The books of the Bible were written over a period of over a millennium and a half, with the oldest parts composed around 1500-1400 BC and the most recent books from the late first century AD. These books cover the entire span of time from the creation of the universe to its final consummation — but most focus on roughly the period of their composition.
This article will provide the best approximation for when each book of the Bible was written, based on both traditional accounts and the latest scholarship.
But first, it’s important to understand that the process of dating books of the Bible always involves a bit (or a lot) of guesswork.
Challenges With Establishing Dates in the Bible
There are several reasons why it’s difficult to establish precise dates for when the Bible was written — including the lack of a consistent calendar, different understandings of history, and the common practice of oral transmission in the ancient world.
These problems diminish the closer you get to the modern age, but even in the New Testament era it can be difficult to lock down precise dating.
No Consistent Calendar
Before the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in 1582, there was no uniform dating system worldwide. Various cultures had different systems — some solar, some lunar, some based on rulers’ reigns. Aligning these systems becomes increasingly challenging the further back you look.
To get past this challenge, historians meticulously reconstruct dates by cross-referencing rulers’ reigns, celestial positions, other information given by ancient writers, and, more recently, carbon dating.
Still, dating precision varies, and can sometimes only be given in ranges of decades or even centuries.
Different Understanding of History
Another problem with dating ancient events is that the Bible’s authors had a different purpose for recording history than modern historians. While today we focus on establishing timelines and causality, ancient writers were more concerned with the events’ meanings rather than their chronological order.
You can see this especially in the books of the Pentateuch (Genesis through Deuteronomy). Few of those stories provide any attempt at dating whatsoever. What matters is the way God appears in and uses history to accomplish his plan for his people.
Oral Transmission
For many of us today, it’s hard to imagine memorizing our email passwords, never mind the entire Bible. But in the ancient world, it was relatively common.
Paper in the ancient world — typically made painstakingly from cured animal skins — was very hard to come by, and literacy was rare. As a result, many works were transmitted orally for years, decades, or even centuries before they were written down.
This was especially true for popular stories, prophecies, Psalms and Proverbs, eyewitness accounts like the Gospels, and other genres that people might have shared widely before a scribe was able to commit them to paper.
New Discoveries
Sometimes new academic or archaeological discoveries — ancient manuscripts, buried buildings, language evolution over time — reveal clues about when a Biblical work was composed. This can help determine more precise dating.
Today, scholars can date the reigns and activities of the kings of the books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles with confidence thanks to the wealth of documents and material culture from that period. Even if that doesn’t tell us exactly when the books about those kings were written, it can help give us an idea of the time frame.
Many of the prophets can be dated during that time as well, though others remain mysterious (Joel is the most notoriously difficult).
Dates of the Old Testament Books
With those caveats out of the way, here are our best guesses for when each book of the Bible was written, starting with the Old Testament.
Pentateuch (Torah)
- Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy: 1446-1406 BC; may have been mostly oral tradition until much later
Historical Books
- Joshua: 1400-1370 BC; possibly oral tradition recorded during the reign of Josiah (late 600s BC)
- Judges: 1045-1000 BC; possibly oral tradition recorded during the reign of Josiah (late 600s BC)
- Ruth: 1011-931 BC (likely during reign of David)
- 1 & 2 Samuel: 930-722 BC; may have been mostly oral tradition compiled during the reign of Josiah (late 600s BC)
- 1 & 2 Kings: 560-540 BC
- 1 & 2 Chronicles: 450-425 BC
- Ezra: 440-430 BC
- Nehemiah: 430-400 BC
- Esther: Probably around 400 BC
Wisdom Literature
- Job: Disputed; dates range from second millennium to fifth century BC
- Psalms: Various times from 1400-500 BC
- Proverbs: 950-700 BC
- Ecclesiastes: Around 935 BC
- Song of Solomon: 960-931 BC
Prophets
- Isaiah: 700-681 BC; oral traditions may have been compiled much later, with additional content as late as early 500s BC
- Jeremiah: 626-585 BC
- Lamentations: ca. 586 BC
- Ezekiel: 593-571 BC
- Daniel: Beginning 530 BC; some parts may be much later
- Hosea: 750-715 BC
- Joel: Disputed; likely either 835-796 BC or 500-450 BC
- Amos: 760-750 BC
- Obadiah: Disputed; 850-450 BC, though most likely the early exilic period (580-560 BC)
- Jonah: Probably 500s BC, though it takes place much earlier (790-760 BC)
- Micah: 735-700 BC
- Nahum: 663-612 BC
- Habakkuk: 612-589 BC
- Zephaniah: 640-609 BC
- Haggai: Around 520 BC
- Zechariah: 520-480 BC
- Malachi: 440-430 BC
Dates of the Apocrypha
In general, the Deuterocanonical or Apocryphal books were written in Greek rather than Hebrew and date from the Intertestamental Period — roughly 300-100 BC or a little later.
Dates of the New Testament Books
The books of the New Testament are much easier to date than the Old Testament. They were obviously all written after the death and resurrection of Jesus in 33 AD, and were mostly in their completed forms by 100 AD, when Christian writers began referencing and quoting from them.
Still, some of the same problems persist from the Old Testament period, and there is dispute about the exact dating of the Gospels (most of which were oral testimony written down after the fact) and most of the epistles. Unlike the Old Testament, though, they are disputes of a few years or, at the most, decades — rather than centuries.
Gospels & Acts
- Matthew: After 70 AD, preserving oral accounts from the previous generation
- Mark: 64-70 AD, preserving oral accounts from the previous generation
- Luke: Debated; could be any time between 62-90 AD, preserving earlier oral accounts
- John: 90-110 AD, preserving earlier oral accounts
- Acts: 62-90 AD (by Luke)
Pauline Epistles
- Romans: 56-57 AD
- 1 Corinthians: 53-54 AD
- 2 Corinthians: 55-56 AD
- Galatians: 50-56 AD
- Ephesians: 60-62 AD
- Philippians: 54-62 AD, depending on whether it was sent from Ephesus, Caesarea, or Rome
- Colossians: 57-62 AD, depending on whether it was sent from Caesarea or Rome
- 1 Thessalonians: 50-51 AD
- 2 Thessalonians: 51-52 AD
- 1 Timothy: 62-64 AD (or 90-110 AD if pseudonymous)
- 2 Timothy: 64-67 AD (or 90-110 AD if pseudonymous)
- Titus: 62-64 AD (or 90-110 AD if pseudonymous)
- Philemon: 54-62 AD, depending on whether it was sent from Ephesus, Caesarea, or Rome
General Epistles & Revelation
- Hebrews: 60-95 AD, but probably late 60s
- James: 45-62 AD
- 1 Peter: 60-65 AD (or 85-90 AD if pseudonymous)
- 2 Peter: 65-68 AD (or 80-90 AD if pseudonymous)
- 1 John: 85-100 AD
- 2 John: 85-100 AD
- 3 John: 85-100 AD
- Jude: 65-80 AD
- Revelation: Either 64-65 AD (during persecutions by Nero) or 95-96 AD (during persecutions by Domitian)
Conclusion: When Did Each Book Take Place?
Understanding even roughly when the books of the Bible were written helps to contextualize not only their relationships to each other, but also to the wider cultures of Israel, the Levant, and the Middle East at the time of their composition.
You also might notice that they weren’t always written (or at least not written down) exactly when they took place — especially with books like Jonah and Esther that take place decades or even centuries before they were finalized.
If you’d like to read the books in the order they take place, look no further than our chronological ordering of the Bible — and learn more about the circumstances of their composition by digging into who wrote each book.
Want to get better context behind each of the dates in this article? Try Bible Gateway Plus free for 14 days and get access to some of the same resources I used to research this very article!
Jacob is Editorial Director of Bible Gateway. He holds a Master of Theological Studies in Early Christian Thought from Harvard Divinity School, and a Bachelor of Arts in Religious History from Memorial University of Newfoundland, though with most of his coursework from the University of Hawai'i at Manoa. His work has appeared in Ekstasis and in Geez Magazine's "Embracing Darkness" Advent devotional.
