Monday, February 8, 2010

Genesis 5

This entire chapter is given to the genealogy of Adam down through Noah. There are 10 generations listed from Adam to Noah, and then there will be 10 from Noah to Abraham. There were almost surely more than this; in fact, I would say absolutely so. For if we count the numbers (ages) back from Abraham to Adam, we get a creation date of about 4000 B.C., and a flood date of about 2500 B.C. And this just doesn’t fit our historical knowledge. But this is no problem. Since most ancient people were illiterate, every trick possible was used to help them learn—and grouping things in equal numbers made for easier memorization—in this case, 10 and 10. If you’ve read my chapter summary of Matthew 1, you’ll see that he did the same thing, except in groups of 14. And we know, for sure, that there are gaps in Matthew’s genealogy. So it’s fair to assume there are some holes in Moses’ early genealogies as well. Now we can’t go back millions of years with these lines; but a few thousand isn’t impracticable. There is no way we can know the exact date of the creation; it’s not important. If it had been, God would have told us.

Notice that all the men begat sons and daughters, lived a certain number of years, and then…”he died.” God said that would happen, and that line is repeated with monotonous regularity in the chapter—as if in confirmation of what God had said to Adam back in chapter 2—“ye shall surely die.”

Each of the men lived for several hundred years. How did they live so long? Or did they? There have been those who’ve tried to play with the numbers and get the ages down to our life span, but I don’t think so. Keep in mind that, when God created the world, it was perfect. There were no diseases, germs, negative bacteria, etc.—the sorts of things that kill most of us today. Since those things didn’t exist, it would take awhile for them to develop in sufficient quantity to affect the human body. There is no reason why our flesh could not live a long time—if it weren’t corrupted today by things that didn’t exist at the creation and were slow to mature after man sinned and God cursed the earth. So the extended life spans are reasonable. And it was also why a man could marry his sister or very close relative and not have negative biological consequences for his offspring. The impurities were simply very slow in arising.

Something else was at play, too, however, because, after the flood, the life spans began to drop rapidly. It has been argued, I think with some degree of reasonableness, that the “firmament” above the earth (Genesis 1:7), was some kind of protective water canopy that kept harmful solar radiation from filtering through to the earth. That protection disappeared with the rain from the flood and thus that affected how long humans lived. But all of that is pure speculation, and, frankly, it’s not especially critical, though having an explanation when people ask how those first men could live so long is not a bad thing. Which is why I’m discussing it.

One man in Adam’s line, Enoch, was apparently so righteous that he didn’t die: “And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him” (v. 24). That’s  means that he never tasted death in the flesh.  Hebrews 11:5 confirms this. He lived on this earth for 365 years.

The chapter ends with the birth of Noah, and then his three sons. And then the Lord becomes grieved…

No comments:

Post a Comment