Posted on 02/17/2017 7:30:35 AM PST by Salvation
I occasionally get questions about the remarkably long lives of the patriarchs who lived before the great flood. Consider the ages at which these figures purportedly died:
How should we understand these references? Many theories have been proposed to explain the claimed longevity. Some use a mathematical corrective, but this leads to other pitfalls such as certain patriarchs apparently begetting children while still children themselves. Another theory proposes that the purported life spans of the patriarchs are just indications of their influence or family line, but then things don’t add up chronologically with eras and family trees.
Personally, I think we need to take the stated life spans of the patriarchs at face value and just accept it as a mystery: for some reason, the ancient patriarchs lived far longer than we do in the modern era. I cannot prove that they actually lived that long, but neither is there strong evidence that they did not. Frankly, I have little stake in insisting that they did in fact live to be that old. But if you ask me, I think it is best just to accept that they did.
This solution, when I articulate it, causes many to scoff. They almost seem to be offended. The reply usually sounds something like this: “That’s crazy. There’s no way they lived that long. The texts must be wrong.” To which I generally reply, “Why do you think it’s crazy or impossible?” The answers usually range from the glib to the more serious, but here are some common replies:
So I think we’re back to where we started: just taking the long life spans of the early patriarchs at face value.
There is perhaps a theological truth hidden in the shrinking lifespans of the Old Testament. The Scriptures link sin and death. Adam and Eve were warned that the day they ate of the forbidden fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, they would die (Gen 2:17), but they did not drop dead immediately. Although they died spiritually in an instant, the clock of death for their bodies wound down much later. As the age listing above shows, as sin increased, lifespans dropped precipitously, especially after the flood.
Prior to the flood, lifespans remained in the vicinity of 900 years, but right afterward they dropped by about a third (Shem only lived to 600), and then the numbers plummeted even further. Neither Abraham nor Moses even reached 200, and by the time of King David, he would write, Our years are seventy, or eighty for those who are strong (Ps 90:10).
Scripture says, For the wages of sin is death (Rom 6:23). Indeed they are, especially in terms of lifespan. Perhaps that is why I am not too anxious to try to disprove the long life spans of the patriarchs, for what we know theologically is borne out in our human experience: sin is life-destroying. This truth is surely made clear by the declining lifespan of the human family.
Does this prove that Adam actually lived to be more than 900 years old? No, it only shows that declining life spans are something we fittingly discover in a world of sin. God teaches that sin brings death, so why should we be shocked that our life span has decreased from 900 years to about 85? It is what it is. It’s a sad truth about which God warned us. Thanks be to God our Father, who in Jesus now offers us eternal life, if we will have faith and obey His Son!
How or even whether the patriarchs lived to such advanced ages is not clear, but what is theologically clear is that we don’t live that long today because of the collective effect of sin upon us.
Why do Roman Catholics question so much of Genesis?
Since God is the Author of Life...he gives it and takes it..I see no reason to believe that Noah didn’t live to 950.
Gen 6:3:
Then the LORD said, “My Spirit shall not strive with man forever, because he also is flesh; nevertheless his days shall be one hundred and twenty years.”
He got sick of us living that long fighting Him.
- So he changed it.
It was not hard to do when you only have to modify the child-bearing ages of one family.
Rev. 9:6:
“In those days people will seek death but will not find it. They will long to die, but death will flee from them!”
Will we be restored to those long lifespans?
I read the last chapter, we win.
Will we be restored to pre-fall lifespans?
Will he still be sick of us hanging around longer?
Is he laughing now at all these assumptions?
If you start considering the energies involved, something that would change the rotation speed would involve survivable energies, changing the orbit would require more energy. An if you want to shorten the year you have to move closer to the sun. A short enough year would put us in Venus’s neighborhood.
Well, since we’re suspending disbelief and playing what if, take a look at the Genesis account and ponder the apparent differences in the geology, weather and atmosphere described. It appears that the planet was surrounded by a canopy of water. Could this provide UV protection and moderate surface temperatures sufficiently to provide a habitable environment?
“Source being a Cretan Greek poem, I’m skeptical of him swinging more than a spoon at his oatmeal but since he was the leader he gets the good press.”
Say you, There were witnesses, His actions actually helped inspired those around him and it was much more than a Poet that said something about the Winners of this History.
Just two examples with reference footnotes in them:
http://www.mikechurch.com/shop/product/defenders-of-christendom/
https://books.google.com/books?id=E_OXa9lhwAMC
God Bless
A canopy of clouds doesn’t work out well for Venus. I think it is more likely that God said he would shorten our life spans and we subsequently started living shorter lives.
No, not clouds. Water.
The atmosphere was different according to the Bible. The earth was watered by a mist that rose up from the earth. The first time it ever rained was when the Flood came.
I’m inclined to believe that we were created to live on earth forever, and be in communion with God. But we messed up, and sinners can’t see God, so He took away the tree of life so that we wouldn’t be subjected to a sinful life forever, but would die, and could at some point have full communion with Him again. Probably more for His sake than for ours!
And somehow, it took a long time for that sin to build up and get passed down through the ages so we went from 900+ years old to 40 years old or whatever it was in the Middle ages. And now modern medicine is able to counter some of the effects of sin.
Who knows - but that’s my thinking. BTW - some/many of the ages in the Bible they use numbers that mean something and are special. (I’m guessing after 700 years they probably lost track of birthdays too - if they even celebrated them. If they were a big deal, maybe SOMEBODY could have marked on a calendar when Jesus was born!?) Anyway - the Bible might say 770 years old when somebody died because it has a meaning - whereas 753 years old doesn’t. But the idea is - they lived a LONG time.
“But, I don’t see why the ages in those books couldn’t have been done according to the calendar usage and practice of the different writers, of which there were many, and over a substantial period of time.”
Well, we don’t know the calendar usage ever changed, that is just speculation, and we don’t know there were multiple authors either, that is more speculation. The jews themselves believe Moses authored the entire Torah himself and also claim to have always followed their lunar calendar that they say was received and handed down through the generations from when God appointed the times and seasons in the Garden.
The “critical theorists” will dispute all of that, of course, but they have a naked agenda to dispute anything that suggests a divine origin for these books, because they are atheistic Marxists, not unbiased scholars. Personally, I choose to believe God was perfectly capable of preserving the Scripture He wanted us to have in the form He wanted us to receive it.
Well, consider that the conditions on Venus we see today are the end result of a greenhouse effect that is cumulative. The Bible shows about 1500 years from creation to the flood, so even if there was a greenhouse effect, and the temperature was rising the entire time, it might not have lasted long enough to turn the planet into anything worse than a tropical paradise.
:Did Noah Really Live to Be 950?”
Nah; God’s just messing with your head. He likes to do that. /s
If He said it was 950 years, it was 950 years.
I agree with everything you said. In addition, because there was no longer a water canopy in the sky, the harmful rays of the sun got through and man had to get adequate and complete proteins from animal flesh to counteract the UV damage to the cellular level. God told Noah:
According to what has survived regarding Gilgamesh, that one died at 550 years of age (if memory properly here serves, I'm too lazy at the moment to go look it up).
By his own time lesser mortals were living much shorter lives -- or so the impression I have from what I've read.
based upon the below opening sentence of Mr. Pope's;
If so, in this particular thread it was a bit unfair I think, to have worded your question having it appear that 'Roman Catholics' widely, or in general(?) question so much of Genesis (all holding the same precise views?) since in regards to the biblical accounts of Noah (at least) it appears to me there are plenty of [Roman] Catholics who do not question that portion, one of them being the writer of the article of course, and then more than a few here who's comments indicate their own agreement with the writer. In addition to that consideration, Mr. Pope could well enough have been referring (or referring also) to those who are not Roman Catholic at all who have raised the questions.
I myself find no disagreement with Mr. Pope said in this latest article of his, here republished on FR. As has been the case with many other of his published articles writings too. He often writes along lines agreeing with, confirming my own opinions, and in general agreement with any number of other-than-Roman Catholic theologians, preachers, expounders of biblical teaching & principles, etc. Perhaps he confirms my own biases?
But you may have something in regard to how, in other places amid RCC teaching and preaching the book of Genesis is treated, if that was also (and/or more) what you were alluding to. Then again, regarding the opening chapters of Genesis, I personally see no need for strictest literal interpretations need be applied.
Those who accept Scripture, then build their doctrine upon His Word are blessed with more wisdom.
Consider how after the flood, there were then generations of younger people whose forefathers outlived them. Later generations appealed to these elders for guidance upon spiritual issues which their fathers were not aware.
Puts a different slant on how different lineages moved to different parts of the planet, but their stories of origins bear the same roots.
To be fair...there are a good number of non-catholics who question the Genesis account as well. But as the article was written by a catholic and posted by a catholic I directed the question to catholics.
With that clarification I move to the next point.
Why not a literal view of the Genesis Creation account?
The Hebrew indicates six 24 hour day periods as we understand them.
More importantly...cannot God create everything in six days? For that matter, could He not create everything in six minutes or whatever time frame posited?
If God is able to create everything out of nothing, is not possible for Him to create all in six days?
I mean, if God can raise the dead why can't He create all in six days?
To me, it comes down to a matter of faith. Either He can or can't.
That's one way to look at it.
Another way is to consider what was being talked about, was 6 time periods from God's own perspective, not necessarily man's own perspective. Or more simply (not demanding these time periods being "days, from God's perspective") just 6 periods of time of indeterminate length -- of length not much understandable to man, and possibly neither here nor there, the Scriptures being not scientific journal, but rather, the Torah is not a history book as I found it put within an article about a writer's work I will discuss just after this extract from https://www.judaismandscience.com/science-and-judaism-the-strange-claim-of-dr-schroeder-part-i/;
Etz Hayim, the Torah commentary published by the Conservative movement (2001) holds similarly: “The opening chapters of Genesis are not a scientific account of the origins of the universe. The Torah is a book of morality, not cosmology.” (At 3, emphasis supplied.) The Chumash (The Stone Edition)(1993), published as part of the more traditional Art Scroll series, accepts Rashi’s understanding that Torah starts with Creation in order to establish God’s supremacy, but acknowledges that “the Torah is not a history book . . . .”
It's been a long while since I read them, but there were a pair of books written by a Jewish physicist by the name of Gerald L. Schroeder, Genesis and The Big Bang, and The Science of God wherein a general theme is to take notice of, from within the text, from who's perspective the "days" are talked about, invoking in first; special relativity, then perhaps in effort to correct himself, re-adjust his theory in the second book(?) general relativity, placing either God, or "the bible" itself outside of what was being created, prior to then abiding somehow with, and within that creation *everywhere* at once (omnipresence).
According to his thinking, that including the idea that; :laws of nature: themselves preexisted the beginning moment of creation itself, thus preexisting the then later resultant existence of natural physical realms.
This sort of idea being difficult to grasp in all it's possible implications, in his own applications hinged upon "perspective" of the viewers, (either 'God' or else man--once man was created on the sixth day, that is)...
You did say "days as we understands them, did you not? Well, man wasn't around on the first five days to be observing them, and so according to as I understand Schroeder's own views to tend, the perspectives not only can be turned from one way (one observer's God's standpoint) to another way (the other observer's, man's own viewpoint).
The viewpoint and perspective from which Creations was being described either simply is, or else must be switched from God's to man's. In the grace of God acknowledging His Creation, I think I find room to assume Schroeder may also assume the perspectives must be turned/changed from an initial perspective (God's) to now our own, or else we couldn't understand anything He was saying much at all - there being no bible, no Torah if not for the changes of perspective which must be, must have to have been included in the Genesis creation account man.
Time itself transpires at differing rates dependent upon perspective of observers, what is being observed, velocities of either, either moving away or nearer, doesn't it? I mean, hasn't that been measured and observed to some small degree, and could be applied to much larger, truly entire Universe scale? This is the stuff of Schroeder's explanations of how 13 billion years can be examined, from those differing perspectives, and still be only 6 days.
I'm likely not explaining it all that well...I confess to not understanding it all that well... but if you can see what I think I see Schroeder is driving at, it is intriguing isn't it?
A little complicated, no? But I think I see what he was driving at, and do confess I'm rather fond of his way of making both; billions of years, and six days (of initial actions by God resulting in creation of all that there is, including the entire universe) fit together in one envelope.
Those books have received critique from many quarters, naturally enough (hidden little pun intended -- a tiny one Shroeder might smile at). :^')
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