Follow the story. Keep the uncertainty visible.
Filter events by era, person, place and dating confidence. Every point explains why it sits where it does.
The second temple is destroyed
70 CE
The destruction transforms Jewish life and forms a crucial horizon for interpreting late first-century Jewish and Christian texts.
- Place
- Jerusalem
- People
- Titus
- Dating note
- The event has a comparatively strong external chronological anchor.
- Primary references
- Mark 13:1–2 (prophetic context) · Luke 21:5–6 (prophetic context)
A map of claims, not a replacement for the text
Biblical books do not share one modern dating system. Some name rulers whose reigns can be compared with inscriptions and imperial records. Others give relative sequence, generations or symbolic numbers without an external calendar anchor. The timeline keeps those different kinds of evidence visible.
Start with an era, then choose an event. Read the primary references before the significance note. If the event is marked debated, follow the methodology link rather than treating the midpoint of a displayed range as a settled year.
Why Genesis is not pinned to 4004 BCE
Genesis 1–11 supplies a narrative order but no uncontested conversion to a modern calendar. Later chronologies depend on interpretive choices about genealogies, textual traditions and whether numbers function as exhaustive chronology. Manna therefore labels these stories “undated in the text.”
Why 722 BCE is different
The fall of Samaria belongs to the documented expansion of the Neo-Assyrian Empire and can be correlated with external royal chronology. That makes the date comparatively firm even while historical sources may explain causes and consequences differently.
Scope: this first edition is a selective orientation timeline, not a list of every king, judge, oracle or manuscript date. Records are added only when the summary, references and uncertainty note can be reviewed together.