Posted on 02/26/2019 8:14:54 AM PST by Salvation
I occasionally get questions about the remarkably long lives of the patriarchs who lived before the great flood. Consider the ages at which these figures purportedly died:
How should we understand these references? Many theories have been proposed to explain the claimed longevity. Some use a mathematical corrective, but this leads to other pitfalls such as certain patriarchs apparently begetting children while still children themselves. Another theory proposes that the purported life spans of the patriarchs are just indications of their influence or family line, but then things don’t add up chronologically with eras and family trees.
Personally, I think we need to take the stated life spans of the patriarchs at face value and just accept it as a mystery: for some reason, the ancient patriarchs lived far longer than we do in the modern era. I cannot prove that they actually lived that long, but neither is there strong evidence that they did not. Frankly, I have little stake in insisting that they did in fact live to be that old. But if you ask me, I think it is best just to accept that they did.
This solution, when I articulate it, causes many to scoff. They almost seem to be offended. The reply usually sounds something like this: “That’s crazy. There’s no way they lived that long. The texts must be wrong.” To which I generally reply, “Why do you think it’s crazy or impossible?” The answers usually range from the glib to the more serious, but here are some common replies:
So I think we’re back to where we started: just taking the long life spans of the early patriarchs at face value.
There is perhaps a theological truth hidden in the shrinking lifespans of the Old Testament. The Scriptures link sin and death. Adam and Eve were warned that the day they ate of the forbidden fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, they would die (Gen 2:17), but they did not drop dead immediately. Although they died spiritually in an instant, the clock of death for their bodies wound down much later. As the age listing above shows, as sin increased, lifespans dropped precipitously, especially after the flood.
Prior to the flood, lifespans remained in the vicinity of 900 years, but right afterward they dropped by about a third (Shem only lived to 600), and then the numbers plummeted even further. Neither Abraham nor Moses even reached 200, and by the time of King David, he would write, Our years are seventy, or eighty for those who are strong (Ps 90:10).
Scripture says, For the wages of sin is death (Rom 6:23). Indeed they are, especially in terms of lifespan. Perhaps that is why I am not too anxious to try to disprove the long life spans of the patriarchs, for what we know theologically is borne out in our human experience: sin is life-destroying. This truth is surely made clear by the declining lifespan of the human family.
Does this prove that Adam actually lived to be more than 900 years old? No, it only shows that declining life spans are something we fittingly discover in a world of sin. God teaches that sin brings death, so why should we be shocked that our life span has decreased from 900 years to about 85? It is what it is. It’s a sad truth about which God warned us. Thanks be to God our Father, who in Jesus now offers us eternal life, if we will have faith and obey His Son!
How or even whether the patriarchs lived to such advanced ages is not clear, but what is theologically clear is that we don’t live that long today because of the collective effect of sin upon us.
Monsignor Pope Ping!
He looked that old when he lived next door to us. The last 6 months was bad for him.
For numerous generations, without written text, people simply shared stories around the campfire. I think most of these stories (all from the Old Testament) fell into the category of stories eventually written into text without a lot of records.
More like he lived for 950 moons...or approx. 79.17 years.
And started having children when 6 and a half.
And started having children when 6 and a half.
Believe.
Don’t believe.
Choose not to disbelieve.
Your choice.
I take it as a mystery too, but of course it has the significance of being the only real indicator that could possibly justify the choice of 4,004 B.C. as the literalist interpretation for the creation event(s), since we know fairly well when to start counting back from around Jacob’s time due to historical references that can be dated. The flood works out to the year 2348 B.C. if I recall correctly, using these ages (and the ages of the fathers when the sons were born, not discussed above but there in the Genesis account).
As I am not a literalist and accept at least some parts of the geological time scale concepts (while keeping an open mind about these processes being a sort of designed cover story for a different starting point), I am not locked into accepting the age of patriarchs on face value either. The most obvious cause to doubt these long ages would be the lack of any other accounts within non-Scriptural historical or cultural records of people living very long lives, if anything, fifty was considered fairly old before David and Solomon’s time. A hundred was probably rarely reached.
Then there is the more practical objection that attends the reputed age of the fathers when their sons were born, often well past seventy. Would that mean (to a literalist) they took on younger wives, because if not, how did their very old wives bear these children?
One possible explanation would be that there is a lost time scale involved in this, that was arbitrarily changed around the time of Abraham when the longevity suddenly ended and more reasonable ages were reported. Perhaps until that break point, they counted the number of months instead of years (lunar months as is still the case in the Jewish culture). As that would divide these numbers by 12.3, then Noah would have lived 77 years and Methuselah about 79. The rest would be in the range we expect for people back in those times, 50 to 70. I’m speculating that this system was changed during Abraham’s life so he accumulated part of his 175 in the monthly count and most of it in the annual count. If he lived to eighty, that would have been about eight years into his life.
However, there is a problem with my theory in terms of the concept shifting paternal ages to very young ages in some cases. So I am not that positive about it anyway.
Back then they were born as full adults.
So, in Genesis 6:3, God says I won’t contend with man forever, for he is mortal, his days will be 120 yrs (NIV) does that translate into 10 years of months?
As for me and my house, we’ll accept the scripture as it reads, in context and in content.
I hadn’t seen the earlier comment when I typed that out, about the lunar time scale, but I get a slightly different result because there are 7 extra lunar months every 19 years as compared to our calendar. that’s where my 12.3 figure comes from, more precisely it should be 12.37.
This was the breaking point that got me out of the Catholic Church for good and all. I was out of state in a university town and was attending an Armenian Catholic church (since the blasted Latins were so liberal), and even there this young Jesuit seminarian told me he simply couldn't say for sure whether or not Noah ever existed. He had no evidence that he did, but he had no evidence that he didn't. I'd been going through hell trying to stay in the "one true church" despite its teachings violating my every instinct but that put the cap on it.
Meanwhile, the hypocrites believe that their "saints" could bilocate, appear and disappear, slay dragons, and basically do anything. All that they accept. We've even been assured on this very forum that "science" proves that angels carried Mary's house from Nazareth to Loreto. Good thing it doesn't say that in the Hebrew Bible or they couldn't believe that either.
What kind of sick mind accepts some miracles but rejects others simply on the basis of whether or not that's what the "rednecks" believe???
Literally forsaking all others?
That's fine if you don't accept the bible as The Word of God. I accept it and believe in it as God's awesome Word and feel no need to explain any of it away.
It is always important for Christians to remember that the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. These questions are interesting to ponder but has little consequence to the question of the relevance of God and his love for you.
I agree.
I’ve known people who said, “Sure, God created the Universe. No problem.”
And they say, “Jesus rose from the grave after three days. He is the Christ.”
And then they scoff and say “Methuselah? 969 years? Give me a break! That’s totally unbelievable!!”
I just shake my head.
Has anyone considered that there might have been a change in the earth and sky after the flood, and that might have had an effect on life on the earth? We know from the Scriptures that there was a change after the Fall (”thorns and thistles it will bring forth for you”), so it is not unreasonable to think that there might have been some other kind of change after the judgment of the Flood. Remember that God assured Noah that “while the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, and day and night shall not cease.” Why would God give Noah that assurance if things had not changed?
Speculation! For what it’s worth . . . .!
“People didn’t know how to tell time accurately back then.”
Some times days seem like years depending on your circumstance.
One theory is that much of the flood deluge was previously water floating in the heavens that helped to shield radiation from the sun.
Once the water was removed ages began to drop as the radiation began to have an longer term effect on DNA.
Noah – 950
Shem – 600
Eber – 464
Abraham – 175
Moses – 120
David – 70
The ages since David’s time continued to fall. The average life expectancy in the middle ages was about 48. As technology and knowledge increased this age was able to be increased back to about 70, but the upper limit has been ~120 for the oldest in the world for some time with 122 1/2 being the oldest verified by Guiness.
This could also potentially explain why animals were larger pre-flood. There is also an increased oxygen theory that is associated with larger animals. It could be that both are at play.
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