Creationists generally believe that God created everything about 6,000 years ago.  When asked for a precise date, they usually do not give one, but only say that it happened "about 6,000 years ago." 

     Why can't they give a precise date?  Did the Bible neglect to tell us the exact date of creation?  No.  The Bible does tell us the exact date of creation.  We just have to calculate it.  Here is the calculation: 

 

1056 years from Adam to Noah’s birth (Genesis 5).

600 years from Noah’s birth to the Flood (Genesis 7:6)

292 years from the Flood to Abraham’s birth (Genesis 11:10-26)

100 years from Abraham to Isaac (Genesis 21:5)

60 years from Isaac to Jacob (Genesis 25:26)

130 years from Jacob to the sojourn in Egypt (Genesis 47:9)

430 years from the sojourn to the Exodus (Exodus 12:40)

480 years from the Exodus to the first temple (1^st Kings 6:1)

And finally, King Solomon began to build the temple in 966 BCE.  We know this from the corroboration of Assyrian and Babylonian texts with the Bible.

 

Wallah, we have a date for creation.  Add 'em up and you get precisely 4114 BCE.  But there are problems, and they concern the earliest origins of the Hebrew nation and the Bible.

     One problem is, if the statement in 1^st Kings 6:1 is correct, that there were 480 years between the Exodus and 966 BCE, then the Exodus happened in 1446 BCE.  This is a problem, because Palestine was under Egyptian occupation during the 1400's BCE, and into the early 1300's BCE.  What sense does it make to "let my people go" from Egypt, just so they can migrate to another province within the Egyptian Empire?

     Another problem is, archaeology demonstrates that the Hebrew nation did not even exist in Palestine before the 1200's BCE.  As Dever points out, their arrival was marked by changes in house building, a lack of pig bones, the disappearance of Canaanite temples, and the appearance of written Hebrew names, all of which occur about 1200 BCE.[1]  Also, the Egyptian Stele of Merneptah from 1220-1210 BCE mentions "Israel" by name.  So archaeology suggests a date for the Exodus in the 1200's BCE.  But there is little evidence for the Hebrew invasion that the book of Joshua describes, and the earliest pottery of the Hebrews looks Canaanite, which indicates that the Hebrews did not so much conquer the Canaanites as come from them.[2]  This calls into question the Biblical book of Joshua, which records that the Israelites accomplished a genocide of the Canaanites.  On the other hand, it supports the Biblical book of Judges, which records that the Israelites intermingled and lived side-by-side with the Canaanites for a long time.  It is to the book of Judges, therefore, that we should turn next, because it seems to be congruent with archaeology.

     The chronology of Judges totals 450 years.  To get a date for the Exodus, we must add 40 years for Moses, 30 years for Joshua, 40 years for David, and perhaps 40 years for Samuel and Saul.  This yields 600 years between the Exodus and the first temple, in contrast to 1^st Kings' 480 years.  Thus, the Bible contradicts itself by roughly 120 years.  The Jewish historian Josephus evidently favored Judges’ chronology, for he said that there were 592 years between the Exodus and the temple.[3]  A 2^nd century Christian named Theophilus gave a similar date for the Exodus, 566 years before the temple.[4]    This puts the Exodus in the mid 1500's BCE. 

     The mid 1500's BCE is indeed a good fit, for it corresponds to well-known Egyptian history concerning the expulsion of a Semitic people called the Hyksos.  We know from Egyptian archaeology and from ancient histories that the Pharaoh of that time was named Ahmose.  The 2^nd century Christian philosopher Justin Martyr confirmed that Ahmose or "Amasis," as he wrote it, was the Pharaoh of the Exodus.[5]  Josephus even tells us explicitly that the Hyksos were the ancestors of the Israelites.[6]  Hence, a strong case can be made that Biblical recollections of the Exodus should be identified with the expulsion of the Hyksos.

     Yet this raises another problem.  As stated above, the Hebrew nation did not settle in Palestine before the 1200's BCE.  If the Exodus happened 300 years beforehand in the 1550's BCE, then where were the Hebrew people for the intervening 300 years?  Egyptian history records that nomads in the deserts south of Palestine knew the God Yahweh during that time.[7]  This dovetails with the comparatively ancient Biblical Song of Deborah, which says that Yahweh came from "Edom," "Seir," and "Sinai" – all of which are in the deserts south of Palestine.[8]  The Bible apparently remembers this 300 years in the southern deserts as "40 years in the wilderness."[9]  40 years is hardly 300 years, and so the Biblical chronology seems derived from fuzzy memories. 

     Another problem is with the sojourn in Egypt.  The Bible says Israel was in Egypt for 430 years.  That opinion is from the Masoretic Text or "Hebrew Bible."  But the Septuagint, Josephus, and the Samaritan Pentateuch all say the 430 years includes not only the time in Egypt, but also the time the patriarchs were in Canaan.[10]  Egyptian chronology favors this second opinion, because the Hyksos migration to which Joseph is tied occurred in the 1700's BCE, which is less than 430 years before the Exodus if it happened in the 1550's BCE.  This subtracts 215 years.  All totaled, Josephus said there were 3,102 years between the temple and creation, which yields a date for creation of 4068 BCE.[11]

     Because of these complications, creationists cannot give an exact date for creation.  They can only say creation happened "about 6,000 years ago," because the Biblical chronology is so problematic that no precision is possible.

     As if that weren't enough, they still have the testimony of the ancients to contend with.  Ancient Christian writings assert that creation occurred 5,500 years before the time of Christ.[12]  This means creation happened 7,500 years ago.  Hence, when today’s creationists claim that the earth was created about 6,000 years ago, they are actually contradicting the testimony of the earliest creationists who believed it was created earlier. 

          Thus, even if we dismiss science entirely, the Bible cannot settle its own internal chronological problems well enough for us to trust a literal interpretation of the creation account in Genesis 1.

Click to read more about how we know Genesis 1 is a forgery.

The creationist narrative in Genesis 1 is contradicted by many ancient Christian texts.  Instead of an Almighty Creator God, ancient Christian texts espouse that the universe is born from blind arrogance and stupidity.  The angels caused evolution to occur from species to species.  There are many gods, (or aliens?), and the Christian God is just one among them.  Satan the Devil writes scripture, and thus the Bible was polluted with Genesis 1.  Archaeology and modern scholarship demonstrate that Genesis is indeed corrupted.  Cavemen walk with Adam and Eve.  Esoteric prophecies reveal the coming of Christ, and also reveal the dark forces that govern the cosmos.  Such are the ancient Christian writings.

Science vindicates the truth of these ideas.  Evolution often happens too fast for Darwin’s theory.  Gaps in the fossil record indicate that some kind of unnatural force acts together with natural selection.  Astrobiology reveals that intelligent life probably evolved long before us.  The fossil record reveals strange clues that aliens abducted species and transported them across oceans, and that DNA from diverse lineages was combined to spawn hybrid species.  Evidently, aliens influence evolution, and they are the gods of the world’s religions. 

This is not fiction.  All these facts are thoroughly documented in the links above.