Timeline of the Bible · Creation to the Flood
Shem
Life · 2446–1846 BC
What the Bible Says
- “Shem lived after he begat Arphaxad five hundred years” Genesis 11:11
Each year here fits these numbers, as the years between the points they count from.
Family
The Years
- Born 2446 BC
- “Noahs second son was Sem; being two years after the flood”
- Died 1846 BC
- “Sem the son of Noah died 500 years after the birth of Arphaxad, Gen.”
Noah was five hundred years old when his sons began to be born (Genesis 5:32), Japheth the elder (Genesis 10:21). Shem was an hundred years old two years after the flood (Genesis 11:10), so Ussher has him born in Noah’s five hundred and second year.
Dated by Archbishop James Ussher’s Annals of the World (1658), quoted as printed, whose dates were printed in the margins of King James Bibles for two centuries.
