GENESIS 5: THE LINE OF SETH

Victor Hamilton comments, “Most readers of Scripture do not normally consider the genealogies among its most exciting parts. Their virtual dismissal by most lay readers contrasts sharply with biblical scholars' obsession with them.” My own view falls somewhere in the middle of these extremes, so here are some tidbits I have picked up that may make reading this chapter a little more palatable.

5:1 This chapter bridges the time period between Adam and Noah, following the godly line of Seth instead to Cain's descendants. It begins with a reference to mankind being created in God's image. “The clear implication is that succeeding generations continue to bear the image of God.” (Satterwaite)  "The likeness does not consist of the physical form at all; rather, the likeness is in the function of that form to represent the presence of God in the world.” (Konkel)

Commentators are in relative agreement that there are two different meaning to adam in this verse, the first referring to an individual and the second to humankind as a whole.”

5:3 “Genesis 5 illustrates well the new function of the genealogy [for religious affirmation rather than for political legitimization] even though the form of the listing is unusual for the Old Testament. The age of the father is given before the birth of his child, then the age after the birth, and finally his total age. Everything focuses on the birth of the child who becomes the carrier of the promise.” (Childs)

In contrast to Cain, Seth is called a son of Adam, in his own image. An early Jewish tradition said that Cain was actually the son of Eve and the wicked angel Samael. (R.E. Brown)

“Humans may legitimately reproduce the divine image by means of procreation. By extending the human line, humans extend witness to God's creative presence in the world.” (J.H. Hunt)

5:5 The lengthy ages achieved by these patriarchs deserves a few comments. They certainly seem excessive to our perspective, but they pale into insignificance when compared to the ages given for the heroes of the early Babylonian sagas who live for 18,600-65,000 years. Attempts to use these ages to calculate the time of man on earth are doomed to failure. even if one chooses to take them literally. For one thing, there is disagreement as to the exact numbers given in this chapter as seen if one compares the Hebrew text with the Greek Septuagint and the Samaritan Pentateuch (see the table on page 247 of Hamilton's Genesis 1-17). I have explained elsewhere that numbers, unlike words, have virtually no redundancy. Thus, minor errors in copying down letters or words can usually be recognized as mistakes by subsequent scribes and corrected. The same is not at all true of numbers.

Another problem with trying to construct a chronology using these numbers is that the genealogical lists in the Bible tend to be highly compressed with many generations skipped over in order to, for example, (1) only highlight significant personages or (2) achieve a symbolic number of generations (such as 7, 10, or 12). C.John Collins discusses a number of such proven examples on pages 204-207 in Genesis 1-4. This is not cheating on the part of the biblical authors since the Hebrew words translated “begat” or “father of” can also be used to indicate a fathering over the course of many generations.

Concerning the individuals' long life times before the Flood, some have made generally unconvincing attempts to explain the fact “scientifically.” Thus, if the Flood were the first time that it had rained on earth, there must have been a huge quantity of water vapor in the atmosphere before that time. It would have acted to shield the earth from the harmful cosmic rays of the sun and thus have allowed men to live a much longer time. Alternatively, “The fact that life spans diminish radically after the Flood may be the Bible's way of saying that history is regressing rather than advancing.” (Hamilton) This point is specifically made in the next chapter (6:3) when God appears to set a limit on man's lifetime (although there are other explanations of that verse).

The repeated and somewhat unnecessary phrase in this chapter “and he died” “has the effect of stressing that, with the exception of Enoch (5:24), none of Adam's line escaped death.” (Satterwaite)

5:18 This is the first of three names in Seth's line that are identical or similar to those in Cain's line. The others are Methuselah / Methushael, and Lamech. Also, more information is given about Enoch and Lamech than the other descendants. C. John Collins surmises that the literary effect of this juxtaposition “is to note that the decline we see in Cain's family was not an inevitable outcome of being human; rather it flowed from the moral orientation of its members, which in turn is influenced by the orientation of the head member of the list.”

5:21-24 The example of godly Enoch, seventh in line from Adam on Seth's side, is in marked contrast to the seventh in line on Cain's line. The Lamech mentioned in ch. 4 is a bloodthirsty murderer. The name Enoch comes from the Hebrew root verb “to introduce or to initiate.” Hess explains that this indicates that he was introduced to the truths of God as they walked together.

Notice the similarity between God walking with Enoch and God walking in the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve. The Dictionary of Biblical Imagery takes a different approach in saying that walking “indicates a manner of life which in other contexts describes the life of a shepherd wanderer...Enoch followed God from place to place.” The statement that" Enoch walked with God" appears twice in these verses for emphasis. Noah will also be called a man who walked with God (Genesis 6:9)

Hess also states that the 365 years of Enoch's life on earth may be taken literally or figuratively as “in the fullness of time” (because of the 365 days in a solar year). Concerning the existence of an afterlife, there is this example of Enoch and his translation to heaven. “If we accept the canonical evidence at face value, that one event should have settled forever the theoretical question.” (Kaiser)

The last phrase of verse 24 is rendered in the Greek Septuagint as “he was not found, because God translated him.” The author of the Book of Hebrews follows this version when he includes Enoch in his list of OT heroes of the faith (Hebrews 11:5). Notice the similar story later in the Bible where Elijah is translated into heaven and was not found by the company of prophets who searched for him. Not coincidentally, it has been suggested that the two witnesses in Revelation 11 might be Enoch and Elijah. Ellison labels that idea as “unprovable” although “based on a proper understanding of the theological problems involved.”

The OT apocryphal books such as I and II Enoch go into a great deal of detail concerning Enoch's supposed revelations while in heaven. One is even quoted in Jude 14-15.

5:27 “The fact that the longest living human does not reach the age of 1,000 years, which is a single 'day' in God's life (Ps. 90:4), is another illustration of the Scripture's refusal to grant godlike status to its heroic mortals.” (Hamilton)

5:29 Noah's name is linked with nauhem (“comfort”) and nuah (“rest”). Hess also notes that it bears a close resemblance to the first part of a name given a person in found in the Hurrian flood story. Of course, the direction of borrowing in the biblical and pagan flood narratives remains uncertain.

The curse on the land in Genesis 3 is either closely linked to or perhaps reversed by Noah initiating the practice of viniculture (grape growing and wine production) in Genesis 9. (Brettler)

5:32 The relative fortunes of the three children will be explained in Genesis 9.