About
The Mission of From Adam to Abraham is to help restore the Church’s faith in the chronology of Genesis.
Goals
1. To demonstrate that chronology is intricately woven into God’s revelation and constitutes an essential element of the biblical metanarrative, beginning with the creation of Adam on the sixth day.
2. To examine and present evidence that the Greek Septuagint and other ancient textual/historical witnesses aligned with it most accurately preserve the divinely inspired numbers originally recorded in Genesis 5 and 11.
3. To research, publish, and develop both popular level and scholarly content on selected topics of interest related to biblical chronology, primeval history, and human and cosmic origins.
For more than two millennia, the science of biblical chronology was widely regarded as an essential component of both mainstream Christian theological reflection and the Judaism that preceded it. Many Jewish and Christian writers throughout history understood chronology to be integral to the Bible’s metanarrative and inseparable from its theological and worldview claims. Biblical chronology was not viewed as an obscure or incidental subject, but as a truthful representation of historical reality.
Jewish and Christian authors alike were nearly unanimous in their conviction that a continuous chronology of human history could be constructed from Genesis, beginning with the creation of Adam on the sixth day. Moreover, when early Christians encountered irreconcilable tensions between extra-biblical chronological systems and the chronological framework presented in Genesis, they consistently maintained that the Word of God possessed both epistemological and historical priority.
Unfortunately, this long-standing consensus began to erode during the mid-nineteenth century under the influence of external philosophical and scientific pressures. Over time, the chronological interpretation of Genesis 1–11 was gradually and unjustifiably abandoned within much of mainstream Christian scholarship. In subsequent generations, this rejection has expanded beyond the primeval history to encompass the broader Genesis narrative as well. From Adam to Abraham therefore seeks to aide the Church in restoring fidelity to the authority and veracity of the Genesis timeline.
About Henry B. Smith Jr
Henry B. Smith Jr. was born and raised in northwestern NJ and has worked with Associates for Biblical Research (ABR) since 2004. He is the Administrative Director of the Shiloh Archaeological Excavations, Israel (2017 to present). Henry volunteered at the Hazor excavations in 2007 and was the host of both the ABR Biblical Egypt Study Tour in 2008 and ABR’s Israel Tour in 2010. He was a square supervisor at the Khirbet el-Maqatir Excavations in 2012 and 2013, and at Shiloh in 2017 and 2018.
Since 2018, Henry has been the host of ABR’s television program Digging for Truth, with 290+ episodes and growing. Henry also hosts the Digging for Truth audio podcast.
The main subject of his research with ABR and his PhD dissertation is on the Genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11, prominently featured on this website.
Henry’s Personal Testimony
Watch Henry share his conversion testimony on this special episode of Digging for Truth.
Education
PhD (c), Amridge University, 2022-present
Master of Arts-Religion, Westminster Theological Seminary, 2015
Master of Arts, Trinity Seminary, 2005
Bachelor of Arts, Rutgers University, 1992
Professional Memberships
Near East Archaeological Society
Evangelical Theological Society
International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies
