According to the Hebrew calendar, 2018 is the year 5778 – meaning it has been 5,778 years since Creation.
Citing biblical prophetic clues and Talmudic tradition, the rabbis have long speculated the Messiah will come in the Hebrew calendar year of 6000, introducing a radical new messianic age for the world.
If their calculations are correct, that would put place the year 6000 some 222 years from now in 2240 on the Gregorian calendar – a time at which no one living on the Earth today will be around.
But scientist Saul Kullok thinks the rabbinic calculations are off by 164 years, actually making this the Hebrew calendar year 5942 – just 58 years from messianic redemption. If he's right, that would be the year 2076 AD, rather than 2240.
According to a report in Breaking Israel News, Kullok has made an intense study into physical-mathematical structures contained in the Hebrew Bible and the ancient tradition of Israel. His correlation between major events affecting the return of the Jewish people to the land of Israel and the latitude of the biblical borders.
“Our current Hebrew calendar is based on the rabbinical work Seder Olam Rabbah, introduced in the Second Century CE,” he said. “It provides the base for the current Hebrew calendar and calculates it according to the destruction of the First Temple in 422 BCE, which introduces a difference of 164 years in relation to the scholarly counting for past historical events. “According to well-known scholarly historical records, the destruction of the First Temple took place in 586 BCE. All our mathematical correlations are in agreement with this date. Nevertheless, the time of the destruction of the First Temple according to Rabbinic calculations corresponds to 422 BCE.”
The Talmud (Tractate Avodah Zarah 9a) states that the pre-messianic age will last for 6,000 years.
“Our current Hebrew calendar is based on the rabbinical work Seder Olam Rabbah, introduced in the Second Century CE,” he said. “It provides the base for the current Hebrew calendar and calculates it according to the destruction of the First Temple in 422 BCE, which introduces a difference of 164 years in relation to the scholarly counting for past historical events.”
Kullok says Torah sources are in agreement that the biblical Exodus took place in the year 2,448 according to the Hebrew Bible chronology. After that, he says, there were 480 years until the First Temple was built, according to the Bible – 1 Kings 6:1: “And it came to pass in the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month Zif, which is the second month, that he began to build the house of the Lord.”
“According to the Talmud (Tractate Yoma 9a), the First Temple was destroyed 410 years after it was built,” he said. “This means that the time of the destruction of the First Temple according to the Hebrew Bible chronology was the year 3,338 (2,448+480+410). Hence, the year 4,000, from when the Messianic age starts, will have begun 662 years after the destruction of the First Temple (3,338 + 662 = 4,000). According to Seder Olam Rabbah and our current Hebrew calendar, the destruction of the First Temple took place in 442 BCE. This means that Seder Olam Raba and our current Hebrew calendar are out of synch with modern historical records concerning the destruction of the Temple. It introduces a difference of 164 years in relation to the scholarly counting for past historical events.”
Thus, he concludes, the age of the Messiah begins in 58 years, not 222 years from now.
“According to the counting of the Hebrew calendar as set by Seder Olam Rabbah, the year 6000 will be in 222 years,” Kullok noted. ”But if you figure the age of moshiach (Messiah) according to the Talmud and what we now know about the historical timing of the destruction of the First Temple, on this basis, the age of moshiach begins in 58 years. Because we are only 58 years away from the end of the 6,000 years of history, we can consider that we are, indeed, at the end-of-times.”
It's not just Jewish tradition that states the pre-messianic age will last 6,000 years. Many Christians, too, believe the Bible similarly hints at that length of time.
In the 17th century, Archbishop James Ussher attempted to calculate the data he could find as to the day of Creation in his famous work “Annals of the World,” whose timeline is cited in many Christian Bibles. According to his calculations, the earth was created Oct. 23, 6,032 years ago.
Other Christians from the apostolic era onward have noted that Creation took place in six days, with God resting on the seventh, according to the Genesis account. Some have likened the seventh day of rest to the messianic age, which, in the Book of Revelation, is said to be a 1,000 year period. If that is so, it might fall on the seventh day, after six one-thousand year epochs.
Apostle Peter noted in 2 Peter 3:8: “But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” The context of Peter's statement was specifically about the age of the Earth and the time since Creation: “Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation. For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water: Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” (2 Peter 3:3-8)
Peter was referencing Psalm 90:4: “For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.”
Christians have also cited Hosea 6:2, a prophecy some believe suggests Messiah Jesus will return after 2,000 years: “After two days will he revive us: in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.”