Genesis tells of people who lived very long lives. Methuselah was the oldest, living 969 years. This chart, and the following table, show each person in the family line from Adam to Abraham. The numbers are taken from Genesis 5 and Genesis 11. While some biblical genealogies are incomplete, listing only prominent people instead of every generation, this list reflects direct father/son relationships.
It’s worth mentioning that Adam was still alive when Methusaleh was born, that Methuselah was alive when Noah was born, and that Noah was alive when Abram (Abraham) was born. This means that Abraham might have sat on Noah’s lap and heard a retelling of first-hand accounts of the lives of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden. That would be amazing!
We can also tell that Noah’s son Shem was alive when Jacob married Rachel. Imagine hearing first-hand stories from the ark!
You can grab and drag this section left and right.
- Adam930 years
- Seth912 years
- Enosh905 years
- Kenan910 years
- Mahalel895 years
- Jared962 years
- Enoch365 years
- Methusaleh969 years
- Lamech777 years
- Noah950 years
- Shem600 years
- Arphaxad438 years
- Shelah433 years
- Eber464 years
- Peleg239 years
- Reu239 years
- Serug230 years
- Nahor148 years
- Terah205 years
- Abraham175 years
- Isaac180 years
- Jacob147 years
Here’s a simple list of the information above:
Name
Age at Son’s Birth
Lived For
Adam
130 years old
930 years
Seth
105 years old
912 years
Enosh
90 years old
905 years
Kenan
70 years old
910 years
Mahalel
65 years old
830 years
Jared
162 years old
962 years
Enoch
65 years old
365 years
Methusaleh
187 years old
** 969 years
Lamech
182 years old
777 years
Noah
502 years old *
950 years
Shem
100 years old
600 years
Arphaxad
35 years old
438 years
Shelah
30 years old
433 years
Eber
34 years old
464 years
Peleg
30 years old
239 years
Reu
32 years old
239 years
Serug
30 years old
230 years
Nahor
29 years old
148 years
Terah
70 years old
205 years
Abram (Abraham)
100 years old
175 years
Isaac
60 years old
180 years
Jacob
147 years
* Noah’s age at Shem’s birth isn’t listed directly, but is calculated this way:
- Noah was 600 years old during the flood (Genesis 7:6).
- Noah’s son Shem was 100 years old when his son Arphaxad was born, 2 years after the flood (Genesis 11:10).
- When Arphaxad was born, Noah was 602 and Shem was 100. That means Noah was 502 when Shem was born.
Why Stop There?
This list ends with Jacob because the next in line is Joseph, whose details are not explicitly laid out in Scripture.
** The Death of Methusaleh
If you do the math, it appears that Methusaleh died in the year of the flood. That leaves us with a couple of options: we can believe that he died before the flood, or that he died in the flood. The Bible doesn’t tell us about his death, so we have no strong evidence either way.
One Jewish source says he died just before the flood. That’s plausible.
Another says he died 14 years after the flood, but I’m not sure how they did that math… or why they would make the claim, when Scripture indicates he wasn’t in the ark.
Another tradition says specifically that he died 7 days before the flood, and that God delayed the flood for a period of mourning due to Methusaleh’s righteousness. More specifically, another tradition says that he died on the 11th day of the Hebrew month of Cheshvan (October-November), just before the flood. These two traditions may be related.
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Hi. I’m a seminary student. I wondered what your thoughts were on the Historical Adam. What is your view of genome science?
Thanks.
Hey Rose! I’m happy to hear that you’re in seminary. How are things going? What’s your favorite part so far, and what do you enjoy the least?
Historical Adam, eh? Hmmm.
We have two choices:
There’s a LOT that could be said about this, and is. I’m not sure I can give a thorough response at this time. Still:
My first reaction is that the ‘quest for the historical Adam’ is similar to the ‘quest for the historical Jesus,’ in which people who claim to believe in God and trust the Bible deny that miracles are possible, forcing them to reframe what they read in the Bible to accommodate their doubts. This first reaction of mine is admittedly simplistic. That’s what often happens with first reactions, right?
I would suggest that this simplistic reaction is accurate, though. I’m not aware of anything in the Bible that directly suggests that Moses’ account of the beginning of the universe and humanity is symbolic, metaphorical, truncated by ignorance, or anything else. Were there some Scriptural warrant for reading the creation account as metaphor, I would consider it carefully. Instead, every indication we have is that the people and writers of Scripture spoke of Adam and the creation as if they were literal. While I recognize that really, really ancient Hebrew is difficult to translate, and while I recognize that we understand more details about biology and cosmology than our predecessors, I also recognize that Jesus Himself spoke of Adam in literal terms. One can read his words as if they were metaphor, or parable… but nothing in His actual words suggest that’s the best explanation.
Paul, of course, used Adam to explain our fall and need for redemption. He could have been using Adam as a metaphor for the human condition… but where else in Scripture do we see that kind of abstraction? We see metaphors as parallels all over the place, but I can’t think of any off the top of my head that abstract at that level. That seems like a modern way of thinking, which makes it unlikely that the writers of Scripture employed it as a method.
Then you have this: https://godwords.org/timeline-from-adam-to-abraham/. Recently, because I was interested, I put the people in the genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 into a graph format. I believe that many such listings are truncated, skipping over one or many who weren’t considered noteworthy… but these passages seem very specifically a generation-by-generation account of fathers and sons. Without a historical Adam, these genealogies are meaningless at best, and misleading at worst. By doubting Adam’s historicity, we don’t solve anything… we only push the question forward a generation. If Adam wasn’t real, was Seth? Was Enosh? What about Kenan, or Mahalel, Jared or Enoch? At what point do we end up with a real, historical person?
I find such discussions very interesting. Unfortunately, we don’t have an iron-clad argument either way… but the implications of a non-historical Adam are, for me, untenable.
I’m interested in hearing what you think, and what your professors think. Thanks for asking!
Hi Tony, could you clarify Genesis 25 : 7 These are the days of the years of Abraham’s life, 175 years – instead of 335 years stated above, thanks!
NP Yeo:
Wow… thanks! I made a mistake. The code that made this chart is pretty complex, and I simply wrote in the wrong number. With your help, it’s been fixed. Is there anything I can do for you?
METHUSELAH HAD TO DIE THE YEAR OF THE FLOOD, HIS NAME WAS A PROPHECY IN ITSELF, WHICH MEANT, “AFTER HIM, IT SHALL COME”, THE FLOOD WOULD NOT COME UNTIL METHUSELAH DIED. ACCORDING TO SOME SOURCE, HE DIED 10 DAYS BEFORE THE FLOOD.
Jermaine:
Do you have any evidence that your words are true? I’ve not seen any. In fact, no Hebrew language source I can find suggests that Methusaleh means anything like “after him, it shall come.”
For a meaning of the name Methuselah, Jones’ Dictionary of Old Testament Proper Names reads מות (mut) for the first part and translates the whole name with When He Is Dead It Shall Be Sent. NOBSE Study Bible Name List and BDB Theological Dictionary both read מת (mat) for the first part; NOBSE translates the whole name with Man Of A Javelin; BDB proposes Man Of The Dart.
Srscotty:
Do you have any information that leads you to conclude which translation is most accurate?
Tony,
Your reply to Rose is interesting. Question – when was all of this dialogue written? There are no dates. Is this recent or from 5 years ago. (I’m writing on January 2nd, 2023).
I, like Rose, am also a seminary student, working on a PhD in Biblical Studies and I am currently planning to write a dissertation on a topic related to this. I happened to be an old-earth creationist that also believes in a historical Adam that was created by God as an adult anywhere between 10,000 and 100,000 years ago (which is still extremely young and unacceptable to atheist and those that believe we evolved from a common ancestor of other modern primates and mammals.)
I found your website while looking for material to start my research (I really haven’t started yet!) I will look around and see what else you have and if can lead me to some solid academic and/or archaeological material.
Thanks,
–Fuller
Fuller: welcome! Thanks for writing. My comment is from November 2021. The dates are there but, as most theological content is evergreen, dates are often a distraction. On this, not as much… considering recent public conversations about the topic.
I’m also an old-earth creationist who believes in a real Adam and Eve. I’d guess it’s closer to 100,000 than 10,000, but have no way of knowing beyond simple things like the existence of objects of worship in archaeology. I find Darwinian evolution pretty silly, to be honest. Let me know if there’s anything I can do for you… and I wish you well in your studies! I’d love to read your dissertation, if possible. Keep in touch!
Nice chart. (the second one stills shows Abram living 335 years, btw) I’m wondering about the age of Terah when Abram was born. Gen 11:26 is not conclusive, but you seem to accept that Terah was 70 when Abram was born. But Abram left Haran after Terah died at the age of 205. (Acts 7:4) Abram was 75 at that time according to Gen 12:4, when he should have been at least 130. I have not yet seen a good solution to this. The best explanation I’ve come across is that Abram’s oldest brother Haran was born when Terah was 70, and Abram was born 55 years later. Not terribly convincing. Do you know of a better resolution?
Thanks again for catching my 335 mistake, Anders! I’ve fixed it (again).
One might assume that the listing in Genesis 11 is chronological, from first-born to last: Abram, Nahor, and Haran. However: in Genesis 5, Japheth is the oldest but Shem is named first. A better assumption would be that the one named first is the one through whom the Messiah would come. Both fit this pattern. If Abram wasn’t the firstborn, there’s room for the math to fit. We don’t know who was the oldest, in what years of Terah’s life each was born, etc.
Terah lived to be 205. Abram left at age 75, right after Terah died, so it looks like he would have been born when his father was 130 years old. I haven’t changed the number on the chart because it’s speculative. I’m not sure we can be more precise with confidence, so I left the number 70 from Genesis 11.
What do you think?
Yes, Gen 11:26 has evidently created confusion and speculation, even long before Stephen asserted that Abram left Haran “when his father was dead”. Anyone who wants to study this question can find plenty of material online. I don’t believe that this is the kind of “foolish questions about genealogy” that Paul warns Titus about. It is healthy for Christians to wrestle with texts that could cause people to question the inerrancy of the Bible.
I wish Gen 11:26 were more precise. But the best explanation seems to be that Abram was the youngest of the three brothers, and he was born when his father was 130, not 70 years old. The options are that Stephen was mistaken, or that a copyist slipped up and changed the original number in Genesis.
It seems that’s the best explanation. We agree about Titus: wrestling with the text isn’t the same as endless speculation, which is often a substitute for serious study. Have a great day!
Good job! Thank you.
Fuller, Adam was not created 100,000 years ago, not even 10,000 years ago, as we have the chronological age of those decedents of Adam who lived before and after the flood. Most theologians agree that from this, that from Adam to Christ is about 4,000 years give or take a couple of years. We also know that Christ lived about 2,000 years ago from our day, so we are now almost 6,000 years combined, from Adam.
Thomas:
I hope Fuller replies on his own but, as we share the view, I’ll respond. While this section of genealogy (Genesis 5 and 11) appears complete, that’s not necessarily the case for each list in Scripture. The reason some think it’s been 6000 years and not far longer? Typically, it’s because in 1650 James Ussher published his calculations, putting the time and date of creation as 6pm on October 22, 4004 BC.
Ussher’s calculations – like other calculations from the time – were based primarily on the idea that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years is like one day. While that’s a biblical phrase, the assumption that it’s a mathematical formula may go too far. After all, the verse (2 Peter 3:8) refers to Psalm 90: A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night. If we’re to take that literally, we should probably take these other phrases from the Psalm literally as well:
If we do take the Scriptures literally in this case, we have to ask: which is it? Is a thousand years like a day, or like a watch in the night? Seems the three watches are about 4 hours each. If a day is 24 hours and a night watch is 4, imagine how far off the calculations would be by choosing the wrong multiple!
Given that the chronological records in Scripture are obviously truncated, even conservative theologians like BB Warfield concluded that such calculations are highly speculative. Ussher was apparently an amazing man, a true scholar, and someone to be admired for a number of reasons, but it should be clear that his work in this area has not been established as fact in any sense. Disagreeing with Ussher’s conclusions and methodology shouldn’t be considered a problem.
An example might be useful. The kingdom of Egypt was, obviously, established after the flood. Egyptian chronology appears to go back to around 3000 BC, while Ussher’s date for the flood was 2348 BC. Both can’t be right… and, at a scale of 6000 years total, 600 years isn’t a minor adjustment. The relevant question is whether Egypt’s timeline is more reliable than Ussher’s. In his calculations, Ussher used historical records of kings heavily, as we do today… but he failed to account for things like overlapping reigns by fathers and sons, the use of different calendars, and how to calculate the year that a king took power. Archaeology has helped in this, from finding King Ahab Shalmaneser’s account of the Battle of Qarqar to the Black Obelisk describing King Jehu. Fascinating stuff.
In the end I don’t believe the exact age of the universe and the earth are relevant to whether the Bible is fully trustworthy, whether the gospel is true, and so on. These are details that modern folks worry about, perhaps as a distraction from the point of it all. In the words of Solomon: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the duty of all mankind.
We can differ on the exact age of the earth. But one thing that is certain is that all of mankind descended from two individuals. Genetic scientists have now discovered that this is the case. And Paul’s reasoning in the Book of Romans would otherwise be incomprehensible.
Anders:
With respect, genetic scientists haven’t quite gotten there. We have the theories of ‘Mitochondrial Eve’ and ‘Y Chromosomal Adam,’ but most estimates for when they might have lived don’t come close to matching up. M-Eve doesn’t necessarily point to a real Eve, either… only to the single common female ancestor of current populations. When an older family group dies out, the M-Eve designation would move to a younger common ancestor. There’s nothing in the theory that suggests a single ancestor for all humanity. An apt image might include (for example) 10 females, with lineage from 9 of them dying out, or having a broken chain of female descendants. Y-Adam is the male analog, and we face the same difficulties in trying to appropriate them as the Adam and Eve in Genesis.
I believe God created the first two humans as described in Genesis, so yeah: the rest of Scripture strongly supports the idea. We can’t escape or ignore the implications of the Hebrew used in Genesis, though. It does leave a bit of room for a different interpretation.
Thanks for your thoughtful response. It’s true that scientists haven’t gotten as far as I indicated… yet. But if Adam and Eve are historical figures, then Science will eventually confirm that. The main difficulty is that most geneticists are firmly committed to another paradigm. For some, virtually no amount of evidence will ever induce them to revise their preferred premiss.
(Humor alert) I’ve always felt that Methusaleh died 1 of 2 ways: (1) (Noah): “Grandpa, bring me that bucket of pitch, would ya please?” (2) (Methusaleh): “NOAH, I DON’T KNOW WHAT THIS STUFF FALLING ON MY HEAD IS, BUT YOU LET ME IN RIGHT NOW!!”
Jim Ray
Thanks for the information. It’s very interesting to see who was alive at the same time and who died before who (Abraham dying before Shem and Eber were eye-openers for me).
Regarding the story of Methuselah living for 14 years after the flood, it comes from the Septuagint (“LXX”) Greek version of the old testament. This is in fact one of the clues that suggest that the LXX is incorrect, and the Masoretic (Jewish version of the OT) is the correct version. I’ll probably attract the wrath of the LXX-only people in saying what I just said, but I’ll attract even more in what I’ll say next: the story about the LXX being translated into Greek by seventy Jewish elders, and all of the versions being identical is false. It was actually translated by a heretic Jewish teacher and he got various things wrong, especially with regard to the genealogical details, as he also used the Samaritan Pentateuch, which gets the genealogical details wrong. In saying that, I’ll be attracting the ire of the Samaritans, LXX-only people, and the Greek Orthodox, but the facts are the facts and Methuselah couldn’t have lived until after the flood because he wasn’t on the Ark, and nobody outside the ark survived the flood. Any other opinion would make the Bible false.
I hope that helps to shed some light on where the story came from.