Albert Barnes Commentary 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 Ziv, which is the second month, that he began to build the house of Jehovah." — 1 Kings 6:1 (ASV)

In the four hundred and eightieth year - The entire earlier portion of what is called the “received chronology” depends on this statement. Despite minor differences, there is a general agreement that places Solomon's accession around 1000 BC (or 1018 BC, according to Oppert). However, we face great difficulties in determining the sacred chronology prior to this. Apart from this one statement, the Old Testament's chronological data is insufficient to fix the interval between Solomon's accession and the Exodus, since several of the periods that compose it are not specified. Consequently, chronologists have based the "received chronology" entirely on this verse. But the text itself is not free from suspicion for the following reasons:

1. It is the only passage in the Old Testament that contains the idea of dating events from a specific era.
2. It is quoted by Origen without the date and seems to have been known only in this form to Josephus, Theophilus of Antioch, and Clement of Alexandria.
3. It is hard to reconcile with other chronological statements in the Old and New Testaments.

Although the books of Joshua, Judges, and Samuel do not provide an exact chronology, they still supply important chronological data—data that seems to indicate a period considerably longer than 480 years for the interval between the Exodus and Solomon. The years that are actually recorded amount to at least 580, or 600 according to another computation. And though a certain deduction might be made from this sum because of the use of round numbers, this deduction would scarcely do more than balance the addition required for the four unspecified periods.

Again, in the New Testament, Paul (according to the received text) calculates the period from the division of Canaan among the tribes in the sixth year of Joshua (Joshua 14:1–15) to Samuel the prophet as 450 years, which would make the interval between the Exodus and the start of the temple's construction 579 years.

On the whole, it seems probable, therefore, that the words “in the four hundred and eightieth year, etc.” are an interpolation into the sacred text that was not widely accepted before the third century AD.