Have you ever read about Methuselah?
Methuselah (Hebrew: מְתוּשֶׁלַח, romanized: Məṯūšélaḥ, in pausa Hebrew: מְתוּשָׁלַח, romanized: Məṯūšālaḥ, 'his death shall send' or 'man of the javelin' or 'death of sword'; Greek: Μαθουσάλας Mathousalas) was a biblical patriarch and a figure in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. He is claimed to have lived the longest life, dying at 969 years of age. According to the Book of Genesis, Methuselah was the son of Enoch, the father of Lamech, and the grandfather of Noah. Elsewhere in the Bible, Methuselah is mentioned in genealogies in 1 Chronicles and the Gospel of Luke.
His life is described in further detail in other texts such as the Book of Enoch, Slavonic Enoch, and the Book of Moses. Bible commentators have offered various explanations as to why the Book of Genesis describes him as having died at such an advanced age: myth, mistranslation, or giving the impression that part of Genesis takes place in a very distant past. Methuselah's name has become synonymous with longevity, and he has been portrayed and referenced in film, television and music.
Methuselah is a biblical patriarch mentioned in Genesis 5:21–27, as part of the genealogy linking Adam to Noah. The following is taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible:
When Enoch had lived sixty-five years, he became the father of Methuselah. Enoch walked with God after the birth of Methuselah three hundred years, and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty-five years. Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him. When Methuselah had lived one hundred eighty-seven years, he became the father of Lamech. Methuselah lived after the birth of Lamech seven hundred eighty-two years, and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred sixty-nine years; and he died. 5:21–27
According to the Hebrew Bible, Methuselah begets Lamech and then lives 782 more years. When Lamech is 182, he begets Noah, and the Genesis Flood comes when Noah is 600 years old. This would imply that Methuselah dies the year of the Flood. (In the Septuagint, most of the ages in this section are different. Lamech begets Noah at age 188, and Methuselah lives 802 years after begetting Lamech. He was also the oldest of all the figures mentioned in the Bible. Methuselah is mentioned once in the Hebrew Bible outside of Genesis, in 1 Chronicles 1:3. Methuselah is mentioned a single time in the New Testament, when the Gospel of Luke traces Jesus' lineage back to Adam in Luke 3.
Some biblical literalists claim that Methuselah's long lifespan can be explained by a better diet, or a hypothetical "water vapor canopy" protected the earth from radiation before the Flood. Others claim theological causes: humans were originally to have everlasting life, but sin was introduced into the world by Adam and Eve, and its influence became greater with each generation, before God progressively shortened human life, particularly after the Flood. The Catholic Encyclopedia says "Certain exegetes solve the difficulty to their own satisfaction by declaring that the year meant by the sacred writer is not the equivalent of our year."
Mistranslation
Some believe that Methuselah's extreme age is the result of an ancient mistranslation that converted "months" to "years", producing a more credible 969 lunar months, or 78½ years, however this would also mean Enoch fathered Methuselah at the age of 5 using numbers from the Masoretic Text. Donald V. Etz suggested that the Genesis 5 numbers "might for convenience have all been multiples of 5 or 10".
Ellen Bennet argued that the Septuagint Genesis 5 numbers are in tenths of years, which "will explain how it was that they read 930 years for the age of Adam instead of 93 years, and 969 years for Methuselah instead of 96 years, and 950 years for that of Noah instead of 95 years"... "Surely it is much more rational to conclude that Noah lived 50 years instead of 500 years before he took a wife and begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth..." and then lists the Septuagint total ages with decimal points: 93.0 for Adam, 91.0 for Cainan, 96.9 for Methuselah, 95.0 for Noah, etc. As mentioned this would mean that Enoch became a father at the age of 6.5 and that the other antediluvian patriarchs did so at implausibly young ages.
Myth
Yigal Levin states that these long lifespans are intended simply to speed the reader from Adam to Noah. Claus Westermann states they are intended to create the impression of a distant past.
Some versions of the Sumerian King List mention a character named Ubara-Tutu who seems almost identical to Methuselah.[citation needed] He was the son of En-men-dur-ana, a Sumerian mythological figure often compared to Enoch, as he entered heaven without dying. Ubara-Tutu was the king of Sumer until a flood swept over his land. Although the ages of Methuselah and Ubara-Tutu are different, they both died in a Great Flood. Babylonian writer Berossus also claims that, prior to the events of Babylon's flood myth, kings could live for tens of thousands of years, which bears some similarity to Genesis 5. In Forever Young: A Cultural History of Longevity, Lucian Boia says that the Bible's portrayal of Methuselah and other long-lived figures features "traces of the Mesopatamian legends" found in the Epic of Gilgamesh, where Gilgamesh rules Uruk for 126 years, and his ancestors are said to have ruled for several hundred years each. Boia also notes that tales of kings who lived for thousands of years can be found in both Hindu and Chinese mythology, and that the Bible is comparatively "restrained" in depicting early humans as being able to live for hundreds of years, rather than thousands.
Boia notes that following the Flood, the Bible depicts its characters' lifespans as gradually diminishing; Noah's sons lived between 400 and 500 years, while Abraham died at 175, Moses died at 120, and David died at 70, an age that the Bible portrays as old for David's time. Boia compares early biblical figures and their vast lifespans to the people of the Golden Age in Hesiod's poem Works and Days, whose bodies are perpetually youthful.
Symbolic
Methuselah's father Enoch, who does not die but is taken by God, is the seventh patriarch, and Methuselah, the eighth, dies in the year of the Flood, which ends the ten-generational sequence from Adam to Noah, in whose time the world is destroyed. Boia believes that Methuselah serves the symbolic function of linking the Creation and the Flood, as Adam would have died during Methuselah's lifetime and Methuselah could have learned about the Garden of Eden from Adam. The kings of the Sumerian King List lived for over a thousand years, and Mesopotamians believed both that living over a thousand years made someone divine or somewhat divine, and that their contemporary kings were descended from the kings of the Sumerian King List. Robert Gnuse hypothesizes that the author of Genesis made all of its characters die before they turned one thousand as a polemic against these Mesopotamian beliefs, as well as any claim that a king is divine. Gnuse also believes that the author of Genesis said that Methuselah died before he lived a thousand years to show that he was not divine.
His life is described in further detail in other texts such as the Book of Enoch, Slavonic Enoch, and the Book of Moses. Bible commentators have offered various explanations as to why the Book of Genesis describes him as having died at such an advanced age: myth, mistranslation, or giving the impression that part of Genesis takes place in a very distant past. Methuselah's name has become synonymous with longevity, and he has been portrayed and referenced in film, television and music.
Methuselah is a biblical patriarch mentioned in Genesis 5:21–27, as part of the genealogy linking Adam to Noah. The following is taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible:
When Enoch had lived sixty-five years, he became the father of Methuselah. Enoch walked with God after the birth of Methuselah three hundred years, and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty-five years. Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him. When Methuselah had lived one hundred eighty-seven years, he became the father of Lamech. Methuselah lived after the birth of Lamech seven hundred eighty-two years, and had other sons and daughters. Thus all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred sixty-nine years; and he died. 5:21–27
According to the Hebrew Bible, Methuselah begets Lamech and then lives 782 more years. When Lamech is 182, he begets Noah, and the Genesis Flood comes when Noah is 600 years old. This would imply that Methuselah dies the year of the Flood. (In the Septuagint, most of the ages in this section are different. Lamech begets Noah at age 188, and Methuselah lives 802 years after begetting Lamech. He was also the oldest of all the figures mentioned in the Bible. Methuselah is mentioned once in the Hebrew Bible outside of Genesis, in 1 Chronicles 1:3. Methuselah is mentioned a single time in the New Testament, when the Gospel of Luke traces Jesus' lineage back to Adam in Luke 3.
Some biblical literalists claim that Methuselah's long lifespan can be explained by a better diet, or a hypothetical "water vapor canopy" protected the earth from radiation before the Flood. Others claim theological causes: humans were originally to have everlasting life, but sin was introduced into the world by Adam and Eve, and its influence became greater with each generation, before God progressively shortened human life, particularly after the Flood. The Catholic Encyclopedia says "Certain exegetes solve the difficulty to their own satisfaction by declaring that the year meant by the sacred writer is not the equivalent of our year."
Mistranslation
Some believe that Methuselah's extreme age is the result of an ancient mistranslation that converted "months" to "years", producing a more credible 969 lunar months, or 78½ years, however this would also mean Enoch fathered Methuselah at the age of 5 using numbers from the Masoretic Text. Donald V. Etz suggested that the Genesis 5 numbers "might for convenience have all been multiples of 5 or 10".
Ellen Bennet argued that the Septuagint Genesis 5 numbers are in tenths of years, which "will explain how it was that they read 930 years for the age of Adam instead of 93 years, and 969 years for Methuselah instead of 96 years, and 950 years for that of Noah instead of 95 years"... "Surely it is much more rational to conclude that Noah lived 50 years instead of 500 years before he took a wife and begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth..." and then lists the Septuagint total ages with decimal points: 93.0 for Adam, 91.0 for Cainan, 96.9 for Methuselah, 95.0 for Noah, etc. As mentioned this would mean that Enoch became a father at the age of 6.5 and that the other antediluvian patriarchs did so at implausibly young ages.
Myth
Yigal Levin states that these long lifespans are intended simply to speed the reader from Adam to Noah. Claus Westermann states they are intended to create the impression of a distant past.
Some versions of the Sumerian King List mention a character named Ubara-Tutu who seems almost identical to Methuselah.[citation needed] He was the son of En-men-dur-ana, a Sumerian mythological figure often compared to Enoch, as he entered heaven without dying. Ubara-Tutu was the king of Sumer until a flood swept over his land. Although the ages of Methuselah and Ubara-Tutu are different, they both died in a Great Flood. Babylonian writer Berossus also claims that, prior to the events of Babylon's flood myth, kings could live for tens of thousands of years, which bears some similarity to Genesis 5. In Forever Young: A Cultural History of Longevity, Lucian Boia says that the Bible's portrayal of Methuselah and other long-lived figures features "traces of the Mesopatamian legends" found in the Epic of Gilgamesh, where Gilgamesh rules Uruk for 126 years, and his ancestors are said to have ruled for several hundred years each. Boia also notes that tales of kings who lived for thousands of years can be found in both Hindu and Chinese mythology, and that the Bible is comparatively "restrained" in depicting early humans as being able to live for hundreds of years, rather than thousands.
Boia notes that following the Flood, the Bible depicts its characters' lifespans as gradually diminishing; Noah's sons lived between 400 and 500 years, while Abraham died at 175, Moses died at 120, and David died at 70, an age that the Bible portrays as old for David's time. Boia compares early biblical figures and their vast lifespans to the people of the Golden Age in Hesiod's poem Works and Days, whose bodies are perpetually youthful.
Symbolic
Methuselah's father Enoch, who does not die but is taken by God, is the seventh patriarch, and Methuselah, the eighth, dies in the year of the Flood, which ends the ten-generational sequence from Adam to Noah, in whose time the world is destroyed. Boia believes that Methuselah serves the symbolic function of linking the Creation and the Flood, as Adam would have died during Methuselah's lifetime and Methuselah could have learned about the Garden of Eden from Adam. The kings of the Sumerian King List lived for over a thousand years, and Mesopotamians believed both that living over a thousand years made someone divine or somewhat divine, and that their contemporary kings were descended from the kings of the Sumerian King List. Robert Gnuse hypothesizes that the author of Genesis made all of its characters die before they turned one thousand as a polemic against these Mesopotamian beliefs, as well as any claim that a king is divine. Gnuse also believes that the author of Genesis said that Methuselah died before he lived a thousand years to show that he was not divine.
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