Genesis11chapter 11

Genesis 11:10-11

This is the account of Shem: This is the fifth of the eleven accounts, and it narrows the field to one line out of Shem. Arphaxad is born two years after the flood, so the line is counted from the flood and reaches back behind the tower. Shem lived 500 years after that and had other sons and daughters.

Shem lived 500 years: after Arphaxad was born, so by the Hebrew numbers of this chapter he was still alive when Abram was born. John Gill reckons from the same figures that Shem was younger than Japheth. His other sons stand in the table at 10:22.

Genesis 11:12-15

When Arphaxad was 35 years old: The list keeps the shape of Genesis 5 and drops its refrain. Every man in Genesis 5 ended with and then he died, and no death is recorded here. The ages at fatherhood fall too, from a hundred and more in Adam's line to 35 years for Arphaxad and 30 for Shelah. Chapter 10 named Arphaxad among the sons of Shem, and here Shelah became the father of Eber.

Arphaxad lived 403 years: Arphaxad lived 438 years, and Gill notes that the Latin gives the 403 years as 303. He also passes on the report of a Jewish writer, Rabbi Gedaliah, that the city of Babel was begun in the years of Arphaxad. The tower then stands in this line of Shem.

When Shelah was 30 years old: Shelah became a father five years younger than Arphaxad had, as John Gill observes. Bede notes that the Greek translation of the seventy has one hundred and thirty years here, adding a century to the age. The Greek adds it again at Eber, Peleg and Serug.

Shelah lived 403 years: Shelah lived 433 years in all, and his other sons and daughters leave no further record in Scripture, as John Gill notes. Gill passes on a Jewish chronologer's claim that Shelah died in the fourteenth year of Jacob. Several of these fathers were alive in Abram's day.

Genesis 11:16-19

When Eber was 34 years old: Eber lived 464 years in all, and his son Peleg 239. The lifespan halves in one generation, and it keeps falling down the rest of the list. Abram is called Abram the Hebrew at 14:13, and the word is drawn from Eber's name. The line runs Eber to Peleg to Reu.

Eber lived 430 years: John Gill names one of these other children from 10:25, Joktan, whose sons fill the list of peoples after him in chapter 10. Matthew Henry notes that Eber outlived every man born after the flood, and he suggests it was the reward of his piety. The promised line runs through Peleg.

When Peleg was 30 years old: Peleg's name is explained at 10:25, where the earth was divided in his days. The Book of Jubilees opens its account of the tower with Peleg's marriage and the birth of his son, so it sets Babel in this generation. Reu is that son.

Peleg lived 209 years: Among the other sons and daughters, Arabic writers cited by John Gill named Melchizedek the priest as a son of Peleg. Gill also reports a Jewish chronicler who puts Peleg's death in the forty-eighth year of Abraham. Scripture itself names none of these children.

Genesis 11:20-26

When Reu was 32 years old: The years keep falling, Reu at 239, Serug at 230 and Nahor at 148. Ten generations run from Shem to Abram here, matching the ten from Adam to Noah in Genesis 5. Abram is named first of Terah's three sons. Adam Clarke reads that order as one of dignity, the place Genesis keeps giving the chosen son.

Reu lived 207 years: Reu's son Serug gives his name, by John Gill's account, to a town called Sarug near Haran in Mesopotamia. The servant of chapter 24 travels to the city of Nahor in the same country. The family's names are also its map.

When Serug was 30 years old: Serug's son Nahor is Abram's grandfather, and John Gill notes that Terah gave the same name to one of his own sons at verse 26. The family passed names down the line. The younger Nahor stays in Mesopotamia, and Rebekah comes from his house in chapter 24.

Serug lived 200 years: Serug lived 230 years. Gill passes on the report of eastern writers that other gods were first served in his years and the city of Damascus became a kingdom then. The land of Haran and Ur held that worship, and Terah became the father of Abram in it.

When Nahor was 29 years old: Nahor fathers Terah at 29, the youngest age in the list. John Gill names Terah as the first father of this line of Shem to fall away to idolatry. The line blessed in Shem at 9:26 reaches an idolater two generations before the call.

Nahor lived 119 years: Nahor lived 148 years. Henry traces the years falling down this list to the seventy or eighty years Moses gives in Psalm 90, and he says God shortened them as the earth filled with people. After Nahor only Terah lived 200 years.

When Terah was 70 years old: Terah lived 205 years and Abram left Haran at seventy-five, so Abram was born when Terah was 130, and Clarke reads the 70 years as Terah's age when Haran was born. Haran was the father of Lot and the eldest. Bede notes that here the Greek years agree with the Hebrew.

Genesis 11:27-28

This is the account of Terah: The sixth account is the narrowest so far, down from the nations of chapter 10 to Terah's household in one town. Lot arrives as an orphan and stays with Abram. Haran is the first man in this list said to die, and he died in his father's lifetime, in Ur of the Chaldeans. Jerome passes on a Hebrew tradition that read Ur as fire and told of Abraham delivered out of it, and he reports it as their story.

Haran died in his native land: Bede reads during his father Terah's lifetime as time and presence together, so Haran died in his father's sight. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown place Ur at Orfa and take the name as light or fire. Fire worship was practised there.

Genesis 11:29-30

Abram and Nahor took wives for themselves: The wives are named, Sarai and Milcah, and then the account halts on one flat line: Sarai was barren; she had no children. That sentence stands one verse before the promise at 12:2 to make Abram a great nation. She waits twenty-five years for Isaac. Rebekah waits at 25:21 and Rachel at 29:31, and every generation of the line arrives late.

Sarai was barren: Aben Ezra, as Gill reports, knew some who said Abram was the one who could have no children, and he answered from Ishmael and the sons of Keturah. Bede reads Sarai, barren in her youth and a mother in old age, as a figure of the Church. The promise waits on her.

Terah took his son Abram: Terah is the one who takes the family out, and Abram goes here as his son. They set out from Ur for Canaan and settle in Haran. Stephen says at Acts 7:2 that God appeared to Abraham in Mesopotamia before he lived in Haran, which puts the call back in Ur. Joshua 24:2 says Terah served other gods, so the household setting out for Canaan was an idolatrous one.

Terah lived 205 years: The first man in Genesis to set out for Canaan dies short of it, at the place where he stopped. Terah lived 205 years and died in Haran. Hebrews 11:13 says of all of them that they died in faith, without receiving what was promised. Chapter 12 lays the same road on the son as a command.