Jews recently celebrated Rosh Hashanah, the start of year 5765. What happened 5765 years ago? Is it the 5765th anniversary of God saying “let there be light”, or is there something else?
And if it is the 5765th anniversary of Creation, does that mean Jews who celebrate Rosh Hashanah are Creationists (i.e. disbelievers in the theory of evolution)?
The year 5765 is meant to represent that this is the 5765th year since the creation of Adam. Adam (traditionally) was created on 1 Tishrei (the date of the year of Rosh HaShannah), year 1. Of course Adam was created on the sixth day of Creation, meaning that Days 1-5 were 25-29 Elul, year 0.
There is room within Orthodox Judaism to take the six days of creation at face value (i.e. six 24-hour days) or as indeterminate periods of length. Likewise, there is room to believe in evolution (in a limited manner). While some Orthodox Jews will tell you outright that evolution is false, there are those who will ascribe to it with limitations. Those limitations would include:
[ul]
[li]There have been only 5764 complete years since Adam.[/li][li]Human beings did not evolve from lesser creatures (but were created by God)[/li][li]Evolution was not random (but was [and continues to be] directed by God).[/li][/ul]
Zev Steinhardt
I realize this might not be in your line of expertise, Zev, but I’m curious about this part.
Does this mean that Orthodox Jews accept that the world, and life upon it, is millions of years old, but humans have only been around for 5764 years? And if so, what about primitive humans and neanderthals? Were these “proto” humans that existed before God made Adam? (Maybe they were all for practice. 
)
Also, at what point did Jews start keeping track of the years? For example, we know that Christians didn’t start counting the year since the birth of Christ for a few centuries after it happened, and there is much speculation that the number is erroneous.
That would be correct.
Well, if you’re going to posit that evolution is possible (or did in fact happen) and that humans did NOT evolve from lower beings, it is certainly possible to posit that proto-humans may have evolved, but that human (homo sapiens sapiens) did not. Of course, that would require one to believe that we are not descended from Neandertals, which is still up for debate in the scientific community.
To quote the famous line… tradition.
Seriously, it’s similar to the Bishop of Usher method.
The traditional answer is that we’ve always kept track from Adam’s time through his descendants to Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, etc.
Even if you don’t want to take that approach, it’s not all that difficult to assemble a timeline. Many biblical events (the destruction of the First Temple, for example) can be pegged with reasonable accuracy to a date. From there, simply count backwards.
Zev Steinhardt
Correction to my previous answer:
Correct according to some Orthodox Jews.
Despite it’s very name, there is room within Orthodox Jewry for a belief in cosmology and evolution (with the caveats I listed earlier). OTOH, belief in a literal 5765 year old universe (a 'la Young Earth Creationism) is also a valid belief. So, if you walked up to a random (Orthodox) Jew and asked him (or her) these questions, you would likely recieve both answers.
The real point is that the universe and everything in it was created by God. The hows, whys and exact details are nice, but not really the main point. Whether God created the universe 15 billion years ago with a Big Bang or 5765 years ago by willing it into existence is really not all that important (from a theological POV – from an astronomical POV it’s very important). The real important lesson is that the universe was created by a Higher Being. Therefore, while some Orthodox Jews are Young-Earth Creationists and others are Old-Earth Creationists, we are all, by definition, Creationists.
Zev Steinhardt
Teeny quibble. No one thinks we are descended from Neandertals, in the sense of having evolved from them. What’s in dispute is whether there was genetic mixing between the Cro Magnon and Neandertal populations, which co-existed.
On topic, does anyone know of another calendar which is not dated from a human birth or human event? The Jewish calendar is the only one I know that starts from a divine event, but my knowledge is incomplete in this area.
Zev answered for Othodox Jews but Reform and Conservative Jews celebrate Rosh Hashana and very few them are Creationists. The Orthodox are a minority within the Jewish Community so it is very safe to say that the overwhelming majority of those who celebrate Rosh Hanshana are not Creationists. The number is just a number. Does everyone who is about to celebrate 2005 all over the world believe in the virgin birth?
Haj
Thanks. One other question: do any religions take offense to the notion of the US government declaring it year 2004 (as opposed to 5765 or some other year)?
The reason I mention this is, in a church/state separation discussion this past weekend, I asked why printing “2004” on our currency wasn’t even more offensive than printing “In God We Trust”, since the former implies endorsement of a specific religion while the latter only acknowledges an anonymous deity.
True enough. That is what I meant.
Zev Steinhardt
Zev, a minor nitpick: the modern Jewish count (this year = 5765) starts from the “Year of Void” before Adam’s creation…Adam was created on Rosh Hashana, year 2 by our count.
In Talmudic times, that was year 1. I think the change in terminology occurred at some point during the Geonic era.
Minor nitpick: The “official position” of Conservative Jewry is that Rosh HaShannah celebrates the creation of the world and, as such, they are creationists. As to how many “Conservative Jews” are truly “Conservative” or would more properly be classified as Reform is another debate.
Zev Steinhardt
Sorry, I shouldn’t have worded my question so sloppily. What I meant was: if you celebrate 2005 you are implicitly commemorating the 2005th anniversary of the virgin birth. If you celebrate 5765, you are implicitly commemorating the 5765th anniversary of the creation of the world, so that must mean you are implicitly endorsing Creationism.
If you’re Christian, it’s pretty obvious what you believe 2005 means: (a) Christ existed (b) he was the son of God (c) he was born 2005 years ago. You either buy it or you don’t. But there is some pretty strong evidence that man walked the earth more than 5765 years ago, and I was curious about how that is reconciled in the Jewish faith.
I’m not so certain about that. I’ve usually seen Shnas Tohu as referring to year 0, not 1. In addition, most of the chronoliges I’ve seen have Adam dying in the year 930. If he was created at the start of Year 2, then his death date would not be 930, correct?
Zev Steinhardt
Jews don’t necessarily object to the current year of 2004, although we won’t put A.D. (Anno Domini - latin for “Year of our Lord”) after it, for obvious reasons. We tend to use C.E. (Common Era) or B.C.E (Before the Common Era).
Zev Steinhardt
Conservative Jew, non Creationist, checking in.
For religious purposes, I treat our calendar as simply the traditional measurement of time. I once heard a lecture that the Jewish calendar corresponds to Human history, so on that basis I accept (for religious purposes) the calendar as the measure of relevant time, since Judaism is concerned with the history and development of Homo sapiens civilization.
Scientifically, everything I’ve heard indicates that recorded civilization started roughly 6000 years ago, corresponding nicely (within margin of error) with Jewish year 1.
Back to Creation – religion is based on belief; science rests on fact, proof, and simplest explanations. The Big Bang and evolution are part of the currently accepted theories of how the world came to be the way it is; any other claim has to prove that it does a better job of explaining the facts. (For example, the theory of intelligent design introduces an outside factor that is not required by evolution, therefore intelligent design has to prove that the outside factor better explains known evidence than evolution does.) In my personal belief, I see that the pattern of Creation in Gen. 1 - 2:3 follows the same pattern as the Big Bang and evolution do; I see no contradiction. Therefore I accept Creation as the Divine plan, and the theory of evolution as the best explanation of the implementation of that plan. (Now that I wrote this, I see that my outlook starts to infringe on intelligent design. To clarify my stance, AFAIK intelligent design postulates a guiding hand in the evolutionary process, and evolution does not. I accept evolution, pending evidence of such a guiding hand.)
Oh, that time factor? That 6 days vs. 5 billion years? Time dilation, my boy, time dilation. I read an SF story some years ago, which redid the Scopes trial with Albert Einstein in the hot seat, that made the point that there exists a speed at which 6 * 24 hours of subjective time equals 5 billion years of objective time. (I leave the determination of that speed as an exercised for the interested student of modern physics.)
zev:
Take a look at the Artscroll’s History of the Jewish People: The Second Temple Era, Appendix: The Year of Destruction, footnote 3.
Correct, his death date would be 931, in this system. Most such chronological tables continue to use the old dating system for Biblical dates because it makes calculation much easier, or simply because they just don’t know any better. But, as demonstrated in the above cite, Adam’s creation-as-year-one, while once the standard, seems to not be the basis for our current Hebrew date.
Then you are a Creationist (albeit not in the fundamentalist YEC mold). Welcome to the club! I’ll treat ya to lunch next Shabbos 
Zev Steinhardt
Not sure where you heard this, but you have to have very liberal definitions of “recorded civilization” and “roughly” to make this fit. Plants and animals were domesticated about 10,000 years ago. The city of Catalhoyuk in Turkey is 9000 years old; it is estimated that 10,000 people lived there.
How far back can this Jewish system of year-numbering be traced? E.g., when the Jews returned to Jerusalem from the Babylonian Exile (537 BCE), were their priests telling them it was the year 3228?
I stand corrected on the official Conservative view point.
I disagree. It means that I am taking part in a family and cultural tradition.
For many, maybe most, Reform Jews, particularly the ones that only show up to shul on the High Holidays, the significance of what the year means doesn’t even cross their mind. A lot of them would even know what the year was and why it is the number it is.
There is way more to the Holiday than just celebrating the fact that it’s a New Year.
Haj