I did some wondering about how the years were recorded before they were numbered AD (anno Domini or after the birth of Jesus*), and BC (before Christ).
A quick Google search reveals that the BC/AD system was apparently invented in 525AD by Dionysius Exiguus. The birth of Christ Jesus was represented as year 1. Dionysius reasoned that this occurred 753 years after the foundation of Rome. (The Romans generally described years based on who was consul, or by counting forward from the founding of the city of Rome—753BC in our calendar today.) He was wrong because Jesus was born under Herod the Great, who it is believed died in 4BC.
I find it interesting that with Dionysius’ method there was no Year 0. (So, in more recent times, the powers that be had it right when they pronounced 2000 to be the millennium—something fussed about at that time.)
The ancient Greeks counted years from the first Olympic Games, which correlates to 776BC.
The Jewish calendar starts from their idea of when the world was created, i.e. 3760BC. Meanwhile, the Muslim calendar begins with the Hijra, the migration of the prophet Muhammad from Mecca to Medina in 622AD.
These days, BC is often replaced with BCE (before the common era); and CE (Common Era) can be used instead of AD.
At this point I can finally comment on Zephaniah. In the very first paragraph we have an example of how events were discussed historically— “the word of the Lord which came unto Zephaniah...in the days of Josiah, the son of Amon, king of Judah...” My New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) gives Zephaniah’s dates as 640-609BCE.
Of course, there were oral historians in those days.
What a lot of scholarship has gone into the Bible!
Joyce Voysey
*Ed. The Latin text means “in the year of our Lord”.
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