After he begot Seth, the days of Adam were eight hundred years; and he begot sons and daughters. So all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years; and he died. (Genesis 5:4-5)
We have no idea how long Adam and Eve enjoyed life in Eden - how many years, centuries, millennia even, they ate of the Tree of Life and remained healthy and young (the age they were created at) before they partook of the other tree and fell into sin. It seems likely that a record of Adam’s years was only kept starting from the moment he tasted the forbidden fruit and began to age, and die.
What we do read, in the fifth chapter of Genesis which is devoted to Adam’s descendants, is that 1,056 years passed from the first day of Adam’s tallied age until the birth of Noah.
Something interesting before we get there:
In verse one of this chapter we read that “[i]n the day that God created man, He made him in the likeness of God.” Back in Genesis 1:27 it says, “So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him.” But notice what it says in chapter five verse three: “And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and begot a son in his own likeness, after his image, and named him Seth.”
So Seth, was begot in ADAM’s likeness, after ADAM’s image. By emphasizing this contrast in these two verses, the passage raises the question (at least for me): Did Adam lose God’s image after the Fall? My concordance does not find another reference anywhere in the Hebrew Scriptures to man having been made in God’s “image” or “likeness” or “similitude.” *(If you find one please let me know.)
Moving on, some gems “hidden” in this chapter five list:
We see that Adam lived to see his children’s children all the way to the birth of the generation that died in the year of the Flood.
Adam was 130 years old when Seth was born, and he lived a total of 930 years. If we call the year of his death the Year 930, then he was alive when Enoch (born 622), Methuselah (687) and Lamech (874) were born. Which means, among other things, that Adam likely knew about Enoch’s translation. But so did Seth, Enosh, Cainan, Mahalalel and Jared, Enoch’s dad. That’s a lot of witnesses! I wonder if they organized search parties when Enoch didn’t come home.
Adam would also have had to live witnessing the terrible consequences on all of mankind of his and Eve’s sin. By the time he died, humanity was well on its way to that state of depravity that brought God to the place where He was sorry He had made man.
Methuselah (died 1656) outlived his son Lamech (died 1651).
Noah, Methuselah’s grandson, was born in the year 956. The flood, as we will learn, began 600 years later, in 1656.
This means that Methuselah was alive during the century it took for Noah to build the ark, and he actually died in the year of the flood - I imagine he passed away before the rain began to fall. Did he encourage Noah to withstand the taunts and rejection of the crowds who spurned him? It’s a thought.
Noah, born 26 years after Adam died, likely learned all about Adam and Eve’s lives from eight generations of their descendants, including their son Seth, who was 826 when Noah was born and died when Noah was 86 years old.
This first period of recorded history was also a time when God interacted with individuals. He had walked with Adam in the Garden. He talked with Cain, wanting to know what had happened to Abel. Enoch walked with Him and “was no more.” And in the next chapter we will read about how He visited with and commissioned Noah.
We also know, by the time we get to this place in Genesis, that there were two main family groups (tribes?) - the descendants of Adam via Seth, and the descendants of Adam via Cane. It seems they lived in different places. Who knows how many offspring came from these main branches, but we learn further on that there were no nations as such yet for God to instruct and direct. They come later - from the loins of Noah’s sons.
Until there were nations there was no separated nation - no Israel. We know God has promised to redeem fallen man (Genesis 3:15). How that redemption will play out, and what channel God will use to bring salvation we do not yet know.
Genesis 5 covers the first millennium. There’s another millennium to go before this all begins to take shape.
More next time.
Please re-think and explain your first paragraph. (how many years, centuries, millennia even).
Would you contend that Adam and Eve lived for millenia without producing sinless children “made in the Image of GOD”? Was the God mandate to fill the earth not in effect during this supposed sinless time? Would children of this sin-free period not have born with the image of God? Where are they in the mix between the time of Creation to the flood?
Please explain. Remember, we have no need to reconcile the Word of God with the evolutionistic (theistic or otherwise) science of the day.
I love your posts…and share the gravity…and reality of such a time as this. God bless your work.
“Remember, we have no need to reconcile the Word of God with the evolutionistic (theistic or otherwise) science of the day.”
A good point indeed
Really enjoy your website !
I found the genealogical timetable interesting.
In relation to Adam’s actual “years”, the Scripture states…”After he begot Seth, the days of Adam were eight hundred years; and he begot sons and daughters. So all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years; and he died. (Genesis 5:4-5) . I literally take that to mean that “all the days Adam lived” (930 yrs) are the years since he became a “living soul”… ( from the day of his creation… ie “birth”).
Granted, we don’t know from Scripture how much time elapsed between the creation of Adam to the creation of Eve, nor how long it took for them to be “fruitful and multiply”.
However, the “death” resulting from the Fall initially was spiritual then physical. Sons Cain and Abel were born of Adam and Eve’s union outside of the Garden, in the fallen state.
Since Cain killed Abel and was banished, wasn’t the lineage of Cain basically “disregarded” therafter and ultimately destroyed in the Flood? Didn’t Seth replace Abel in the lineage of Adam/ Eve towards the fulfilled promise of Messiah , the Seed of the woman? Seth… Noah…Shem… Avraham, etc. I believe the focus on Seth in the Adamic “likeness” is the promise of the Messianic lineage through him . Gen 5:4 says Adam had more “sons and daughters” but only Seth is focused upon. Just a thought.
Bless you and yours!
Thanks for the history lesson on the ages of the men that lived after Adam and Eve broke the one and only commandment and caused the fall of man..
I believe the ages referred to here in the scriptures are referring to after the fall, because up until that point there wasn’t time on our planet as we know it today!.
When I was talking to God, I was so dishearted with our world and all the sufferings that are happening and will be happening, I said” I only wish I could have lived my life so perfect that you could just pick me up and take me out of this world, like you did Enoch and Elisha”. God quietly whispered into my heart, I will be picking you up and taking you out, that’s what the rapture is all about!!.
I know I must strive to be a holy person, Gods word says to “Be Holy as I am Holy!.
All of us who are obeying Gods word and have been born again by the righteous blood of Jesus and are watching and praying and striving to be perfect will be taken up just like righteous Enoch and Elisha Hallelujah.
The fall of America. The fall of the West
Posted on Tuesday 11 November 2008
By Jan Willem van der Hoeven
I just finished reading all the comments concerning Jan Williams on”The fall of America. the fall of the West. I read it to late to send a comment in there so I thought I would send it to you here.
Two major things caused the fall of the USA, they were when our constitution granted us the right to freedom of any religion. In 1962 prayer and bible reading were taken out of the United States schools. In 1966 the first satan church was brought into our land, thus beginning in a flood of ungodliness.! The bible clearly states ‘For there are certain men…. ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ” Jude 4 and in 1John 4:3 ..Every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is not of God: and this is that spirit of antichrist, whereof ye have heard that it should come…”. There is no such thing in Gods vocabuary as “interfaith”. It is only thru Gods only begotten son Jesus that we have any hope!!. Gods word says, “Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake “.
Matt.24:9 Our battle will begin when we declare it is only thru the” name of Jesus” that prayers are answered, we will be fought against ferousily..
This” interfaith” thing that the world is placing there hope in is the “anti-christ” system, it is the system that Obama clings to and President Bush is pushing it also!.
America will be stripped of its power and probably completely destroyed, since this is the goal of most of the evil spirited world powers!
Israel needs to take heed to these scriptures for they will be here thru it all!!!!………………..
Matthew 24:15 When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)
16 Then let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains.
17 Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house
:24 For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect’
Luke 21: 20 And when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh..
21 Then let them which are in Judaea flee to the mountains; and let them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let not them that are in the countries enter thereinto.
22 For these be the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled.
After the anti-christ system takes the West Bank they will be coming into take their most prized “Jerusalem”, for complete possession. They will succed for 7 years then God will cast the beast and false prophet into the Lake of fire. God will bound satan for 1000 years! This will usher in 1000 years of peace on this earth, with Jesus as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
I dont really understand this…we are made in God´s image a little less than the angels, as the Word tell us…That Adam begot a son in his own likeness, after his image…is for me that he was man like Adam himself. (My concordance does not find another reference anywhere in the Hebrew Scriptures to man having been made in God’s “image†or “likeness†or “similitude.â€) *(If you find one please let me know.)
God has promised to redeem fallen man…(How that redemption will play out, and what channel God will use to bring salvation we do not yet know.)
Psalm 19:14 May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart
be pleasing in your sight,
O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.
…states who our redeemer is. I hope I have only misunderstood…
I have been reading your posts for many years and am blessed by your work.
I believe the first time was when you reported on The Burning of Josephs Tomb.
I wept that day, it was the first day I felt a small fire in my heart for Israel.
(This is an impressive video of that day I found.) http://www.shechem.org/kyos/engkyos.html
Keep writing and testify what you see and hear…Bless you and your family.
Good to see you back with The Bible on Israel, Stan! I found your thoughts on Genesis 5 intriguing…made me think of things I hadn’t thought of before, and some things that I had - but in a new way. Sometimes I wonder why God did not see fit to include more about the early years of Adam and Eve, and of mankind in general, when Genesis was written. Instead He chose to leave some things a mystery. I totally do not believe in evolution, but I did not take what you said, to mean that you were trying to reconcile God’s word with evolution. Rather, I just found it interesting to think that perhaps time as we know it just began ticking at the fall of man, when sin entered the world. Before that nothing aged or decayed, so it seems to me that you would not really be able to trace time back before the Fall anyway. Interesting stuff…
Good article to digest. Food for thought… Was adam meaning man created in Gods image? yes easy answer. what was Gods image? Spirit, not quite as easy. Gen. 1:26-28 From the living Torah.God said “let us make man in our image and likeness. let him dominate the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky…….27 God thus created man in His image. In the image of God, He created him, male and female He created them,28 God blessed them. God said to them be fruitful and become many”. My point is Adam and eve, (man) were created as one being on day six. Both halves one emotional on logical created as one united being. The creation of Eve was merely the seperation of those halves. Thats why marriage is so important, it brings those items back into unity. As does salvation, which reuinites our spirit with Gods as it was with Adam. When reading Gen. who does God tell not to eat the fruit from the tree of life. He told Adam as the whole being not the seperated…….
GEN 1 IN THE BEGINNIG OF GOD CREATING THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH WHEN THE EARTH WAS BEWILDERMENT AND VOID, WITH DARKNESS OVER THE SURFACE OF THE DEEP, AND THE BREATH OF GOD WAS HOVERING UPON THE SURFACE OF THE WATERS _ GOD SAID ” LET THERE BE LIGHT”. AND THERE WAS LIGHT…… “RASHI” THE SAPIRSTEIN EDITION. Why have so many people been covinced that the earth is say 10000 years old or less. To say scripture does not harmonize with an older planet is not correct. Our english versions say “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. vs1. My quention is what happens between vs1 and vs2 Why would God create a chaotic state of mess and confusion? Did he not know what he was doin? May it never be. Isaiah 45 declares that he created the world to be inahabited and not chaotic and a wasteland. But thats the first picture we see. Was the flood of Noah the first time the earth had been destroyed by water? Notice how in the creation story some things are created and some are simply brought forth. As if to say they were previously here but covered by the water which was already here. Dont be afraid of history , it proves the scriptures more correct every day. We need not fear evolutionists they should fear the truth…..
My dad once did a series on Genesis and he spent a lot of time of time on the meanings of names. “Methuselah” means “when he dies, judgement will come.” Yes, when he died, the flood came.