Timeline: History of the Earth: Age of Division Year 1657 - Year 2107

History of Creation
Year	Event	Notes	Date in B.C.E (Before the Common Era)
1657	Noah and his family emerge from the Ark; The Second Age Begins, the Age of Division	They most likely settled near Sumer.  So that would explain why Sumer is one of the first areas to spring up again in history.  Now, although God said he would shorten the days of mankind, with the land no longer being cursed and with animals now a food source, humanity likely multiplied quickly at this point.  With food no longer being as big of a deal, mankind would thrive and repopulate much quicker than during the 130 years before Cain killed Abel.  Therefore, it is likely that people spread out rather fast.  Especially after the incident where Canaan mocked Noah and Ham and Canaan and their descendants were cursed, chances are, this created a rift in the family, and they all went their separate ways.	2428
1658	Arphaxad is born	This date lines up with the Genesis account perfectly, and it also shows that Shem was the youngest son of Noah.  After all, Genesis says that Noah was 500 years old when he had Shem, Ham and Japheth.  However, Arphaxad was born 2 years after the Flood when Shem was 100 years old.  Therefore, it makes sense that Japheth was the firstborn, born to Noah when Noah was 500.  Then Ham was born to Noah in 1557 and Shem was born in 1558, exactly 98 years before the Flood, making Shem 100 when Arphaxad was born 2 years after the Flood.	2427
1693	Salah is born		2392
1723	Eber is born, known as the father of Hebrews.  Some believe the ancient word for Hebrew was Habiru, and this word was derived from Eber's name.		2362
1757	Peleg is born. Since Peleg is mentioned as being born around the time of the dividing of peoples, it is most likely that Peleg is born just after the Tower of Babel is being constructed by Nimrod, a descendant of Ham.  So it is likely that in the Year 1756 and possibly into 1757 the Tower of Babel is begun but God visits it and decides that man is too smart for his own good.  If the Tower is completed nothing will stop man's pride.  Therefore, God divides all the people across the world into tribes and nationalities and gives them all different languages to confuse them.  It is quite possible that during this time the world is physically divided as well, splitting the continents into different land masses as we know them today.	Regardless of how far they may or may not have spread, the Tower of Babel incident led to the vast separation of people.  New languages sprang up from this incident, people were clustered together based on their tribe.  So it is likely that people were scattered, by God, either by supernatural causes or simply by driving them out of fear, to various parts of the world.  Since there are no Great Cataclysm stories that are told throughout the major ancient religions of that time, as there were for the Flood, it is likely that the event was not some huge cataclysm or huge supernatural event.  However, there are stories that mention a tower being built, and lightning and earthquakes seem to be some of the things mentioned in these stories.  Therefore, my guess is that God simply confused their language.  Then, being confused and frustrated, they probably started fighting with one another and trying to hurt one another in their frustration, as humans often do when they don't understand something.  However, to ensure they'd divide and separate, and to ensure they knew it was a sin, God then caused an earthquake and a storm that destroyed the tower, and then it split the land just of that region to form a small river in the middle of the city.  This would force the peoples to divide and go in different directions from one another at a much faster pace, and because they were first frustrated and angry with their original family, they would most likely not return again.  Also, it is believed that a Great Aridification began around 2300 B.C.E. and it swept across all of the lands of the world, even the Americas.  It lasted for about a 100 years or more.  This aridification devastated all of the main nations of the world.  Could it be that this aridification is what caused the nations to split and scatter to all corners of the world?  This would then explain how Peleg got his name as well.  Peleg means "a dividing by a small channel of water.  The root of the word is associated with earthquake.  Although there is no story of a great Cataclysm having to do with a great tower, there are plenty of stories in other lands and cultures that are very close to the Tower of Babel story.  Besides the Bible, there is a story in ancient Sumer that says that Enmerkar of Uruk was building a ziggurat in Eridu to the god Marduk.  As one translation goes, he recites an incantation to the god Enki in the hopes of restoring one language to all people, but in another it is to confuse the language of the people.  In Mexico, there is a pyramid called the Pyramid of Cholula.  As the story goes, when the sun first touched the land there were giants who went searching for the sun.  Not finding it, they built a tower to the sky.  The Lord of the Heavens got angry and essentially destroyed the tower and scattered its inhabitants.  The ancient Toltecs had a story that was even closer to the Bible account.  They stated that after a great deluge, men multiplied and built a tall tower to preserve themselves in the event of a second deluge. However, for whatever reason, their languages were confused and they went to different parts of the earth.  Even the Tohono O'odham American Indians in Arizona have a story about a great flood and a tower to heaven.  They say that Montezuma escaped a great flood.  After that he became wicked and attempted to construct a tower reaching to heaven, but the Great Spirit destroyed it.  The Tharu of Nepal and northern India have a similar story.  In Africa, the traditional story again is similar but in this version the builders' heads are cracked open when the scaffolding falls on them.  There are actually even more stories than that all over the world, which is even more evidence that the story is true.  Therefore, what likely happened is that Noah and his family descended out of the north and east, out of eastern Turkey, and down into Sumer.  There, it seems that the entire family lived for a time in unity.  Then Nimrod, son of Cush the son of Ham, rose up amongst them and led them to build the Tower of Babel, for Genesis 10 tells us that Nimrod became king in the land of Shinar, which is ancient Sumer.  The king of Sumer that fits most closely with Nimrod is Lugal-zage-si who supposedly took over the world.  Lugal claimed that Enlil had given him "all the lands between the upper and the lower seas", which are the Mediterranean Sea and the Persian Gulf.  The Bible calls Nimrod a mighty hunter or the mighty one on the earth.  Some have said that Nimrod more closely resembles Sargon, but if you notice Sargon is the first Semitic-speaking king of the Akkadian Empire.  It would therefore make sense that Nimrod was Lugal who built the Tower of Babel and then Sargon rose up against him after the tower was destroyed and took over.  Lugal basically built the foundation for the Akkadian Empire, but Sargon swept in and took it over and built upon it.  Still, Sargon could have also been Nimrod, for he is better known and he also fits the description.  Whatever the case, the Tower of Babel situation occurred just before Peleg was born to Shem, and since his name is associated with the event, we can place its construction in the same year as Peleg's birth.  After the Tower of Babel incident, Japheth's family went north and west into Europe and West Asia, so they were likely the ancestors all Europeans, Russians...essentially all Caucasians.  Ham's family was the one to spread out the most, it seems.  They went south and west into Israel (or Canaan at that time), Syria, Egypt and pretty much all of Africa.  Although it is likely that Ham's family were the ancestors of all Africans, it is not true that they were the ancestors of all colored races.  Shem's family seems to have remained in the Middle East, living around the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers but also as far as the borders of India.  After all, Elam was a son of Shem, and the Elamites were said to be a black-skinned race of people.  So Shem's family was likely the ancestors of the Jews and Arabs, but obviously other races sprang up out of his line as well.  Since Cush's family seemed to be the main rulers of Sumer, although Abram and his family began their lives in Ur of the Chaldeans, I think that Shem's family spread eastward into India, China, Japan, Korea, Indonesia, Australia and even into the Americas.  So, essentially, Japheth took Europe and northern and western Asia, Ham took Africa and the southwestern lands of Asia, and Shem took to the south and east in Asia and crossed even over to the Americas.  Of course, it is also possible that some ethnicities are combinations of two or all three of the family lines.  For example, as Japheth's family met Shem's family in the east, they may have intermarried.  Therefore, some of the features of each family passed on to their children. Thus, it is possible that those of the Orient are a mixture of both lines of Japheth and Shem.  Later, in Judges, we find a king whose name means "twice-evil Cushite".  He came from Mesopotamia.  So it is possible that this king and his people were a combination of Shem, Ham and Japheth.  Ham's eldest son was Cush, and Japheth was the father of Europeans.  The invaders that the Bible speaks of at this time in Judges were possibly Indo-Europeans, or individuals of European and possibly even Indian descent, for the names of several of their kings were Indo-European, though their language was different from any known language.  Therefore, it is likely that this king was of the family of Ham, since he was called a "twice-evil Cushite", of the family of Japheth, and of the family of Shem, since the Indians probably came from Shem and the Europeans came from Japheth.  But what about American Indians, Aztecs, etc.?  Just because we have no evidence that people sailed across the ocean and arrived in the Americas during this time, doesn't mean they didn't.  It is quite possible that some from India, China, Japan, or especially Korea or other parts of Asia closest to Alaska, crossed that ocean bridge and wound up stranded in America or they stayed by choice.  After all, people would undoubtedly begin to explore the New Earth in search for land they could call their own, to escape from those who didn't believe as they do and who didn't speak the same language they did.  Then, as they began to spread out, they would find ruins of ancient civilizations and religions, built before the Flood, and they would begin to wonder, "Is the God of Noah really God, or are these gods that we have found in these lands really the true gods?"  And especially if they couldn't read the ancient language anymore, because God had confused their minds, creating new languages, it would easily lead people to begin to make up their own tales about gods.  Thus, all of the ancient religions began to spring up again in new ways.  Even if people once knew that their long-living kings were just men, to ancient people who could not understand what the pictures or the statues were showing them, it would be easy for them to get the basic idea of what these stories were saying and then fill in the gaps with their own versions of the myths.	2328
1787	Reu is born	I believe that around this time the nations began to truly rise up again in strength.  This was likely the beginning of Djedkare Isesi's reign in Egypt.  He and his tribe, after being separated by the Tower of Babel situation, wound up in Egypt and found many things still intact.  They began to rebuild their empire under Djedkare's leadership, which is why he began to do so many reforms.  He branched away from the old, but as he and his tribal leaders began to find more and more of what the ancient Egyptians used to believe, they began to use these things for their own purposes, to control their own family and people.  Being sons of Ham, and having been cursed because of the incident with Noah and his nakedness, Ham's family undoubtedly had no love for God.  Making a transition to Egyptian beliefs is not a far stretch.  This is also likely why they began to focus so much on Osiris, god of the underworld.  After hearing so much about how God wiped out the world and killed everyone, most of the families at this time would likely be a bit more focused on death.	2298
1819	Serug is born		2266
1849	Nahor is born, this Nahor is not Abram's brother.		2236
1878	Terah is born		2207
1931	Gutians invade Ur and establish their rule across the lands of Sumer, Elam, and Persia.	It is possible that this invasion was done by a tribe known as Semites, sons of Joktan, son of Eber.  It is also possible that Terah's family were actually these Gutians who came down out of the Zargos Mountains and conquered the land.  This would explain why Abram and his family lived in Ur.  This date is based on historical records and not on the Bible.  However, it certainly makes sense with the Biblical account far more than the belief that it was the Gutians who chased Abram's family out of Ur.  First, around 2,170 B.C. the Akkadian Empire began to fall because of the aridification of Mesopotamia.  This was a widespread drought and famine that caused many to dramatically migrate south.  By 2,115 B.C., the Akkadian Empire was overthrown because it simply didn’t have enough of an army to stop invaders.  It is believed that this same aridification had a huge impact on the agriculture of the Near East at that time.  Therefore, it is not entirely clear when the Gutians began their invasion, but it would seem to coincide with this date.   When you look at the reign of the last king of the Akkadian Empire, Shu-turul, you find that his reign ended in 2154 B.C.E.  The Gutians then rule until about 2050.  See the notes for Year 2050 for more on this.	2154
1948	Haran is born	Once again, it seems that Haran is probably the oldest of the three brothers.  Just as with Shem, Ham and Japheth, the youngest is listed first, or so it would seem, because he is the most important.  Therefore, it is likely that what Genesis is saying is that Terah had no children until 1948 when he had Haran, the oldest.  The birth dates of Nahor and Abram, then, are in question.  Here, however, is how the situation seems to have worked out.  Terah lived in Ur of the Chaldeans.  This is where many of the Semites lived (the children of Shem).  It is also where many of the children of Eber lived, Eber being the father of the Hebrews.  So Abram's family lived on the south side of the conquered nation of Sumer.  That means that many of the ancient gods of Sumer such as Enki, Enlil, Anu, Ki, etc. were likely of great influence on Abram and his family.  The Bible then tells us that Haran died in Ur, the land where he was born and where Terah still lived.	2137
1960	Nahor is born, this Nahor is Abram's brother.	This is an approximate date only.  The Bible doesn't really give us any way of determining Nahor's birthday.	2125
1996	Peleg dies		2089
1997	Nahor dies, this Nahor is not Abram's brother.		2088
2006	Noah dies at 950 years old		2079
2008	Abram (Abraham) is born		2077
2018	Sarai (Sarah) is born		2067
2026	Reu dies		2059
2028	Lot is born	This is an approximate date only.  The Bible doesn't really give us any way of determining Lot's birthday.  However, we do know that he was born before Haran dies and Terah leaves Ur.  Therefore, this date does fit into the timing of events.	2057
2035	Utu-hengal, king of Sumer, rebels and overthrows the Gutians.  This is likely the reason for Haran, Abram's brother's, death.  He likely died while fighting to defend his family against Utu-hengal's soldiers.  Thus, because of Haran's death Terah leads his clan to a new place in Syria to escape what would be the obvious persecution at the hands of the Sumerians.  They integrate into Amorite society being called Amorites.  Terah then leads the construction of the city he names after Haran.  Nahor goes his own way and builds the city of Nahor.	This is an approximate date.  It is believed that the Gutians were Indo-Europeans, but many also think they were Semites, or sons of Shem.  Abram and his family were also Semites.  Therefore, it makes sense that they were likely the Gutian invaders.  However, after Utu-hengal rebelled, Abram and his family would have no place to live.  Their only choice would have been to flee to Syria or continue to fight against the might of Utu-hengal.  Therefore, that is why I chose this date as the date when Haran dies.  Besides, God would desire for Abraham, a man who still believed in God and had faith in God, to get as far away from this eastern region and its secular influences.  The Sumerian influence was likely turning many of Abram's family away from God and towards the gods of Sumer.  That would be a good reason for God to call Abraham to the Land of Canaan where, at that time, many still believed in the one true God, like Melchizedek.	2050
2049	Serug dies		2036
2083	Terah dies.  Abram leaves Haran and begins his journey to Canaan.  Over the course of the next few years Abram thus visits Canaan and Egypt.  Lot and Abram separate.	This date is placed here because it would be likely that Abram leaves Haran only after his father dies.  The first thing that implies this is that Genesis 11 ends with the death of Terah.  Then Genesis 12 begins with Abram leaving Haran.  Also, we find in chapter 12 that Abram and Sarai had acquired a lot of servants and possessions, and they took them all with them.  They also took Lot, Terah's grandson, the son of Haran.  Lot would have likely stayed with Terah if Terah had still been alive, for Lot would have been favored by Terah since he was the son of Terah's dead son.  All this then implies that Abram really had nothing left in Haran, and he was taking everything he cared about with him.  Also, Nahor is mentioned in Genesis 24 as having founded his own city of Nahor.  Therefore, it seems likely that Nahor continued on and left Terah, his father, in Abram's care.  Therefore, being a godly man, Abram would not have left Haran until after his father had passed away.  He would have remained there to fulfill his obligations to his father, caring for him in his old age.  God, also, would not have demanded that Abram should leave his elderly father to die alone in Haran.  It seems fairly obvious that the idea to go to Canaan was already in the minds and hearts of Terah and Abram, for Terah left Ur in Genesis 11 to go to Canaan.  However, something must have happened, and they decided to settle, instead, in Syria.  Although the Sumerians were bad as a whole, and a good reason to escape Sumer to make the trip to Canaan, there were obviously still some places in Canaan that were really bad.  The story of Lot is evidence that Canaan's people were not all friendly.  Still, aside from a few bad city-states, Canaan was overall much better than Sumer, where they had come from.  As time went on, however, a new aridification of Mesopotamia and Canaan occurred, which is the cause for the famine in Abraham's story and why he went to Egypt, where the aridification hadn't hit yet.  Still, unlike in Mesopotamia, Canaan became good to settle in after the first wave of aridification, allowing Abraham to return there relatively quickly.  As for who this pharaoh was that Abram visited, it is too difficult to ascertain.  During this time in Egyptian history, dates are less certain and who was ruling what portion of Egypt was also uncertain.  However, I will say that it was likely one of the pharaohs of Upper Egypt, which means it was probably either Mentuhotep I or Wahankh Intef II.  Based on what we know about both of these rulers, Mentuhotep I probably fits the story more than Wahankh Intef II.  After all, Mentuhotep I doesn't appear to have been a very big king of Egypt and neither does the Biblical pharaoh of Abram's day.  Mentuhotep also seemed to have been a person of peace as opposed to violence, for he forged an alliance with the nomarch of Coptos.  Meanwhile Wahankh Intef II seemed to be a much more ambitious individual.	2002
2093	Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Chedorlaomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of nations war against Bera king of Sodom, Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela in the Valley of Siddim.  Lot is captured.  Abram is then forced to rescue him and gives his tithe to Melchizedek.  Shortly after, it seems, probably because he gave a tithe to Melchizedek and honored God the way that he did, God gives Abram a vision about the stars and how his descendants will be as numerous as the stars.	The Bible often does not give us the exact names of people as they may have been called in other countries.  Instead, the Hebrews tended to give names to people based on how they viewed them.  For example, Amraphel means "one who utters dark things."  However, he is likely associated with the king Ishbi-Erra.  As for Chedorlaomer, king of Elam, he was likely Kindattu, who invaded Ur and overthrew Ibbi-Sin after allying with Isbi-Erra.  This supposedly occurred, according to many, in about 2004 B.C.E, but accounts vary with some saying it occurred about 60 years later.  Chedorlaomer likely meant "servant of Lagamar, a goddess of high ranking in the Elamite pantheon.  Kindattu's reign also varies.  According to history, Ishbi-Erra betrayed Ibbi-Sin and helped Kindattu overthrow Ur.  Then Ishbi-Erra became king under Kindattu.  Kindattu also had other lands under his control at this time, so having the other kings mentioned in Genesis join him against the Canaanites would not be a far stretch.  However, in the end Ishbi-Erra betrays Kindattu and reclaims much of Sumer, pushing the Elamites out once more.  Thus it would again make sense that the Hebrews would call Ishbi-Erra "one who utters dark things" because he was an individual who obviously had questionable moral character.  So, it is likely that Abram went up into the north and battled with these kings and either Kindattu was killed by Abram and his men or his power was so weakened that shortly after Ishbi-Erra was able to sweep in and finish him off, thus liberating the lands from the rule of Elam.  Now, one other thing to note is that Abram gave a tithe to Melchizedek, king of Salem.  Salem was undoubtedly Jerusalem.  Melchizedek means "King of Righteousness".  To this day, there is no lineage for Melchizedek.  Therefore, it is uncertain who this man was.  However, one thing we can be sure of is that Melchizedek truly was a "King of Righteousness," for Abram gave the tithe to him.  It was as if Abram was giving his tithe to God's high priest of that time, so he must have been well known as a prophet like Enoch, Elijah, Elisha, Moses, etc.  So although Abram was God's chosen for the future nation that He would raise up to be His people, Melchizedek was God's favored high priest and prophet.  So why didn't God choose Melchizedek to be the father of his future nation?  Who exactly was he?  There are way too many theories to list them all.  One theory in the 2nd book of Enoch (Apocrypha) states that Melchizedek was born of a virgin who died in childbirth.  He immediately sat beside his mother, fully developed and clothed and speaking blessings to God.  He survived the Flood when an angel whisked him away to the Garden of Eden so that he survived on the peak of the mountain without being in the Ark.  Of course, that contradicts the Bible in many ways and makes no sense whatsoever, so we know that isn't true.  However, I wanted to mention it here to give an example of some of the silly things we find in the Apocrypha.  Another theory found in the Babylonian Talmud, among a few other documents, was that Melchizedek was actually a nickname for Shem, son of Noah, who had settled in Jerusalem.  However, this goes against the book of Hebrews which specifically tells us that Melchizedek has no genealogy, no father and no mother.  This doesn't mean that he literally had no mother or father or ancestry.  It is merely saying that his lineage is purposely left out of the Bible by God so that Melchizedek would be a type of Jesus, meaning he is a foreshadowing of Jesus, a person who parallels Jesus in many ways.  If he had been Shem, or anyone that we can link him to, that would negate this.  Some have also speculated that Melchizedek was Jesus before he actually was born in the flesh.  However, that makes no sense.  That means that the King of Glory, the Eternal King, had come in bodily form prior to being born of Mary.  That also goes against Hebrews for Jesus is said in Hebrews to be "after the order of Melchizedek".  If Jesus WAS Melchizedek then it wouldn't have been worded this way.  So God purposely obscured the lineage and history of Melchizedek, his name and everything, so that no one would know who he was.  In this way, Melchizedek could be used as an example in scripture.  Therefore, though I do believe Melchizedek was a real human being with real family history and lineage dating back to Noah and his sons, I firmly believe that no one will ever truly know who he is until we reach heaven.  Melchizedek is Melchizedek.  He was a king of Jerusalem and he was good and righteous and holy, a high priest unto God.  That is all we are meant to know.  I'm sure he was born and I'm sure he died, for every man is appointed to die.  However, we are not meant to ever know when these dates were, so that he, like Jesus, is a "priest forever" with no beginning and no end.	1992
2094	Ishmael is born.  Before this, however, Abram has sex with Hagar and she becomes pregnant.  Hagar runs away because Sarai is mean.  The Angel of the Lord appears to Hagar and tells her to return to Sarai and submit to her.  The child who will be born of her will be called Ishmael, and he gives the prophecy about Ishmael.	Notice the story of Ishmael.  As with many situations throughout history, one man's poor decision created countless centuries of strife.  Ishmael is the ancestor of the Muslim people and the religion of Islam.  Today, Islam still wars with Christians and Jews over Israel, claiming that it belongs to them by right and not to the Jews.  After all, they argue, Ishmael was their ancestor, and he was the oldest son of Abraham.  It is, therefore, not a far stretch of the imagination to assume that these types of events occurred all throughout history.  When families split, new religions are formed, each in an effort to establish their leader's right to control some land or people.  This lends credibility to the theory that during the Age of Myths, Cain and many of Adam's sons claimed to be gods, or were proclaimed gods, making up their own religions in an effort to seize power from Adam and later Seth and Seth's descendants.  Thus, most wars are called Holy Wars because mankind uses their religions to justify their right to fight for the Throne of the Earth.	1991
2096	Arphaxad dies		1989
2107	Abram and God's Covenant.  Abram is called Abraham.  Sarai is now called Sarah.  Isaac's birth is promised.  Abraham circumcises himself and his entire family.  Sodom and Gomorrah are destroyed.  Lot's wife dies.  End of the Age of Division.		1978