Chapter Five

The genealogy of the Sethites.

Genesis 5:1–2. This is the genealogy of Adam: This is the heading of an entire new section (toldoth), like the preceding one (Gen 2:4) and a whole series of those following it (Gen 10:1). Translating this heading of the history of the Sethites into the language of modern concepts, we should say: “this is a listing of Adam’s descendants.” And since further the account is concerned only with the Sethites, it is clear that this listing concerns not all, but only the nearest descendants, related to him not so much in flesh as in spirit. when God created man, in the likeness of God he made him, male and female he created them, and blessed them, and called their name Man, in the day of their creation. As he begins the enumeration of descendants, the writer does not without purpose mention the creation of the founder and his wife in the image of God. Perhaps he wanted to suggest to the reader that the enumerated descendants of Adam derive their lineage through him, as if from God Himself; that God, who created Adam in His image and likeness, is, as it were, the first member of the genealogy (Luke 3:38), (Visarion).

Genesis 5:3. Adam lived one hundred thirty [] years In presenting the genealogical table itself, the biblical author, beginning with Adam, maintains the same order throughout: having named a certain patriarch, he indicates his age at the moment when the next member of the genealogy was born, then determines the number of years of this patriarch’s remaining life, sums up the total of his longevity, and concludes all of this with mention of his death. In some chronological dates, mainly in those concerning the birth of a son to one or another patriarch, there is a disagreement between the Russian and Slavonic texts, arising from the difference between the Hebrew and Greek Bibles. This difference is, in all likelihood, of accidental origin (introduced by some translator or scribe) and in any case has no serious significance for the substance of faith, clearly proving only the evident truth that the Bible has no precise chronology, and what is present is fairly conditional and relative, and, at least in some of its sections, was probably added to it later. Another, even more important question relating to this antediluvian genealogy is the question of the astonishing longevity of its members, reaching almost a thousand years. In opposition to the tendentiousness and groundlessness of rationalistic attempts to undermine faith in patriarchal longevity, its recognition has a whole series of real proofs. In its favor speaks, first of all, the fact of the previous paradise immortality of man: although through the Fall man lost this divine gift, yet the infection of death could only gradually destroy the primitive robustness of his organism. The analogy of the patriarchal period with childhood of humanity also testifies to this: the patriarchal-antediluvian period was a kind of epoch of infancy in the life of humanity, that is, a time of special richness, wholeness, productivity, and freshness of all its spiritual and physical powers. The justice of this is confirmed to a considerable degree by a whole series of parallel traditions of other ancient peoples, recorded by Egyptian priest Manetho, Phoenician—Moho, Chaldean—Berossus, and others. Finally, an important confirmation, and at the same time the best explanation of the fact of patriarchal longevity, is the evident action of divine Providence, accomplishing through it high religious aims: the preservation of religious truth, the spread of the human race, and the establishment of the fundamental elements of religion, morality, and culture (for more details see I. Spassky, “Biblical Chronology,” Plastov, “Sacred Chronicle,” and A. Pokrovsky, “Biblical Teaching on Primitive Religion”). and begot a son in his own likeness, in his own image, and named him Seth. These words rather expressively establish the innate quality of fundamental spiritual and physical properties of human nature; in virtue of this, to the descendants of Adam passed both the features of the image of God laid in his nature, and the properties of that sinful resemblance which darkened this divine image in the act of the Fall (Gen 1:26; Rom 5:12).

Genesis 5:4. And the days of Adam after he begot Seth were eight hundred [] years, and he had other sons and daughters. The Bible names three sons of Adam and Eve by name and one daughter—supposedly the wife of Cain (Gen 4:17); but apart from these, as is evident from the stated words, they probably had other sons and, certainly, more daughters, who are not mentioned here because they had no essential significance in the history of God’s economy. We have similar accounts regarding the families of other patriarchs of this genealogy (Gen 5:7-26, etc.), from which once more we are convinced that this genealogy does not represent a complete list of all Sethite families, but marks only chosen persons, somehow particularly distinguished in the history of human salvation.

Genesis 5:9. Enosh lived ninety [] years and begot Kenan. Philological analysis of this patriarch’s name reveals the identity of its meaning with the name “Cain,” that is, “acquisition, possession”; and this, of course, casts no unfavorable shadow on this godly Sethite, since even the name Cain itself, according to the idea it contains, was significant and bright (Gen 4:1).

Genesis 5:12. Kenan lived seventy [] years and begot Mahalalel. which in translation means: “praise, glory to God, or one who praises, glorifies Him.” In this way, it indicates, obviously, the flourishing of religious interests during Kenan, son of Enosh—the first organizer of the service of God, in which a prominent place was occupied by the solemn calling upon and glorification of the Creator (Gen 4:26), the Providence of the world, and the Redeemer of humanity.

Genesis 5:15. Mahalalel lived sixty-five [] years and begot Jared. Originating from the Heb. verb jarad—meaning “to descend, to go down,” the name of this new patriarch points to him as a man “descending, going down, falling.” Retaining both the literal and figurative sense of this word, we are justified in supposing that here there is mention both of the physical descent of the Sethites from some height, and of their moral decline. Since the generation of Jared, fifth from Adam through Seth, was contemporary with the generation of Lamech, fifth from Adam through Cain, and since, on the other hand, there is a tradition that the Sethites originally lived on heights, while the Cainites in low valleys, then it is not without plausibility that the Sethites, captivated in the age of Jared by the beauty of the contemporary Cainite women (headed by the beautiful Naamah, Gen 4:22), descended from their heights into the valleys of the Cainites, entered into sinful unions with them, and thereby fell morally. This opinion, originating from philology, is supported also by ancient Jewish tradition, recorded, among other places, in the Book of Enoch.

Genesis 5:18. Jared lived one hundred sixty-two years and begot Enoch. The name of this patriarch, already known to us from the genealogy of the Cainites, points to its bearer as a renewer, founder, sanctifier—in a word, something new and, as a firstfruit, dedicated to God. But while Enoch the Cainite was the beginning of worldly power and cultural dominion (expressing itself in the building of a city bearing his name), Enoch the Sethite, by contrast, showed himself to be a typical representative of primitive faith, hope, and godliness—in a word, all that is united in the concept of the Old Testament “righteousness.”

Genesis 5:21. Enoch lived sixty-five [] years and begot Methuselah. In the literal translation from the Hebrew, this name, according to the opinion of authoritative Hebraists, means: “man of the spear, man of weapons.” Since, according to the more probable calculation, Methuselah died in the very year of the flood, they find it possible to see in his name a symbolic foreannouncement of his death from this spear of divine wrath, that is, from the flood. And this is all the more probable, since Methuselah’s father—the righteous Enoch, according to the words of the Apostle Jude (Jude 1:14-15), prophesied concerning the flood, and, consequently, in the spirit of this foresight, could easily have given a corresponding name to his son.

Genesis 5:22. And Enoch walked with God A similar expression occurs repeatedly in the Bible (Gen 6:9; Mic 6:8; Mal 2:6, etc.) and everywhere it means the highest degree of the moral direction of a man’s life, when he has become deeply permeated with a reverent feeling of divine omnipresence, which he sees with the eyes of faith as it were constantly before him, and in strict accordance with this directs the entire pattern of his behavior and each step of his life. This expression is even somewhat broader—namely, it contains a hint also of the consequences of such righteous conduct, in the form of a special and exceptional closeness to God, as is also transmitted in the Slavonic text: “and pleased Enoch was... to God,” as well as the Apostles Paul (Heb 11:5) and Jude (Jude 1:14).

The godliness of Enoch and his being taken alive to heaven

Genesis 5:24. And Enoch walked with God; and he was not, because God took him. “And he was not found” (Septuagint, Slavonic)—Enoch, that is, he did not absolutely perish, but mysteriously disappeared from among men. Already this very departure of the biblical author from his usual manner of speaking of the death of patriarchs shows that the end of Enoch’s earthly life did not resemble the death of other patriarchs, was not, therefore, ordinary. The further words of the text “because God took him” reveal precisely this thought, although perhaps not sufficiently fully and clearly; turning for clarification of this phrase to biblical parallels, we find that they are literally repeated again concerning the prophet Elijah (2 Sam 2:11), from whose history it is positively known that he was wonderfully taken alive to heaven. The same thing, according to the interpretation of the Apostle Paul, happened earlier with Enoch (Heb 11:5; cf. Sir 49:16). Presumably, for this reason, in the Sacred Scripture Elijah and Enoch are presented together, as forerunners of the awesome second coming of the Lord to the earth (Rev 11:3, cf. Matt 17:11; Mark 9:12; Luke 9:8). This understanding of Enoch’s end fully corresponds moreover to the context, where this end is presented as a reward to the righteous man for his godliness; since death is “the wages of sin” (Rom 6:23), and Enoch through his “walking with God” sufficiently atoned for his guilt, he passes into the afterlife without seeing the corruption of the flesh (Ps 15:10), which underwent instantaneous transformation according to the pattern of what awaits, according to the apostle’s promise, the bodies of believers—contemporaries of the second glorious coming of the Lord (1 Cor 15:20-23; 2 Cor 5:4; 1 Thess 4:17).

Genesis 5:25. Methuselah lived one hundred eighty-seven years and begot Lamech. From the genealogy of the Cainites we already know that the name “Lamech” means “fierce man, a man of war and destruction.” It is difficult to determine with precision how the Sethite thought is symbolized by such an apparently unsuitable name. Most likely, in it should be seen a trace of the warlike and God-opposing spirit of the Cainites, which began from this generation to be distinctly felt also among the Sethites.

Genesis 5:27. Altogether, Methuselah lived nine hundred sixty-nine years; and he died. This is the longest-lived of all ten antediluvian patriarchs (and together—all historically known men), whose years or age have become a proverb among us (the years, the age of Methuselah).

Noah and his three sons.

Genesis 5:28–29. Lamech lived one hundred eighty-two [] years and begot a son, and he called his name Noah, saying: This one will bring us relief from our work and the toil of our hands arising from the ground which the Lord [God] has cursed. The last antediluvian patriarch was the son of Lamech—Noah. The significance of this name is explained in the biblical text itself, namely in the sense of “rest, consolation” from the labors and work of tilling the ground. It is thought that Lamech himself, not distinguished by godliness, in giving such a name to his son, connected with it an impious thought, namely—expressed hope for the speedy annulment of the power of divine curse upon the earth, thanks to cultural advances, of which he imagined his newborn son to be the harbinger. But according to the interpretation of John Chrysostom, Lamech, like the high priest Caiaphas in the judgment over Jesus Christ (John 11:49-52), expressed here against his will another great idea: placing the biblical indication of the lessening of toil and labor in connection with the words of the divine judgment on the Fall and their explanations in the Apostle Paul (Gen 3:13; Rom 8:20), the Fathers of the Church justly see in the name of Noah a prophetic foreannouncement that through Noah and his descendants the power of divine punishment for the Fall will be weakened, and after the storm of impiety (violence of the giants) (Gen 6:4) and the thunder of divine punishment for it (the flood in Noah’s time) there will come a new, relatively peaceful and quiet course of community and religious life.

Genesis 5:32. Noah was five hundred years old when he begot [three sons]: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. Noah spent most of his life in the antediluvian epoch and by the end of it had already managed to have three sons; but the activities of these latter belong to the postdiluvian epoch, of which, following the narrative, we shall speak. As to the question of why Noah’s children were born so late compared with other patriarchs (Noah was already 500 years old), the best answer would be the supposition that Noah’s children did not have time before the epoch of the flood to become parents themselves, or became so corrupted and depraved that they too would have shared the sad fate of the entire primitive world.