tablets in Uruk.
'Shem, the father of all the children of Eber... And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg. For in his days was the earth divided.' (Genesis 10:21, 25)
3070?
Birth of SHELAH, father/ancestor of (H)EBER.
c.3000
Babylonians begin to use a sexagesimal number system (base 60) for recording financial transactions. It is a place-value system without a zero place-value. This is reflected today in our measurement of time and angles (i.e 6x60 degrees in a circle)
2940?
Birth of (H)EBER, father of PELEG, and patronymic ancestor of the Hebrews (Gen.10:21; 11:16).
  c.2900 Uruk in southern Mesopotamia is now the largest city on earth covering 6 km2 within its walled area.
NOTE: 2806?
arrow
Birth of PELEG, father/ancestor of REU, in whose time the human family divided at Babel bullet (Gen.10:25).
PELEG's birth, so named for its association with the division of the human race at Babel, almost certainly long predates the death of Ötzi above, further indicating that Abrahamic genealogy cannot be used for chronology.
  c.2800 Ur becomes one of the richest cities in Sumer (southern Mesopotamia/Iraq).
Not Noah's Flood!
2715
(+/-10)
Dendrochronology date (tree-ring dating) for a catastrophic Black Sea land subsidence that buries all Early Bronze Age settlements in that region under what is now 8-10 metres of water.
c.2700
GILGAMESH (grandson of ENMERKAR), king of Uruk (Erech), 'visits' aged UTNAPISHTIM (Noah) of the Great Flood.
2676?
Birth of REU, SERUG's father/ancestor.
c.2667-2648
or c.2630-2611
ZOAR (Djoser/Netjerykhet) King of Upper and Lower Egypt of the 3rd dynasty. (His step pyramid, designed by the high priest of Ra, IMHOTEP, is the earliest complete building of hewn stone in Egypt, the complex covering 15 ha / 37 acres).
Ur grave pit Plan of
the "Great Death Pit" cemetery at Ur, so called because it held the bodies of seventy-three retainers who apparently died as part of the royal funeral.
Reprinted from Woolley's The Royal Cemetery, Ur Excavations, Vol. 2, published in 1934. C. Leonard Woolley, 1934, and the Iraq's Ancient Past, Penn Museum.
 
2544?
Birth of SERUG, father of NAHOR.
 
c.2500
Earth climate cools, putting once flourishing settlements in the higher latitudes under great stress, such as in the Orkney islands.
See: Earth's Weather
2414?
Birth of NAHOR, ABRAM's grandfather.
c.2400
Ur is conquered by the Semitic-speaking kings of Agade/Akkad (the site of Akkad city has never been found).
c.2350
There is evidence of a huge meteor strike devastating southern 'Iraq'/Mesopotamia at this date according to tree-ring dating (dendrochronology) which would have led to the breakdown of these kingdoms (other date estimates vary between c.2400-2100 BCE).
Dead Sea level now drops by about 100 metres.
c.2345
The city of Troy (level IIg) is utterly devastated by fire as well as the region to Tell Leilan (possibly by a meteor shower).
c.2230 SARGON (Sharru-kinu='Legitimate-king') king of Kish, founds the Akkadian Empire.
2334-2279
(Middle Chronology)
SARGON I (2371-2316) of Akkad (in Semitic), Agade (in Sumerian), conquers Sumer (Shinar/שִׁנְעָר/Šin`ar), and makes his daughter *EN-HEDU-ANA high priestess/consort of the moon god Nanna (full moon) at Ur (meaning 'the abode of Nanna'; he is also known as En-zu 'lord of wisdom' regarding astrology).
* EN  Chief Priest/Priestess
  HEDU  ornament
  ANA  of Heaven
Enheduana composed 42 hymns addressed to temples across Sumer and Akkad including Eridu, Sippar and Esnunna.
The name
Sumerian was given to them by these semitic Akkadians as a geographic reference, but they referred to themselves as 'the black-headed people' (phonetically: uŋ saŋ giga).
c.2300
Stonehenge on the Salisbury Plain in Britain begins to be built.
The Mesopotamian
post-Akkadian cylinder seal from this period, often called the 'seal of temptation' because it has been seen as depicting Adam and Eve on either side of the Tree with serpents in the background, is more likely that of a god (shown by his horned headdress) receiving a worshipper at the tree of fertility.
temptation seal
'temptation' seal
2296-2271
LUGAL-ZAGESI (originally of Umma), makes Uruk his new capital after conquering all Sumer.
2291-2255
NARAM-SIN (grandson of SARGON) conquers the area from Elam (south-west Iran) to Syria, including the city of Ebla.
2278-2270
RIMUSH of Akkad conquers Elam and Marhashi (central Iran).
2235
Birth of TERAH, ABRAM's father.
c.2194
East Africa, Palestine, Mesopotamia, Gulf of Oman, Aegean, and Indus regions experience an abrupt climatic change.
c.2180
A period of low Nile floods begins that includes periodic severe famines, until c.1950BCE.
(Analysis and carbon dating of ancient sediments from Lake Tana in Ethiopia – the source of the Blue Nile – found that around 4,200 years ago, lake levels dropped considerably, indicating massive water shortages and drought may have ultimately brought an end to Egypt’s first major dynastic civilization, the collapse of the Old Kingdom.
אוּר כַּשְׂדִים
Ur of the Chaldees
2165
Birth of ABRAM in Ur (אוּר/Urim/Tell el-Muqayyar, today north of the Tallil military air base in Iraq), the land of their 'kindred' (Gen.11:28), capital and port of Sumer (river sediment has since pushed the coastline far south), whose patron deity is the Sumerian moon god Nanna (the name of the city is derived from the god's name, URIM).
Akkadian empire under SHU-TURUL collapses.
In antiquity the Euphrates River
flowed near Ur city walls.
  c.2160
Climatic changes hasten the end of Egypt's Old Kingdom.
See: Earth's Weather
See: Code of Ur-Nammu 2112
King UR-NAMMU, founder of Ur's 3rd Dynasty, builds the great Ziggurat Temple.
(He uses column, arch, vault, and dome forms of architecture, with every wall being an imperceptible convex to create an illusion of strength; the so-called entasis principle).
Harran was established by Ur as a merchant-outpost due to its ideal location along a trade route between the Mediterranean and the plains of the middle Tigris on the road from Antioch eastward to Nisibis and Ninevah.
Short Chronology c.2047-2030 2095
UR-NAMMU dies, his son SHULGI rules the Sumerian empire (2094-2047) and extends it to all Assyria.
    "By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance.
And he went out, not knowing where he was going."
(Hebrews 11:8).
2090
Akkadian-speaker ABRAM enters Canaan at the age of 75, from Haran (חָרָן/Harran) where his father died, and he worships God (יהוה) at the local open-air sanctuary in Shechem (Gen.12).
c.2089
ABRAM moves to Egypt because of famine and lies about his wife SARAI to the Tenth Dynasty pharaoh, ruler of northern Egypt.
  c.2085
MELCHI-ZEDEK, Amorite city-king of Salem and priest of God Most High (כהן לאל עליון), supplies food and drink to the troops of ABRAM and his Amorite Allies, after their military action to free LOT and rescue the captives taken from the cities of the plain of Siddim (south of the Dead/Salt Sea).
ABRAM gives the city-king of Salem 10% of his plunder of the Eastern Alliance armies (Gen.14:18-20).
In the Abrahamic Covenant: the '400 years affliction' begins with the death of Joseph; and the 'fourth generation return' to Palestine is of Judah's genealogy (Genesis 15:13, 16).
Note: 
Abram adopts the king of Salem's terms for God, El Elyon (אֵל עֶלְיֹון), in rebuking the city-king of Sodom; terms also found in the Ugaritic Poems on clay tablets excavated at Ras Shamra in Lebanon. This language of the Amorites of Canaan/Palestine (known to us as Canaanite) eventually becomes the language of the family of Abram and directly ancestral to the Hebrew of our Bible.
  God
promises ABRAM innumerable descendants. Although it seems physically impossible, ABRAM believes/trusts God beyond his own understanding and he is therefore considered righteous before God (Gen.15:6).
Ibrāhīm ابراهيم God
enters into a formal covenant with ABRAM concerning the Land of Palestine according to the custom of the time (Gen.15:8-21). (See: Israel's Right to Canaan/Palestine).
Please note right side-bar
2079
ISHMAEL is born to ABRAM and HAGAR (Gen.16); from whom all the Arab tribes are descended through Ishmael's twelve clans (Gen.17:30).
Although
the Hebrew of our Bible is derived from the Canaanite language which Israel's Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, learned in Canaan, in addition to Ancient Egyptian, the Bible's Hebrew also shows the influence of the (Assyro-Babylonian) Akkadian language in both its vocabulatory and grammatical structure.
Akkadian was the primary diplomatic language throughout the Middle East in this time. For instance, even later the letters which the Canaanite Princes of the fourteenth century BC/BCE wrote to the Egyptian Pharaoh Akhenaton in his new capital at Tel-el-Amarna were written in Akkadian.
          The following is a sample of associated terms –
        Akkadian   Biblical Hebrew
1.   artist, artisan   ummanu   omman
2.   I   anaku   anokhi/ánuk
3.   book   shipru   sefer
4.   went   alaku   halakh
5.   locust   erebu   arbeh
6.   cattle   alpu   eleph
7.   enemy   ayabu   oyeh
8.   light   urru   or
9.   inward parts, bowels   kirbu   kereb
10.   eleven   ishten eshrit   ashte esreh
11.   palace   ekallu   heikhal
12.   governor, ruler   shaknu   sokhen, segen/sagan
13.   chief, captain   sharru   sar
See:
Akkadian and the
Cause of the Flood.


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