ANSWER:
The Jewish date for Creation is 3761 B.C. This date is given in all Jewish calendars. But Bible chronology shows almost 6000 years have passed from the time of Creation of Adam and Eve. Is there a discrepancy in the Bible and the calendar on this matter? The answer is NO!
The calendar is NOT an instrument for measuring historical time. The calendar simply furnishes us with the length of any given year and the position of the various days and months within that year. The computations nowhere tell us how many years have passed since Creation. They just tell us how to figure each year. If we want the full number of years which have passed from Creation to the present, we must go to the document which is intended to reveal that information – the Holy Bible, not the calendar.
The Creation date which the Jews have set on their calendar year is one of their own manufacture and has nothing to do with the calendar itself. It is an arbitrary date. So why this late Creation date?
We are told that the acceptance of 3761 B.C. as the Creation date by the Jews goes back no further than the 10th or 11th century (Spier, Comprehensive Hebrew Calendar, p. 218). But traces of this fictious date can be traced back to the fourth century. But why this late date? The Bible shows plainly that Adam was created just over 4000 B.C., not 3761 B.C.
The answer is simple. The Jews in the time of Christ had a strong tradition that for the first 2000 years the world would be without the codified law, then would be 2000 years under the law, and finally 2000 years when the Messiah would be known and worshipped (Schurer, History of the Jewish people, Div. II, vol. II, p. 163). In other words, shortly after the year 4000 from Creation, the Messiah would appear. And He did!
The tradition in the first century put the Jewish rabbis on the spot, for they were saying the Messiah would come after 4000 years. Christ did come but they rejected Him! This led them to a novel invention.
They arbitrarily lowered the Creation date (disregarding the Bible) some 250 years. By doing this, they said that Jesus could NOT be the Messiah for He appeared too early. This was a plain lie! Of course no Messiah came at the end of their new 4000 years, but the Jews answered this by saying that the people were too sinful for Him to appear (Schurer, ibid.)
Thus, the Jewish date for Creation was invented as a counteraction to the claims of Christ. By accepting it, they completely disregarded the chronology of the Bible. This Jewish date has nothing to do with the accuracy of God’s Calendar.
