The Genealogy of Genesis 5

Introduction

This article[1] is concerned with the genealogy of Genesis 5. The sceptic baulks at the high ages and the total number of years that s/he calculates for the creation of Adam and Eve. Both young earth and old earth creationists read the chapter in a non-consecutive way, unless the young earth creationist is a strict literalist. Our interest in the genealogy is in finding the reason why the age of the father is given for the birth of the ‘son’ along with that for his death; why are there two ages rather than one or even none?[2]

Patterns in the Ages

We can infer that everyone after Adam and Eve lived for hundreds of years, even though the genealogy of Genesis 5 shows nothing more than the ages recorded for a few individuals. Although no ages are recorded in Cain’s genealogy, it too requires long lifespans, because Cain is credited with building a settlement; this detail implies sufficient undocumented population growth to support ‘building’ a settlement. Since this happens between Cain and Enoch, it implies a greater lifespan for Cain in order for there to have been several generations of children. Cain names the settlement[3] after his son Enoch, and rapid frontier population growth is implied with multiple lineages. (Outside the genealogy of Cain, rapid undocumented population growth is also implied by the fact of Cain’s wife.) The genealogy of Genesis 4 is not our topic in this paper, but it is worth noting that its incidental detail from the start implies that it is not a consecutive record of fathers and sons.

Scholars have long compared the high ages and the ten generational pattern of Genesis 5 to the Sumerian King List (SKL)[4] and used Babylonian sexagesimal mathematics to interpret the numbers.[5] The hypothesis has been that the ages are the results of an algebraic formula working to a sexagesimal base. The consequence of these comparisons is that the high ages at death come down, but to exactly where is a matter of supposition about the underlying formula. Scholars have their eye on natural lifespans today in setting a formula as well as later patriarchal ages (c. 70 or 200) which is why they offer different formulae.

If we assume today’s natural lifespan for the genealogies of Genesis 4 and 5, we do not have the necessary framework for the population growth implied by the incidental detail in Genesis 4. A formula that yields a high age is required by the details in Genesis 4, which is overlooked by scholars puzzling over the mathematics of Genesis 5. We do not have the formulae and we might be tempted to dismiss the whole strategy, but we cannot assume that the numbers are a simple record of two ages because they do betray certain patterns. That the numbers are not random but chosen for a reason might be suspected by their mostly ending in ‘0’ or ‘5’. The natural cycles in procreation would suggest a more random distribution of ‘birth’ ages if this was the intent of the genealogy.[6] Another indication that the ‘birth’ ages are chosen for a reason other than ‘birth’ is the age of Noah at the ‘birth’ of his sons; this is of a different order (500) to the other ‘birth’ ages in the genealogy.

Moreover, with the Flood happening when Noah was 600 (Gen 7:6), it is significant that the ages of Shem reverse this 500+100 pattern, with Shem being 100 when he begat Arphaxad and then living after that for another 500 years. After Shem, in the Genesis 11 genealogy, the ages plummet in two stages by a factor of 200 years each time. The first stage is associated with the Flood, with Arphaxad born two years after the Flood; the second stage happens with Peleg in whose days the earth was divided (Gen 10:25, Babel). The pattern here is that the decrease in age from 900 to 400 and then to 200 marks major historical happenings.

The genealogy of Genesis 5 is often read as a simple father-son genealogy, but the above patterns[7] show that the genealogy reflects history and is co-ordinated to something more than the year a father had a son or the lifespan of the patriarch.

Forbears

We might say that where there is no detail in the record of the father giving his son a name, there might be intervening forbears between the father and the ‘son’. A naming of the son is recorded for Seth in Gen 5:3 and for Noah in Gen 5:29 but not for the other ‘sons’ (Enosh is named outside the genealogy in Gen 4:26). There may therefore be a number of generations in the middle of the genealogy.

The Genesis 5 genealogy is ‘the book/scroll of’ the generations of Adam (Gen 5:1). This reads the Toledot formula here forwards, which is the most natural reading. The phrase ‘the book of the generation of’ is quoted in Matt 1:1 in relation to Jesus’ genealogy (reading forward). Jesus’ genealogy is stylised according to a 14 generations pattern which complements the 10 generations pattern of Genesis 5. The point of comparison here is not that genealogical practice was the same for the recorder of Genesis 5 and Matthew (hundreds of years later), but that Matthew is quoting a feature of the Genesis 5 genealogy as a whole. In the light of this, it is significant that Matthew’s genealogy has forbear gaps (Matt 1:8).

If there are forbear gaps in the Genesis 5 genealogy, what would be the reason for recording the age of the father at the birth of the ‘son’? The genealogy of Genesis 5 records that Enoch ‘walked’ with God for 300 years after he begat Methuselah. The detail of ‘walking with God’ suggests that there has been a renewal of a covenant and a prophecy of a son. The same connection of ‘walking’, a prophecy, the birth of a son, and the mention of the age of the father, is found in the episode of Abram and Sara and the prophecy of the birth of Isaac. At the age of 99, God invited Abraham to walk before him and promised that he would be a father (Gen 17:1f). A covenant was made and a son was promised (Gen 17:16f). This is what the genealogy of Genesis 5 is indicating in its brief remark about Enoch ‘walking’, the mention of his age, and the birth of the ‘son’. We should note too for Noah, that he ‘walked’ with God but he begat three sons (Gen 6:9-10); this is the same close association of ideas as with Enoch.

The Enoch record provides the key to the genealogy: each of these patriarchs is given a prophecy of a son. That prophecies underlie the genealogical records is also shown in there being a prophecy to Adam regarding Seth which told Eve that God had appointed her another seed instead of Abel (Gen 4:25), and in there being a prophecy to Lamech concerning Noah which included a promise about comfort (Gen 5:29). In fact, it is also implied that there had been a prophecy about Abel, that he was the seed, because Eve talks of ‘another’ seed (and possibly even Cain, who Eve acknowledges as from the Lord – Gen 4:1). Finally, a prophecy is implied by the birth of Enosh because men began to call upon the name of the Lord at that point.

It is not just a speculation then to suppose that there might have been intervening forbears before the birth of some of the ‘sons’ that are recorded. Cain and Abel are not forbears to Seth, but they do intervene before him and are unrecorded in the genealogy. What then about the two ages noted in the records?

Two Ages

The characteristic of the record that is really distinctive is not the high ages of the patriarchs at death but the fact that there are two ages. Take the inclusion of the age of the patriarch at the birth of the ‘son’. In the case of Levi and Kohath, in a Levitical genealogy, their duration of life is given, but not their age at the birth of a son (Exod 6:16-25). Except for Genesis 11, later genealogies like the one at the end of Ruth, don’t even give a duration of life, and so this Levitical genealogy is distinctive for also including the duration of life of the father.

The record of Noah might appear an exception to the ‘two ages’ pattern, there being only the ‘birth’ age (Gen 5:32), and as the last generation to be recorded, this might be set aside in our analysis as an exception. However, the death formulae of the genealogy are actually carried forward for Noah, but to Gen 9:28-29 – ‘lived after’ and ‘all the days of’ are picked up and re-used. On the other hand, instead of there being one ‘son’ recorded at the age of the patriarch, Noah has three sons listed at his age of 500 years.[8] This raises the question of when Shem, Ham and Japheth were each born (Gen 10:21). This implies that the ‘begat’ ages in the genealogy do not have to be about the year of birth. It could be the age at which the prophecy of the ‘son’ was given. The episode of Abram and Sara supports this reading. The ‘son’ may follow after a year, or a few years in the case of Shem, Ham or Japheth, or it may be longer if there were a number of forbears.[9]

The age of Noah is of a different order to all the other ages at ‘birth’ in the genealogy. Such a difference strongly suggests that a prophecy about three sons marks this time, and that they are chosen because the Flood is shortly going to happen and that they are to re-populate the land. However, the three sons of Noah are not equally the chosen seed and this also breaks the pattern of the genealogy. In their case, the prophecy which selects the chosen line is subsequent to the Flood, when Shem is signalled out from his brothers (Gen 9:26). The line of descent is shown at this time.

We have enough textual evidence here to infer that the ‘sons’ of Genesis 5 are the appointed seeds and the subject of prophecy. The age of the father at the birth of the ‘son’ can signal the time of the prophecy rather than actual birth which may follow years later. It is also a device that allows the genealogy to pass over forbears in making a record.

The ante-diluvian patriarchs had many sons and daughters. Of these there is a chosen line periodically identified through prophecy. How then does the family record the fulfilment of the prophecy when it occurs? It can do so through the preservation of a genealogical record passed down orally through the generations and augmented from time to time. It wouldn’t be necessary to record the age of the father if a prophecy was always fulfilled immediately through a first generation son and the son was named (though it could be a redundant detail). It would however be necessary to identify the chosen seed by reference to the age of the father if there had been forbears and he was not a first generation son; this would tie the fulfilment of the prophecy to the father and the right forbear at the same time as identifying the son. It would simultaneously exclude the other first generation sons of the father, and their lines of descent, while identifying the line of descent from the ‘son’ back through the generations to the father. The prophecy was about a father and a son, and specifying the ‘son’ and relating him to the father at a certain age therefore records how the prophecy was fulfilled.

The pattern of giving the age of the patriarch at the birth of the ‘son’ and the duration of life subsequently continues for Seth’s genealogy in Genesis 11 and for Abram,  Isaac and Jacob; and there are prophecies involved (Gen 25:26; 25:7; 35:28). The pattern stops with Jacob.

The Genesis 5/11 genealogies are unique. Cain’s genealogy doesn’t have the ages recorded. The notion of there being a ‘son of prophecy’ is established in Gen 3:15 and this explains why the age of the father at the birth of the ‘son’ is given in Genesis 5/11 – it is on ongoing expression of hope in that promise. Lamech’s words are poignant and pertinent, “This same shall comfort us concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground which the Lord hath cursed.” This tells us the point of the genealogy at the end of the genealogy (or in its middle if we include Genesis 11 and the birth prophecies and notices of Abraham Isaac and Jacob). The purpose of the genealogy is to identify who it was hoped would be the one to relieve the curse, i.e. the named ‘son’.[10]

Someone might say that the purpose of the two ages in these genealogies is to allow the calculation of the date of creation, particularly the date of the making of Adam. Certainly, Jewish and Christian commentators since have used the ages in this way, ignoring the possibility of forbears in the process. Whether patriarchs up to the time of Jacob were ever concerned with the date of the making of Adam is another matter about which we might be doubtful.[11] There is practical value in recording the age of the father at the birth of the ‘son’ – it secures the Edenic faith; but what is the practical value in a calculation about the date of creation?

The Age at Death

Recording the age of a person when they died is not exceptional, and this data may carry no significance, whether for dating creation or anything more personal. On the other hand, if there is significance  in recording how long a patriarch lived it is likely that it is in the reasoning behind the refrain ‘and he died’, which is noted for all the patriarchs in the genealogy including Noah (Gen 9:29), with Enoch the only exception. This refrain is unique to this genealogy.

The significance of ‘and he died’ is set by the narrative story up to this point and the leading information that the reader has is the pronouncement to Adam and Eve about their dying. Dying is important to the purpose of the genealogy as well as the birth of the ‘son’ of promise. They counter-balance each other. The genealogy of Genesis 11 does not have this refrain, and so we are being directed to think of Genesis 5 in connection with the reality of Adam’s punishment. The relevant intertextual link is ‘all the days of’, another refrain of the genealogy, which is quoted from Gen 3:14, 17 and particularly from the curse on the ground.[12]

The ages that are given mostly cluster above the 900 mark—just short of a thousand years. Lamech’s life is cut short just before the Flood and Enoch is a special case, but otherwise the 900 +/- pattern is carefully chosen, because the choice of a “thousand years” as a limiting period isn’t arbitrary. In the “Prayer of Moses”, it is said that, “…in your eyes a thousand years are like yesterday that quickly passes, or like one of the divisions of the night time” (Ps 90:4). The comment is, no doubt, a simile for the passage of time and how God marks the ages. The New Testament writer Peter makes a comment on this verse when he says, “Now, dear friends, do not let this one thing escape your notice—that a single day is like a thousand years with the Lord and a thousand years are like a single day.” (2 Pet 3:8).

This language is relevant to Genesis 5 because, in Genesis 2, God had declared that were Adam to sin, he would die in the day that he sinned (Gen 2:17). If the divine perception of time expressed in the Prayer of Moses is at work in Genesis 5, the limitation of the antediluvian ages to just under a thousand years is another way in which the Edenic faith is expressed. Alongside the record of the ‘son’ of promise, there is an inner-biblical exegesis going on of the curse on the ground. If a thousand years are as a day in God’s eyes, all these men did die in the kind of “day” that God had decreed for Adam’s dying. The ‘and he died’ of Noah (Gen 9:29) is the end of this pattern, which significantly coincides with the promise after the Flood that “I will not again curse the ground any more for man’s sake” (Gen 8:21).

Scholars do not dismiss the genealogy as lacking historical value. Rather, they seek to explain the use of large numbers in the genealogy. The best suggestion is that the numbers are notional and based on an underlying algebraic formula[13] which produces the high age as a product. This device serves the purpose of structuring an unknown long period of time while at the same time preserving the ancestry through which the Edenic faith was transmitted across the ‘missing’ generations of forbears. The history was constructed and recorded in a scroll. R. R. Wilson, reviewing studies on the genealogies concludes,

Although we have seen no anthropological evidence indicating that genealogies are created for the purpose of making a historical record, genealogies may nevertheless be considered historically accurate in the sense that they frequently express actual domestic, political, and religious relationships. They are, therefore, potentially valuable sources for the modern historian. However, the nature of genealogy requires that the question of historiographic worth be asked in each individual case, for only in this way can the complexities of genealogical form and function be taken into account. In dealing with the issue of the historiographic value of genealogy, no generalizations are possible. [14] [My Emphasis.]

Although the history in the genealogy is about recording the line of descent through which the Edenic promise will be fulfilled, there is a qualification to add. The detail in Genesis 4 presupposes unrecorded population growth and this in turn requires that the ages of the ante-diluvian patriarchs be high; any formula we suggest needs to reflect this fact.

Conclusion

Our conclusions are two in number:

1. the intertexts of the genealogy do not validate the use that later Jewish and Christian commentators have made of it, viz. to date the creation of Adam and Eve. Their creation is indeed historically recent, but we cannot date this event using this genealogy, because the purpose of the genealogy is different: the genealogy is about continuing and validating the Edenic faith.
2. The device of giving the age of the father at the birth of the ‘son’ marks the time of the prophecy that there would be a son (there being sons and daughters before and after the age that is given), and it is a necessary device if some of the genealogy omits forbear(s) when connecting the ‘son’ of a prophecy to the father.