Literary:Indicators of Achronology/0

Indicators of Achronology

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Explicit Markers

Dates and Passage of Time

The most obvious indicator of achronology is when an event is dated and explicitly appears out of order. Examples follow:

• Shemot 16:35  – Shemot 16 opens in the first year of the Wilderness period, yet mentions the eating of manna throughout the forty years of the nation's journey to Canaan.
• Bemidbar 1-9 – Bemidbar 1 is dated to the second month of the second year in the Wilderness, yet Bemidbar 7 and 9 explicitly backtrack to the first month.  Bemidbar 7 is dated to the "day that Moshe finished erecting the Mishkan", which Shemot 40:17 teaches took place on the first of the first month, while Bemidbar 9 similarly opens "בַּשָּׁנָה הַשֵּׁנִית לְצֵאתָם מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם בַּחֹדֶשׁ הָרִאשׁוֹן"

Ages

Sometimes, even though no calendar date is given in the text, the timing of an event can be determined through knowledge of people's relative ages provided by genealogy lists and birth and death notices. Calculations might then point to achronological ordering. For example:

• Death notices: The deaths of many characters in Sefer Bereshit are recorded at the end of the narratives devoted to them rather then in the middle of later narratives when they chronologically occurred.
• Terach: Terach's death is mentioned at the end of Bereshit 11, before we read of Avraham's departure from Charan even though one can calculate that he first passed away 60 years after Avraham's departure.¹
• Avraham - Avraham's death is mentioned in Bershit 25, before the text shares the story of Yaakov and Esav's birth, even though one can calculate that he died only 15 years afterwards.²
• Yitzchak: Yitzchak's death is recorded in Bereshit 35, before the stories of Yosef and his brothers are discussed, even though he really passed away only 12 years after the sale.³

Passage of Time

Sometimes, the timing of an event is marked not through calendrical dates but through the passage of time.  Here, too, calculations can point to an explicit achronology. Examples follow:

• Shemot 16:35

Headings

אַחַר הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה

וַיְהִי בָּעֵת הַהִוא

וַיְהִי בַּיָּמִים הָהֵם

וְאַחֲרֵי כֵן

Grammatical Markers

עבר מהופך

Literary Phenomena

Resumptive Repetition

Masoretic Markers

¹ This can be derived from the fact that Terach bore Avraham at the age of 70 (), that Avraham departed from Charan at 75 (), and that Terach died at the age of 205 ().

² Given that Avraham bore Yitzchak at the age of 100, that Yitzchak bore Yaakov at the age of 60, and that Avraham died at the age of 175, one can calculate that he passed away 15 years after the births of his grandchildren (and that his death notice is, thus, recorded achronologically).

³ Given that Yitzchak was 60 when he bore Yaakov, that Yaakov was 108 during the sale of Yosef, and that Yitzchak died at the age of 180, one can determine that he passed away 12 years after the sale.