Genesischapter 5
32 verses · Moses, by tradition · 15th to 13th century BC · The Law
Enoch walked with God, and then he was no more, because God had taken him away.
Introduction
Moses, by tradition, The Law, Genesis Overview.
This chapter was written for Israel, a nation that kept its identity by keeping its family records, and tradition gives it to Moses. It calls itself a written record and reads like one. It carries the line of the first man down ten generations to the man who would come through the flood. Its sentences follow a set pattern, and the pattern is the point. Listen for the clause that closes each life and for the two places where the pattern breaks. The ages are large, and the ancient copies of Genesis give them differently, which a reader should know before counting them.
Context
- Who
- Israel in the wilderness, a nation that held its identity by holding its genealogies
- What
- A genealogy of ten generations from Adam to Noah, each entry written in the same form.
- Where
- A written record; the chapter names no place.
- When
- Before any dated history; the Hebrew figures add up to about sixteen centuries from Adam to the flood, and the Samaritan and Greek texts give other totals.
- Why
- To show that the promise given in the garden was carried by named people through real generations to Noah, and that death came to every man in the line but Enoch.
Historical context
The chapter opens the second named section of the book, the book of the generations of Adam at Genesis 5:1, and it carries ten names from Adam to Noah. It says in its first line what kind of document it is.
Show the rest of the historical context, 4 more paragraphs
Ancient scribes kept lists of exactly this kind. Mesopotamia produced the Sumerian King List, which also runs a line of figures before a flood and gives them enormous reigns, with numbers reaching into the tens of thousands of years. The figures in Genesis are far smaller.
The formula repeats on purpose. A man lived so many years, he fathered, he lived more years, he had sons and daughters, and he died. The closing clause falls eight times and is the chapter's argument.
The Hebrew text, the Samaritan Pentateuch and the Greek Septuagint give different ages in this chapter, which is why careful chronologies of the period disagree with one another. The order of the names is the same in all three.
Two names break the pattern. Enoch walked with God and was taken, and Lamech names his son Noah with a hope of relief from the ground God had cursed, which is the first time in the book anyone looks ahead to that curse being lifted.
Significance
For Israel a genealogy served as title deed and as identity. This one told them that the promise made in the garden had been carried by named people through real generations to the man in the ark.
Show the rest of the significance, 1 more paragraph
In a list where every man dies, the one who walked with God and was taken stood as a mark that death held the last word over the others alone.
This chapter in Jewish lifeWhat this chapter is in Jewish life and reading.
What is done
This chapter is heard inside the opening portion of the annual cycle, which is read in one sitting and carries the reader from creation into the days of Noah (src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts). The list of ten generations is chanted as part of that reading. The card above carries the portion and the prophetic reading set beside it.
How it is read
The chapter is a genealogy, and the classical comment on it turns on two questions: why the years are so long, and what the record leaves out. Four voices stand in the corpus with their English text kept. Rashi is quoted from the public domain Rosenbaum and Silbermann edition. Radak is quoted from the CC-BY translation of Eliyahu Munk, HaChut Hameshulash, and Ramban from the CC-BY translation of Charles B. Chavel, 1971 to 1976.
Radak reads the line of Seth as the line of those born in the likeness of their father. He holds that the sons and daughters left unnamed were of another kind, and that this is why the descendants of Cain are not counted in this chapter (Radak on Genesis 5:2:2 and 5:4:1). Rashi reads the hundred and thirty years before Seth as years Adam lived apart from his wife (Rashi on Genesis 5:3:1, citing Genesis Rabbah 24:6). Radak gives a practical reason for the summing of the years at the end of each life. The total is written out "in order that the scribe should not make a mistake" (Radak on Genesis 5:5:1).
The long lives are the contested point, and the corpus carries the argument itself. Radak reports the ruling of Maimonides in the Guide for the Perplexed 2:47, that only the men named in this chapter lived so long (Radak on Genesis 5:4:1). Ramban sets himself against that ruling in plain words, calling it "words without substance" (Ramban on Genesis 5:4:1). His own account is physical. The first man was made in full strength, and the air was tainted by the flood, so the years fell away by degrees from Shem to Peleg to Abraham.
Ibn Ezra, Malbim and Sforno carry eight comments on this chapter that the corpus holds by reference alone, because the licence Sefaria reports for the English versions keeps the text out. They are Ibn Ezra on Genesis 5:1:1, 5:3:1, 5:22:1, 5:24:1 and 5:29:1, Malbim on Genesis 5:5:1 and 5:22:1, and Sforno on Genesis 5:22:1.
What the rabbis say
The walking of Enoch with God is where the Jewish reading of this chapter parts from the Christian one most sharply. Rashi reports that Enoch was righteous and easily turned, so God took him before his time and before he could go wrong (Rashi on Genesis 5:24:1 and 5:24:2). A Christian reader takes the same verse as a man carried to God without dying, which is the reading at Hebrews 11:5. This site sets the two readings side by side and names the holder of each.
Rashi carries three more sayings of the rabbis here. The son born to Lamech was named for building, and Rashi reports that the world was built up from him (Rashi on Genesis 5:28:1, citing Tanchuma 1:1:11). The comfort his father spoke of he reads as the plough. Until Noah came, people worked the ground with no tools, and he made them (Rashi on Genesis 5:29:1, same locator).
The third is the question of Rabbi Judan on why Noah fathered his sons at five hundred years, when the generations before him fathered sons at a hundred. Rashi reports the answer given: wicked sons would have perished in the flood and grieved their father, and righteous sons would have meant building more arks (Rashi on Genesis 5:32:1, citing Genesis Rabbah 26:2). On the order of the three names he reports that Japheth was the eldest. Shem is named first because he was righteous, was born circumcised, and was the father of the line of Abraham (Rashi on Genesis 5:32:2, citing Genesis Rabbah 26:3).
The corpus records forty places where the Midrash and the Talmud cite this chapter, thirty one under Midrash and nine under Talmud, with the locator for each one and no text. Bereshit Rabbati reads the line verse by verse, all of it in Parashat Bereshit. It reads the third verse at 88, the fifth at 23, the sixth at 27 and 82, and the seventh at 29 and 83. It reads the sixteenth at 71, the twenty fifth at 90 and the twenty seventh at 91. Bereshit Rabbah reads the second verse at 17:2, the fifth at 19:8, the eighteenth at 69:7 and the twenty fourth at 25:1. It reads the twenty ninth at 25:2 and 25:3, and the thirty second at 26:1.
Seder Olam Rabbah reads the death of Methuselah at 1:2, and Seder Olam Zutta the years of Enosh at 2:1. Sefer HaYashar reads the walking of Enoch at Bereshit 10, and Pesikta DeRav Kahana at 23:10. Midrash Tehillim reads the same verse at 9:8 and Midrash Tanchuma at Bamidbar 26:1.
The Talmud is cited at Avodah Zarah 5a:9 on the first verse, Berakhot 61a:14 on the second and Eruvin 18b and 18b:10 on the third. It is cited at Jerusalem Talmud Nazir 7:2:6 on the fifth verse and Sotah 11b:20 on the seventeenth. Avot DeRabbi Natan is cited at 31:3 and 2:5, and in its second recension at 8:6.
Sources: Rashi, Rashi on Genesis 5, in Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A. M. Silbermann, 1929 to 1934, public domain, about 1090; Radak, Radak on Genesis 5:2:1, 5:2:2, 5:3:1, 5:4:1 and 5:5:1, in HaChut Hameshulash, translated by Eliyahu Munk, CC-BY, about 1200; Ramban, Ramban on Genesis 5:2:1 and 5:4:1, in Commentary on the Torah, translated by Charles B. Chavel, 1971 to 1976, CC-BY, about 1270; Ibn Ezra, Malbim and Sforno, their eight comments on Genesis 5, cited by reference; the licence Sefaria reports for the English versions keeps the text out of the corpus; The Midrash and the Talmud, the forty locators on Genesis 5 in scripts/data/sources/sefaria/genesis/5.json; MannaFest, the annual cycle table at src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts, 2026.
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
From Adam Down to Jared
Genesis 5:1-2
the book of the generations of Adam: The heading opens a book of names. The first thing it says is that God made man in His own likeness, and that He created them male and female. He called them both by one name, man. The Hebrew is adam, the name of the first man and the word for mankind.
Genesis 5:1
“That there was a day in which God created man. He was not from eternity, but of yesterday; he was not the first-born, but the junior of the creation. That God made him in his own likeness, righteous and holy, and therefore, undoubtedly, happy.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
ConnectionsGenesis 11:10
and He blessed them: The blessing repeats 1:28, where God blessed the male and the female and told them to be fruitful and multiply. The sons and daughters of this chapter are that blessing carried out, under the sentence of death. Jerome noted that the name man covers both.
Genesis 5:2
“Adam had himself named the rest of the creatures, but he must not choose his own name, lest he should assume some glorious pompous title. But God gave him a name which would be a continual memorandum to him of the meanness of his original, and oblige him to look unto the rock whence he was hewn and the hole of the pit whence he was digged, Isa. li.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
in his own likeness: Adam was made in God's likeness, and his son is in Adam's own likeness and image. The wording shifts between verse 1 and verse 3, and Henry read the shift as the fall passing down through the family. What Adam had lost he could not hand on. The register passes over Cain and Abel and carries the line through Seth.
Genesis 5:3
“And Adam lived a hundred and thirty years, etc. - The Scripture chronology especially in the ages of some of the antediluvian and postdiluvian patriarchs, has exceedingly puzzled chronologists, critics, and divines. The printed Hebrew text, the Samaritan, the Septuagint, and Josephus, are all different, and have their respective vouchers and defenders. The following tables of the genealogies of the patriarchs before and after the flood, according to the Hebrew, Samaritan, and Septuagint, will at once exhibit the discordances.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Genesis 5:3
“This was Adam's own likeness, the reverse of that divine likeness in which Adam was made; but, having lost it himself, he could not convey it to his seed. Note, Grace does not run in the blood, but corruption does. A sinner begets a sinner, but a saint does not beget a saint.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Genesis 5:4-8
after he had become the father of Seth: Adam reached 930 years, longer than any man before him, and then he died. Seth became the father of Enosh, lived 807 years more, had other sons and daughters, then died. Romans 5:14 stands on these verses, where death reigned from Adam to Moses. The long years change nothing about the ending.
a total of 930 years: Adam's death carries out the word of 3:19. By the Hebrew numbers of this chapter he lived until Lamech, the father of Noah, was 56. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown saw these long lives as the means by which the knowledge of God was handed down.
Genesis 5:5
“Since we cannot obtain satisfactory evidence on these points, it is wise to resolve the fact into the sovereign will of God. We can, however, trace some of the important uses to which, in the early economy of Providence, it was subservient. It was the chief means of reserving a knowledge of God, of the great truths of religion, as well as the influence of genuine piety.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
When Seth was 105 years old: Jerome noted that where the Greek copies give a father two hundred and some years, the Hebrew gives one hundred and some, and Seth's 105 is one of these. Gill held that Seth had other sons and daughters before Enosh. The named son carries the line to Noah.
Genesis 5:6
“And Seth lived an hundred and five years, and begat Enos. Not that this was his firstborn, no doubt but he had other children before this time; but this is only mentioned, because it carried the lineage and descent directly from Adam to Noah, the father of the new world, and from whom the Messiah was to spring; whose genealogy to give is a principal view of this book, or account of generations from Adam to Noah.”
Seth lived 807 years: Each father had other sons and daughters, all unnamed. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown held that Moses gives only the line from Adam through Seth to Noah, leaving out the firstborn. That would explain fathers who were old at the birth of the named son.
Genesis 5:7
“And Seth lived, after he begat Enos, eight hundred and seven years,.... The Septuagint version makes the same mistake in the numbers of Seth as of Adam, giving him two hundred and five years before the birth of Enos, and but seven hundred and seven years after: and begat sons and daughters; very probably both before and after Enos was born; but how many is not said.”
1 more voice on this verse
Genesis 5:7
“Now notice that when the inspired writer sets forth the length of the lives of the men he mentions, the narrative always ends with the formula "and he begot sons and daughters, and all the time that so and so lived were so many years, and he died." Considering that these sons and daughters are not named and remembering how long people lived in that first period of our history, can anyone refuse to believe that so great a multitude of men was born as to have been able, in groups, to build a great number of cities?”
Augustine of Hippo · written before 430 · City of God 15.8patristic
a total of 912 years: By the Hebrew years, Seth died fourteen years before Noah's birth. The son given in place of Abel lived to see seven generations of his own line, from Enosh to Lamech. Matthew Henry called long life to these patriarchs a blessing that made them blessings.
Genesis 5:8
“The present life surely was not to them such a burden as commonly it is now, else they would have been weary of it; nor was the future life so clearly revealed then as it is now under the gospel, else they would have been impatient to remove to it: long life to the pious patriarchs was a blessing and made them blessings.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Genesis 5:9-14
When Enosh was 90 years old: The older commentators take the name Enosh to mean mortal or frail man. His son Kenan carries a name close to Cain's, and the two family lists share name after name: Enoch and Lamech stand in both, Methuselah beside Methusael, Jared beside Irad, Mahalalel beside Mehujael. Gill notes the overlap and leaves it standing. Enosh lived 905 years and Kenan 910, and both then died.
Genesis 5:9
“For it is the mark of a wise man to separate oneself from the pleasures of the flesh, to elevate the soul, and to withdraw from the body; for this is truly to recognize oneself as a human being. He who is called Enos in the Chaldean language is called, in Latin, homo.”
Ambrose of Milan · written before 397 · On Isaac and the Soul, Chapter Ipatristic
Enosh lived 815 years: After the birth of the named son, each of the first six fathers lived between 800 and 840 years, and Enosh lived 815. The ages at which they became fathers vary far more. Adam Clarke set the Hebrew, Samaritan and Septuagint years in tables.
Genesis 5:10
“And Enos lived, after he begat Cainan, eight hundred and fifteen years,.... The Septuagint version is seven hundred and fifteen; the hundred which is wanting is to be supplied from the preceding verse, which in that version has an hundred too much: and begat sons and daughters; others besides Enos, as very likely he had before he was born.”
a total of 905 years: Counted by the Hebrew numbers from creation, Enosh died in the year 1140, when Noah was 84. A grandson of Adam was still living in Noah's lifetime. Matthew Henry reckoned the flood year the same way, at 1656 years from the creation.
Genesis 5:11
“And all the days or Enos were nine hundred and five years, and he died.”
When Kenan was 70 years old: The ages at fatherhood fall through the first five entries, from Adam's 130 to Kenan's 70 and Mahalalel's 65. Jared breaks the run at 162. Gill read each named son as a link in the line from Adam to Noah, with older children left unnamed.
Genesis 5:12
“And Cainan lived seventy years, and begat Mahalaleel. Here the Septuagint version adds an hundred years, as before.”
Kenan lived 840 years: No father in the chapter lived longer after the named son than Kenan's 840 years. Luke 3:37 names him Cainan among the fathers of Jesus, back to Adam and God. Gill saw in the list the line toward the Messiah.
Genesis 5:13
“And Cainan lived, after he begat Mahalaleel, eight hundred and forty years,.... The Septuagint has seven hundred and forty, which, added to the years given him before, makes the same sum: and begat sons and daughters; as his progenitors did.”
a total of 910 years: Kenan died at 910, older than his father Enosh at 905, so the years of these men rise and fall unevenly. The shortening comes after the flood, in the line of Shem. Clarke tied these great ages to the days before the flood.
Genesis 5:14
“And all the days of Cainan were nine hundred and ten years, and he died. The Arabic writers (o) also commend him as a good ruler of his people; and at his death he charged them not to desert the holy mountain, and join themselves with Cain's posterity; and having appointed Mahalaleel, who they say was his eldest son, his successor, he died on the fourth day of the week, and the thirteenth of the month Cheziran, A. M.”
Genesis 5:15-20
When Mahalalel was 65 years old: Mahalalel is the fifth from Adam, Jared the sixth, and Enoch the seventh. Jude 14 names Enoch the seventh from Adam when he quotes his prophecy. The seventh from Adam in Cain's line is the other Lamech, who boasts at Genesis 4:23 of a man he killed. Luke 3 runs these same names backwards from Christ.
Genesis 5:15
“And Mahalaleel lived sixty and five years, and begat Jared. A hundred and sixty, according to the Septuagint version.”
Mahalalel lived 830 years: Mahalalel's sons and daughters go uncounted, and in 830 years one father's family could become a people. Genesis 6:1 describes that growth across the earth. Irenaeus traced how wickedness spread through the whole race of man.
Genesis 5:16
“And Mahalaleel lived, after he begat Jared, eight hundred and thirty years,.... Seven hundred and thirty, as the above version, still making the same mistake: and he begat sons and daughters; how many cannot be said.”
a total of 895 years: Mahalalel died at 895, the first man in the list to fall short of 900 years. Of later fathers, only Enoch and Lamech had fewer years. Matthew Henry held that these men found long life light to carry.
Genesis 5:17
“And all the days of Mahalaleel were eight hundred ninety and five years, and he died. He also is spoken well of by the Arabic writers (p) as a good governor, a pious man that walked in the way of righteousness; and when he died blessed his children, and adjured them by the blood of Abel, not to suffer any of theirs to descend from the mountain to the sons of Cain: according to Bishop Usher he died A. M. 1290. (p) Elmacinus, & Patricides in ib. p. 234.”
When Jared was 162 years old: Jared was 162 at Enoch's birth, the first age at fatherhood above Adam's 130. Methuselah at 187 and Lamech at 182 are older still. Bede took Enoch's place, seventh from Adam, as a figure of Christ's birth by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Genesis 5:18
“Enoch, in that he was engendered seventh in the line of descent from Adam, prefigured that the Lord would be conceived and born not in the usual way of mortal nature but by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
Bede · written before 735 · Homilies on the Gospels 2.15patristic
Jared lived 800 years: By the Hebrew numbers Jared was still alive when God took Enoch away at 365, and he outlived his son by 435 years. The father saw the son taken. Gill read that early removal as a mark of God's favour.
Genesis 5:19
“And Jared lived, after he begat Enoch, eight hundred years,.... And so, the Greek version, but the Samaritan is seven hundred and eighty five: and begat sons and daughters; in that time, as well as before; for it is not to be imagined in this, or either of the foregoing or following instances, that these sons and daughters were begotten after living to such an age, since it is plain at that age they died.”
a total of 962 years: Jared's 962 years are the second longest life in Scripture, behind his grandson Methuselah's 969. By the Hebrew numbers he died when Noah was 366. Adam Clarke called Methuselah's the longest life the Bible records.
Genesis 5:20
“And all the days of Jared were nine hundred sixty and two years, and he died.”
Enoch Walked with God
Genesis 5:21-24
When Enoch was 65 years old: The pattern breaks once. Enoch walked with God is said twice, at verse 22 and again at verse 24, and Genesis 41:32 says a doubled word is established by God. He was no more, and God had taken him away. Hebrews 11:5 says he was taken so that he never died.
Genesis 5:21
“THE three passages of Scripture which I have read are all the authentic information we have concerning Enoch. It would be idle to supplement it with the fictions of ancient commentators. Enoch is called the seventh from Adam, to distinguish him from the other Enoch of the line of Cain, who was the third from Adam. In the first Patriarchs God was pleased to manifest to men portions of His Truth in reference to true religion.”
Enoch walked with God 300 years: The walk is dated from Methuselah's birth, and Gill held that Enoch walked with God before it as well, and more closely after. The Greek version gives two hundred years here. Adam Clarke derived the name Enoch from a root meaning to instruct or to dedicate.
Genesis 5:22
“And Enoch walked with God, after he begat Methuselah, three hundred years,.... The Greek version is two hundred. He had walked with God undoubtedly before, but perhaps after this time more closely and constantly: and this is observed to denote, that he continued so to do all the days of his life, notwithstanding the apostasy which began in the days of his father, and increased in his.”
2 more voices on this verse
Genesis 5:22
“And Enoch walked with God - three hundred years - There are several things worthy of our most particular notice in this account: 1. The name of this patriarch; Enoch, from חנך chanack, which signifies to instruct, to initiate, to dedicate. From his subsequent conduct we are authorized to believe he was early instructed in the things of God, initiated into the worship of his Maker, and dedicated to his service.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Genesis 5:22
“The continuance of his religion: he walked with God three hundred years, as long as he continued in this world. The hypocrite will not pray always; but the real saint that acts from a principle, and makes religion his choice, will persevere to the end, and walk with God while he lives, as one that hopes to live for ever with him, Ps. civ. His glorious removal to a better world.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
a total of 365 years: Enoch's 365 years match the days of a year, and Gill called it a year of years. The span is less than half that of his fathers. This verse lacks the words and then he died, which close every earlier entry.
Genesis 5:23
“And all the days of Enoch were three hundred and sixty five years. A year of years, living as many years as there are days in a year; not half the age of the rest of the patriarchs: our poet (t) calls him one of middle age; though his being taken away in the midst of his days was not a token of divine displeasure, but of favour, as follows; see Psa 55:23. (t) Milton's Paradise Lost, B. 11. l. 665.”
God had taken him away: Every father before him lived and died, and Enoch was taken away instead. Wesley read it as the change of the saints at Christ's return. Elijah is taken with the same verb in 2 Kings 2.
Genesis 5:24
“Executing the priest's office is called walking before God, 1 Sam. ii. 30, 35 , and see Zech. iii. Enoch, it should seem, was a priest of the most high God, and like Noah, who is likewise said to walk with God, he was a preacher of righteousness, and prophesied of Christ's second coming.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 more voice on this verse
Genesis 5:24
“He was changed, as those saints shall be that will be found alive at Christ's second coming. Methuselah signifies, He dies, there is a sending forth, viz. of the deluge, which came the very year that Methuselah died. If his name was so intended, it was a fair warning to a careless world long before the judgment came.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
ConnectionsHebrews 11:5
Methuselah, Lamech, and Noah
Genesis 5:25-28
When Methuselah was 187 years old: Methuselah reached 969 years, longer than any man in Scripture, and then he died. He became the father of Lamech at 187 and lived 782 years more. The numbers put his death in the year of the flood, and Jamieson reads his name as a warning built into the family. The etymology is disputed.
Genesis 5:25
“And Methuselah lived an hundred and eighty and seven years, and beget Lamech. The Septuagint version is an hundred and sixty seven; the Samaritan only sixty seven; the same names were given to some of the posterity of Seth as were to those of Cain, as Lamech here, and Enoch before.”
Methuselah lived 782 years: By the Greek numbers Methuselah lived fourteen years after the flood, which Jerome called the famous question of all the churches. Gill gave 167 as the Greek age when Methuselah became the father of Lamech. By the Hebrew years, 187 and 782, he died in the flood year.
Genesis 5:26
“Like his namesake, however, he also spoke in numbers on occasion of the birth of Noah--that is, "rest" or "comfort" [Ge 5:29, Margin]. "The allusion is, undoubtedly, to the penal consequences of the fall in earthly toils and sufferings, and to the hope of a Deliverer, excited by the promise made to Eve.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
a total of 969 years: Gill passed on a Jewish explanation of why no man reached a thousand years: a thousand years is God's day, from Psalm 90:4. Adam Clarke added that even this longest life ends with the words then he died. No life in Scripture reaches a thousand.
Genesis 5:27
“And all the days of Methuselah were nine hundred and sixty nine years, and he died,.... This was the oldest man that ever lived, no man ever lived to a thousand years: the Jews give this as a reason for it, because a thousand years is God's day, according to Psa 90:4 and no man is suffered to arrive to that.”
1 more voice on this verse
Genesis 5:27
“The days of Methuselah were nine hundred sixty and nine years - This is the longest life mentioned in Scripture, and probably the longest ever lived; but we have not authority to say positively that it was the longest. Before the flood, and before artificial refinements were much known and cultivated, the life of man was greatly protracted, and yet of him who lived within thirty-one years of a thousand it is said he died; and the longest life is but as a moment when it is past.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
he had a son: Lamech had a son, and for once the name waits. Every earlier son is named in the verse of his birth, and Lamech names Noah with a saying of his own in verse 29. Gill held that Lamech spoke it by a spirit of prophecy.
Genesis 5:28
“And Lamech lived an hundred eighty and two years, and begat son. According to the Septuagint version he was an hundred and eighty eight years old; but according to the Samaritan version only fifty three; the name, of his son, begotten by him, is given in the next verse, with the reason of it.”
2 more voices on this verse
Genesis 5:28
“Enoch begot Methuselah, and Methuselah begot Lamech, and Lamech begot Noah (whose name means "relief" in Hebrew and Syriac).”
Ephrem the Syrian · written before 373 · COMMENTARY ON GENESIS 5.2.2patristic
Genesis 5:28
“The first words of the chapter are the title or argument of the whole chapter: it is the book of the generations of Adam; it is the list or catalogue of the posterity of Adam, not of all, but only of the holy seed who were the substance thereof ( Isa. vi. 13 ), and of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came ( Rom. ix.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Genesis 5:29-31
Lamech asks for comfort in the labor and toil of his hands. This is the second Lamech in Genesis, and the first had used his voice to boast of vengeance at 4:23. He names the boy Noah and dies five years before the flood. The comfort came in a form he never named.
Genesis 5:29
“And he called his name Noah,.... Which signifies rest and comfort; for rest gives comfort, and comfort flows from rest, see 2Sa 14:17, where a word from the same root is rendered "comfortable", and agrees with the reason of the name, as follows: saying, this same shall comfort us, concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground, which the Lord hath cursed; this he spake by a spirit of prophecy, foreseeing what his son would be, and of what advantage to him and his family, and to the world, both in things temporal and spiritual.”
1 more voice on this verse
Genesis 5:29
“This same shall comfort us - This is an allusion, as some think, to the name a Noah, which they derive from נחם nacham, to comfort; but it is much more likely that it comes from נח nach or נוח nuach, to rest, to settle, etc. And what is more comfortable than rest after toil and labor?”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Lamech lived 595 years: By the Hebrew numbers Lamech died five years before the flood. The father who asked for comfort from the cursed ground died before the waters rose, with his son 595 years old. Adam Clarke derived the name Noah from a word meaning rest.
Genesis 5:30
“And Lamech lived, after he begat Noah, five hundred ninety and five years,.... The Septuagint version is five hundred and sixty five; and the Samaritan version six hundred: and begat sons and daughters; of which we have no account.”
a total of 777 years: Apart from Enoch, Lamech lived the fewest years in the chapter, 777. Gill gave 753 for the Greek and 653 for the Samaritan, and held the Hebrew years safest, with the Targum of Onkelos agreeing. Methuselah and Noah outlived him.
Genesis 5:31
“And all the days of Lamech were seven hundred seventy and seven years, and he died. According to the Greek version, he lived but seven hundred and fifty three; and according to the Samaritan version, only six hundred and fifty three: but it is best and safest in these, and all the above numbers, to follow the original Hebrew, and the numbers in that, with which the Targum of Onkelos exactly agrees, written about the time of Christ; and these numbers were just the same when the two Talmuds were composed.”
After Noah was 500 years old: Eight men in this chapter lived and then died, and the chapter closes on Noah without that line. Shem is named first, though Genesis 10:21 calls Japheth the elder, and Clarke reads the order as the line the promise runs through. Genesis 10 divides the nations among these three names. Shem, Ham and Japheth carry the rest of the book.
Genesis 5:32
“Noah begat Shem, Ham, and Japheth - From Gen 10:21; 1Ch 1:5, etc., we learn that Japheth was the eldest son of Noah, but Shem is mentioned first, because it was from him, in a direct line, that the Messiah came. Ham was certainly the youngest of Noah’s sons, and from what we read, Gen 9:22, the worst of them; and how he comes to be mentioned out of his natural order is not easy to be accounted for.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Genesis 5:32
“Noah was five hundred years old: and . . . begat--That he and the other patriarchs were advanced in life before children were born to them is a difficulty accounted for probably from the circumstance that Moses does not here record their first-born sons, but only the succession from Adam through Seth to Abraham.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
How this psalm is built
The form: A genealogy carrying the lineage directly from Adam to Noah, which is the principal view of this book of generations, as Gill classes it.
The patterns in this chapter
| Device | What it does | Where to see it |
|---|---|---|
| The register's fixed formula | Each man is given in the same three clauses, his years before the son, his years after him with other sons and daughters, and his total followed by his death. Counted over the Berean text of Genesis 5 in the store, the death clause closes eight of the entries. John Gill walks the formula name by name and records the Septuagint and Samaritan figures against the Hebrew at each turn.John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763), on Genesis 5:4 to 5:31. | Genesis 5:5, Genesis 5:8, Genesis 5:11, Genesis 5:14, Genesis 5:17, Genesis 5:20, Genesis 5:27, Genesis 5:31 |
| The ten men walked in order | Counted over the Berean text of Genesis 5 in the store, the chapter walks ten men from Adam to Noah and then names Noah's three sons at its last verse, thirteen personal names in all. Matthew Henry reads the chapter as the list or catalogue of the posterity of Adam, carrying the holy seed rather than every descendant, and John Gill gives the reason for the selection, that this line runs from Adam to Noah and on to the Messiah.Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710, on Genesis 5:28. | Genesis 5:3, Genesis 5:32 |
| The line said twice of Enoch | The formula breaks at the seventh name. Counted over the Berean text in the store, the phrase that Enoch walked with God stands twice, at verse 22 and again at verse 24, and his entry closes with God taking him in place of the death clause. This site's published exposition sets the doubling beside Genesis 41:32, where a doubled word is established by God, and beside Hebrews 11:5.This site's published exposition of Genesis 5, the note at Genesis 5:21 to 24, when Enoch was 65 years old. | Genesis 5:22, Genesis 5:24 |
The debate over the numbers
9 more paragraphs on the patterns
Adam Clarke holds the question open. He records that the Hebrew, the Samaritan, the Septuagint and Josephus all differ, that each has its defenders, and he prints the tables rather than choosing between them. The strongest objection to leaving it open is that the chapter is a chain of arithmetic, and a reader who wants the years from Adam to the flood has to take one column.
John Gill takes the Hebrew. He holds it best and safest to follow the original in all these numbers, and he supports the choice with the agreement of the Targum of Onkelos and with the state of the figures at the time of the Talmuds. The strongest objection is that the Septuagint is the older surviving witness in Greek and that its differences are systematic, which is the pattern Clarke's tables show.
Jamieson, Fausset and Brown decline to account for the long lives at all and resolve the fact into the will of God, tracing its use rather than its cause. The objection is that this answers what the long lives were for and leaves the figures where it found them.
This site's published dossier for Genesis carries the same question under its own entry and sets two readings beside each other, the numbers taken as literal years sustained by conditions before the flood, and the numbers taken as carrying the significance that extended lifespans held in ancient king lists. The dossier settles neither.
The debate over the name Methuselah
Three of the pool's voices read the seventh patriarch's son's name as a prophecy. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown give the name as meaning that he dies and the sending forth, hold that Enoch gave it as a prophecy of the flood, and state that Methuselah is computed to have died in the year of that catastrophe (Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871, on Genesis 5:21). John Gill reports Bochart to the same effect, that the name says an emission of waters will be sent forth upon the earth when he dies, and he cites the heathen writer Eupolemus for the bare fact that Enoch had a son of that name. John Wesley states the reading plainly and adds that if the name was so intended it was a fair warning to a careless world long before the judgment came.
The strongest objection stands in this site's published exposition, which records the computation from the chapter's own figures and then states that the etymology of the name is disputed. A reading that rests on the sense of one Hebrew name carries only as much weight as that sense does.
The New Testament's use
This site's published exposition records four places. Jude 14 names Enoch the seventh from Adam when it quotes his prophecy, and the chapter's own order puts him seventh. Hebrews 11:5 says that Enoch was taken, which is the ending verse 24 gives him. Romans 5:14 says that death reigned from Adam to Moses, which is what the eight death clauses of this chapter record. Luke 3 runs these same names backwards from Christ, which is the use Gill gives as the reason the line was kept at all.
Keep studying
Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The form and classifications
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871, on Genesis 5:32; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763), on Genesis 5:6 and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710, on Genesis 5:28.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Bede, Homilies on the Gospels 2.15; Charles Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 1307: Enoch; Chuck Missler, The Book of Genesis; Irenaeus, The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching, Sections 18-19; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Hebrew Questions on Genesis; John Calvin, Commentary on Genesis; John Gill; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.