Geneology and Genesis

Genesis 5

Right away, we’re back to calling God….God, similar to Genesis 1, and varying from the Lord God title in Genesis 2-4. Under the Documentary Thesis, Chapter 5 of Genesis is believe to have been written by a redactor who combined and edited the contributions of two other authors.

This is a key chapter for Young Earth Creationists, it is the geneology in this chapter that forms part of the foundation for their calculations into the age of the earth.

Chapter 5 identifies a second Lamech as the father of Noah. The Lamech of Chapter 5 is a very different sort of person from the Lamech in Chapter 4. Lamech of Cain’s lineage initiated polygamy, boasted of murdering other people, and pretty much laughed in God’s face. Lamech of Chapter 5 gave birth to the great ark builder.

Pre-flood humans lived an unbelievably long time! 900 years on average. If I was to take that for truth (which I once did), you’d have to wonder at the amazing quality of life people had back then.

I had a bit of fun playing around with at the Family Echo genealogy website, to create a family tree for Noah.

Noah's Family Tree, According to Genesis 5. 

With such a short chapter, I also decided to do a bit of research into the names mentioned in Genesis 5. The Ancient Hebrew Research Center website came in quite handy for this purpose. 

I started with Methuselah (son of Enoch--the one that "walks with God", father of Lamech, grandfather of Noah), solely because it is rather unique, and I like the way it rolls off the tongue. 

Until I discovered I was completely wrong in my pronunciation. Instead of a "th" sound, as in "three", it is pronounced "tu", as in "meh-tu-sheh-lach". Thinking of the little Hebrew that I know, that does make sense. The name is a combination of two words, metu and shelahh, and means "man of the dart". 

Other names and their Hebrew origins:

Noah - "rest". Of course, our English understanding of rest is not quite the same as the ancient Hebrew. In this instance, a close approximation of the true meaning is something along the lines of to lead to a rest.

Lamech - According to the Ancient Hebrew Research Center, this is one of those words whose meaning has been lost over time. In other words, who knows!

Enoch - "dedicated" and is derived from the very root meaning "to dedicate".