These are some recent reader questions that reflect questions I get fairly often regarding history curriculum and history dating of ancient times from a young earth perspective. Since these seem to be common questions with a similar theme, I decided to combine them into a post and include my answers in case they would be helpful to anyone else.
Q: What history curriculum do you recommend for a young earth perspective?
A: There are several good choices out there that I know of:
- Mystery of History uses young earth dating.
- BJU Press Heritage Studies (I recommend this if you’re doing traditional Christian ed rather than classical Christian ed)–Note: They are strongly young earth in perspective but don’t use AiG/Ussher dating for Ancient Egypt. There are likely other traditional Christian ed curricula that use a young earth perspective, but BJU Press has a very strong, good quality traditional history program.
- I would assume Diana Waring’s History Revealed is young earth since it is sold by AiG (Answers in Genesis), though I have never looked at it myself.
- My favorite answer to this question (that I recently discovered and love so much!!) is Guerber’s Story of… (the Ancient World, the Greeks, the Romans, the Middle Ages, etc.) series–but you need to buy the ones edited by Christine Miller (Nothing New Press) to get the young earth perspective. This series is better than Story of the World, in my opinion, because it has an unashamedly Christian perspective and young earth dates (and it’s just as well written, if not better) while still being in the beloved story format like Story of the World.
Q: Will you please let me know how you rearrange the Veritas timeline cards to fit with AiG’s young earth creationism? We are 100% young earth creationists here and already have all of the Veritas books needed for next year. If all I need to do to make my year successful is teach the cards in a slightly different order I will be thrilled!
A: Here’s how I would rearrange the Veritas cards to fit with the AiG timeline. I’ve also included the young earth dates from my research if I could find a date.
1 Creation 4004 BC
2 Fall 4004 BC
3 Cain and Abel
4 Flood 2349-2348 BC
5 Tower of Babel 2242 BC
6 Unification of Upper and Lower Egypt
7 Old Kingdom in Egypt 1900 BC
–SKIP CARD 8 (no First Intermediate Period according to AiG)
9 Call of Abram 1921 BC
10 God’s Covenant with Abraham 1897 BC
12 Sodom and Gomorrah 1897 BC
13 Birth and Sacrifice of Isaac 1896 BC (birth)
11 Hagar and Ishmael
19 Code of Hammurabi 1792 BC
15 Joseph as a Slave 1728 BC
16 Famine in Egypt 1707-1700 BC
17 Twelve Tribes c. 1700’s BC
14 Middle Kingdom in Egypt 1572-1445 BC
22 Moses’ Birth 1571 BC
23 Plagues 1491 BC
24 The Exodus 1491 BC
25 The Ten Commandments 1491 BC
20 Hyksos Invasion c. 1405 BC or sometime following The Exodus (AiG argues that the Hyksos invaded after the death of Pharoah and his armies in the Red Sea)
18 “Second” Intermediate Period (Hyksos Rule, as argued by AiG) 1405-1021 BC
29 Davidic Kingdom 1048-1015
21 Early New Kingdom in Egypt 1021 BC
30 Solomon’s Reign 1015 BC
26 Amenhotep and Monotheism 824 BC
27 Reign of Tutankhamon 802 BC
28 Later New Kingdom in Egypt (not sure about the placement of this one; I have down from AiG sources “New Kingdom in Egypt, ‘Third’ Intermediate Period, and Late/Persian Period–spanning 18th-31st Dynasties–1021-332 BC)
31 Alexander the Great Conquers Egypt c. 332 BC
32 Egypt Falls to Rome c. 30 BC
I hope I didn’t skip anything typing that out! Of course, it’s almost impossible to exactly date some of these ancient events/people, so I just went with the prevailing arguments for dating that I found at AiG and their recommended resources.
I didn’t check the back the back of the cards for discrepancies in information. (I don’t use the cards for my curriculum.) However, I do know that for card 22, AiG argues that Hatshepsut was likely the Queen of Sheba who visited Solomon, whereas the back of card 22 lists Hatshepsut as possibly Pharaoh’s daughter who found Moses in the Nile. You can see just in this alone how a young earth timeline affects the Egyptian dates drastically.
My research came mostly from
- This article on Egyptian chronology (and similar articles on AiG)
- Big Book of History
- AiG’s Seven C’s Timeline Poster
- Ussher’s Annals of the World
Q: We just started CC and I was not happy with their ancient timeline, as they have Egypt before the flood… Thank you very much for doing all this research and putting together an accurate timeline from creation!!! I spent the last few days trying to nail down an accurate date for the exodus… Would you be willing to share your findings for 4004 BC to say AD 5?
A: Here are the young earth (AiG/Ussher) dates I found for Creation to Christ. I included as many events and people as possible from Veritas history cards, Story of the World, and Mystery of History. I have also recently discovered Guerber’s Story of the Ancient World history curriculum (and the rest of the series) edited by Christine Miller (this is important) which very helpfully includes young earth dates right in the story/text, so that may be helpful for you to use as a spine along with CC (these can be found at Nothing New Press). Mystery of History also does this, though I don’t think it’s as well written as the Guerber/Miller series.
About Becky Aniol
Becky holds a bachelor's degree in English literature and music, a master's degree in Christian education, and is currently pursuing a PhD in Christian education. She taught classical upper school grammar, literature, and history and lower school composition and grammar for two years, elementary school music for one year, and Kindermusik classes for four years before the birth of her children. She now loves staying home with her four children, Caleb, Kate, Christopher, and Caroline and homeschooling them classically.
