Why is everyone in Genesis really old?

Question

Why is everyone in the 5th chaper of genesis like 900 years old? This doesnt make sense to me.

Answer 1

The tale is fiction. It is not possible for anyone to grow older than about 130 years, because of genetic limitations. There are numerous other errors in the book.

Answer 2

It is possible that the ages of the Patriarchs were actually measured in lunar months (a Sumerian custom). Take everybody's age and divide by 12. This makes even more sense in the Septuagint Old Testament, which has slightly higher values for some individuals.

According to Sumerian historical annals, there were 10 dynasties before the Flood. It is possible that the 10 patriarchs in Genesis were the heads of the 10 pre-Flood Sumerian dynasties.

Answer 3

IN THE BEGINNING there was no written language, only oral tradition. This is true of all societies, and some still maintain their oral traditions. Stories passed down this way tend to use language very figuratively to get an idea across and since they also predate anything but the simplest arithmetic, it's a mistake to interpret them as if they were the records of Certified Public Accountants. Anything relating to great age or unbelievable size simply denotes how revered an ancestor may have been. There are very few that can be remembered in an oral tradition, since there's a limited amount of information that can be kept without writing it down. Those who are remembered attain mythic proportions.

When writing came on the scene, oral traditions were recorded. But there was no way to go back and check on the literal truth of an oral tradition, it merely got recorded. What didn't get recorded was the way the story affected those who told and heard it, which is why it was told and heard that way. "He was a person who was remembered over all the rest" became "He did several lifetimes worth of work" became "He lived several lifetimes" and when it was finally written down with descriptive numbers became "He lived 900 years." This had everything to do with how notable the person was and had nothing to do with chronological age.

And so, while we mere ordinaries may live several decades, the notables of the past (greater than us, obviously) lived several centuries, and the Lord (much, much greater than anything else, ever) only needed several days to do tremendous works. It was a matter of comparison, not of record keeping.

Biblical literalists can't quite grasp the concept that this is how faith was expressed in the past. During the oral-history phase of a culture there was simply no way to account in great numbers, and in fact most people didn't know their own age. We know that because we can observe it in primitive societies today.

Answer 4

God created Adam perfect and to live eternally if he had eaten from the tree of life instead of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. When Adam sinned everying created started to be corrupt and to decay from their perfection. At the start of the decay things were still close to perfection and man could live longer and the environment just less than perfect. But all things became worse as time progresses including the age of man which keeps on decreasing until in Gen 6:3 where God ordained that man who strive with the Holy Spirit shall live to 120 years.The age of 70 to 80 years in Psalm 90:10 were for the Israelites who were under the judgement of God and condemned not to enter the promised land and not for mankind in general. The maximum age of man who strives against the Holy Spirit is 120 years.

Answer 5

There are two answers to this, one Christians like and one they don't like.

1) When Genesis 1-11 was written (between about 3300 and 2000 BC) there were competing number systems. Almost every village had their own way of counting, either for units, for volume, for weight or area, depending on what they were trading with other villages.

About 1800 BC, the Babylonians began to reconcile all of these number systems and enforce a universal base 60 numbering system for commerce throughout the Middle East. We still use aspects of it today, for example in time and direction (360 degrees in a circle).

When they began trying to interpret older number systems they frequently erred and read the numbers literally, assuming the meanings of the symbols hadn't changed. The most obvious erroneous reading can be seen in the first 8 kings in the Sumerian Kings List (published about 1700 BC) which gives the first kings after creation life spans in the hundreds of thousands of years! (For some mysterious reason, all of them are divisible exactly by the number 3600.)

It's possible that when the first chapters of Genesis were being compiled, the same errors were made by literate men working in a different part of the world with a different numbering system and simply exadurated older documents.

(That's the answer Christians probably won't like.)

2) There are quotes from various documents using words for numbers instead of number symbols for numbers, and they tell a very different story than any of the numbers and different than what we would expect.

The first comes from Genesis. Jacob is asked by the Pharoah how old he is, and this is his reply:

"The days of the years of my sojourning are a hundred and thirty years; few and evil have been the days of the years of my life, and they have not attained to the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their sojourning."

This is a quote from "the Rulers of Lagash" describing a period just after the flood:

"...in those days, the carefree youth of man lasted for 100 years and, following his upbringing, he lasted for another 100 years."

(This is the quote that Atheists won't like. Some of us, as Christians will call it evidence favoring Genesis and in direct violation of the doctrines of Evolution.)

There is a third answer often given for this and it's easily demonstrated to be wrong, that is the answer that they used a different calendar.

The Egyptians were using a 365-day calendar longer than they've been literate (about 3200 BC). Their calender appears on the Polermo Stone which records (and actually measures) the rising of the Nile every year from the first dynasty.

The Sumerians developed a 360-day calendar based on 12 months of 30 days each before they were literate (about 3500 BC). We know this because their year was based on two growing seasons of 6 months each, and they had already developed their growing seasons by about 4000 BC.

The Chinese had a 365-day year as early as their own literacy, by 2400 BC, if not sooner.

All three years were based on the rotation of the earth around the sun and were either measured by seasons or by the length of the shadows (the Chinese used 4 sundials to tell time).

Everyone knew what a year was, and it was the same as our years.

Answer 6

Up until the flood there was a canopy of water surrounding the Earth. It protected the inhabitants from the ultra violet ray coming from outer space. In addition sin was not as strong a force on the Earth as it is now. The early inhabitants such as Adam and Eve(Isha) had to succumb to death, which at first they did not know how to do. It took a lot of time before death took hold on mankind.
I Cr 13;8a

Answer 7

The reason I've been told that everyone lived to be so old in chapter five is because the ozone was much thicker, because of so much water in the earth's atmosphere.

And then in Chapter 6, verse 3, it says our days will be up to "120 years"

And then Noah lives to be 601 (or so), and then in Chapter 11, people are living to be 300 or so, even after the flood.

So, really, I couldn't tell you why people are living to be so old.

Answer 8

1. The human race was more genetically pure in this early time period, so there was less disease to shorten life spans.
2. No rain had yet fallen on the earth and the expanse of water above kept out harmful cosmic rays and shielded people from environmental factors that hasten ageing.
3. God gave people longer lives so they would have time to "fill the earth."

Answer 9

Genesis was written thousands of years before the invention of "Heaven" and "Hell." In Jewish belief 4,000 years ago, everyone who died went to a place called "Sheol," which was a boring and dismal eternity.
The reward for good behavior from God was a longer life BEFORE going to Sheol; the more holy you were, the longer God let you live. So reciting these people as having lives of hundreds of years was meant to demonstrate that they were very close to God.

Answer 10

The ancient people living in ancient times highly respect longevity. They somehow tend to link logevity with heaven, and thus with God himself. The bible writers were heavily influeced by such a popular belief. We today usually take the Genesis as the legend or imagiation of those people in that region. So take it literally, you will be OK.谢谢

Answer 11

people used to live longer in the past as they are closer to god, and they also didn't have a working calander, they don't go by our today's 7 day week, 4 week month and 365 day year and leap year, they go by a different way to count time, so they think they're 900 yrs old when they're like 90