Tag: Methuselah

Patterns in the Ages

Posted on by jovial_cynic
Genesis is full of patterns that are intended to draw your attention; breaks in the repetition should make you stop and ask, “Why?”

Genesis 5 lists the ages in the generations between Adam and Noah, and a few stand out. The youngest, the oldest, and the one with the strange number.

Methuselah lived the longest – 969 years. His name is linked to his long life, which was not just for his benefit, but for the benefit of humanity as God restrained the Flood until after Methuselah died.

Enoch notably never died.

And Lamech? He shares a name with a notable man in Cain’s genealogy. Cain’s Lamech is man of seventy-seven-fold vengeance. But the Lamech of Genesis 5 goes down a different path. Not one of vengeance, but of Comfort.

10

Posted on by jovial_cynic

Now Jared lived 162 years, and fathered Enoch…
Now Enoch lived sixty-five years, and fathered Methuselah…
Now Methuselah lived 187 years, and fathered Lamech…
Genesis 5:18, 21, 25 (NASB)

Now Lamech lived 182 years, and fathered a son. And he named him Noah, saying, “This one will give us comfort from our work and from the hard labor of our hands caused by the ground which the Lord has cursed.”
Genesis 5:28-29 (NASB)

For the Rabbis, 7 is “perfection,” and 10 is “completion.”

Tenth from Adam, we have another oddity. It’s the first time the name of the son is not immediately shown. Everywhere else, it would have said, “and fathered Noah.” Instead, it pauses. So we, too, must pause.