From Adam to Noah

Disclaimer: My math might not be entirely correct, but you get the idea.

I'm reading Genesis and in the 5th chapter I came across the genealogy of Adam through his son Seth. I have always found genealogies boring to read. This one drew my attention in an interesting way. The basic structure is Adam was 130 when Seth was born. He lived 800 years after that and had more sons and daughters and he died at age 930. No one lives to 900 these days. Most are lucky if they make it to 100. For 10 generations people lived close to one thousand years. You only find this in books. Elves are notorious for living thousands of years. Dwarfs are usually a long lived race, but seldom do you find books where humans live for such long periods of time.

Here are the highlights of what I found out according to Bible. Adam was alive to see 8 generations of descendants. Lamech, the father of Noah, was 56 when Adam died. Methusaleh lived the longest out of all of these men to a ripe old age of 969 years old. He is the only one to outlive his son, Lamech, who died quite young at 777. Only two others lived less than 900 years. Mahalel died at 895 and Enoch please God and was taken away at age 365.

None of these men except maybe Adam had sons before they were 50 years old. Seth is the third son of Adam. Cain killed Abel and that took both of them out of this lineage. They might have had daughters but the Bible doesn't say. Noah had three sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth. The Bible lumps them all together. Maybe they were triplets who knows. All it says is that when Noah was 500 he had three sons, and it lists them. The flood happened the same year as Methusaleh died and when Noah was 600. After the flood Noah lived 350 more years and died at 950. Noah is the last of these men with uber long lives. From the time Adam was created to Noah's death 1977 years passed.

Can you imagine what it would be like to live so long? Think of how different the world was 900 years ago. It is mind blowing to think of it. When 9 years is equivalent to 1% of your life, can you imagine how fast the days must have gone by? Some numbers and food for thought as you slide over hump day.