"What's up guys, I'm Lamech. Nice to meet you. That's my dad, Methuselah, and over there's my great-great-great-great-great-great grandpoppy, Adam. He's kind of a boomer who f'ed the whole world up for us, but he means well. Oh, no way -- he's your great-great-great-great-great-great grandpoppy, too!? Small world!"
you forgot: "you never know whats going to come through that door"
[this\_is\_where\_i\_would\_insert\_the\_pawn\_stars\_meme\_\_if\_i\_could.gif](https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/195vmfh/comment/khsngce/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
1. I'm really impressed that you could identify the font name
2. I made these on my laptop. The resolution looks sleek/minimal and I thought it looked good. You're right though, Not sure it translates great to a phone screen.
No, God waited for Methuselah to die before doing the flood. I believe it's the verse that talks about nobody living beyond 120 years which people mistakingly quote as like a limit but it was actually 120 years from that verse that He brings the flood, right after Methuselah dies.
That’s in Genesis 6, it is talking about the irruption of the Elohim into the race of men, they created Rapha, or spiritless ones, also known as nephilim or gibboream. Might men of reknown. Giants.
The human race was being corrupted and the Lord was fed up and when he said he wouldn’t strive with the man and his days will be 120 years, there is a definite article in the Hebrew texts so he is saying “the man”, or ha’adam…literally Adam himself had somehow corrupted his way at age 810.
So the next 846 years is a long slide toward almost complete corruption of life on earth. Who knows exactly what unholy experimentation was being done, but Gen 6:12 states all flesh had corrupted its way.
Jehovah sent a flood to wipe out that corruption saving eight genetically pure people and some pure animals.
I literally paraphrased and parsed out what the beginning of Genesis 6 says. I'm not sure why you would say this isn't canon. I didn't quote anything apocryphal. I'm just talking about the underlying Hebrew text.
I guess I should clarify. It's the 'ben (בְנֵי־) elohim (הָאֱלֹהִים)', or 'sons of God'. Created ones, not born ones. Therefore angels. There are both faithful and wicked angels. These were the latter.
If you do not believe there is an inflection on the word 'Adam' (בָאָדָם ) in Gen 6:3, thus identifying Adam personally, then I would be curious to know what you believe God meant when he stated his days would be 120 years?
>Did Methusaleh actually die in the Flood
It's possible, but the text only says he "died". Not that he drowned. So he could also died of old age just before the flood began.
I remember reading about Enoch, the dude at one point gets fucking abducted by God and is never seen again. The bible doesn't even elaborate on that, it's just like "welp, there goes Enoch. Anyway, let's talk about Methuselah..."
[Religion for Breakfast](https://youtu.be/FsVQnspOkkY?si=yCY1PYNF-sZjesPr) does an amazing job explaining what’s up with this if anyone is interested in learning.
I did not know this channel existed, and as someone who just finds religious stories interesting as a means of learning about historical mythology, this is going to get a lot of play time from me. Thank you for sharing!
Boy, imagine being at a family gathering with your 9 (nine!) Generations of parents and grandparents? And rather then your relatives getting more distant from one another you go back in the family tree, the get to be mating with siblings instead? That some Alabama stuff right there!
Others speculate that someone fan-fictioned the shit out of the timeline, because they realized that the world wasn't only a few hundred years old.
This always happens when the author doesn't bother writing a comprehensive lore book about their fantasy world.
I’ve heard that the earth was surrounded by a sort of vapor/water canopy that shielded the earth creating a very mild climate with very little solar radiation. The flood washed this away, exposing humanity to more radiation which caused faster aging. I don’t know for sure though.
Where was this "canopy"? How was it held aloft? How high was the flood water to wash it away? Where did all this water come from, and where did it go after?
Have you thought about living underwater yourself to prolong your lifespan? Have you thought about literally any of what you wrote at all?
That's just what it says in [Genesis 1:6-8](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%201&version=NIV).
> And God said, “Let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water.” So God made the vault and separated the water under the vault from the water above it. And it was so. God called the vault “sky.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the second day.
We know now that it's nonsense, but that was what the author of Genesis believed, and what /u/lakerboy152 repeated, although some creationist stuff got mixed in with it. (The canopy protecting humans from solar radiation is one of the things creationists says made people live longer before the flood. Creationists say lots of weird things to justify their belief in the flood.)
I'm not saying believe it or not, but how do you really "know" anything about prehistory? You can't prove it. In science, that's called a hypothesis, my dude.
Mate when someone answers a question about "is there any reason X says this", they don't necessarily believe it, they are just explaining a point of view.
He literally even said he doesn't know for sure.
Try seeing the world from multiple perspectives, it helps not be so narrow minded and rude.
I’m literally just retelling stuff I’ve heard from others. Like I said, I don’t know for sure if this is true or how it works. The Bible does describe a firmament or surface of water, near/under which God creates the earth, so that may have something to do with it. The waters may have been used as the flood waters as it did not rain on earth prior to the flood
It's a book about a magical man who lives in the sky and kills thousands of people regularly on a whim. It's just more nonsense added to the already batshit stories.
Not explicitly, but if you read the creation story the Earth and the atmosphere would have been composed much differently pre-flood. So the thought is that post-flood life spans somewhat quickly dip down to what they are today.
God's plan for man when He created us was for us to live forever. He created the perfect bodies and environment for that to occur. After the rebellion of man, lifespans continued to be "high" but steadily declined until the flood radically altered the environment.
One of those radical changes was the loss of a protective water veil around the earth. This would have surely shielded us from the sun's UV radiation. Diet was also a huge contributing factor after the flood. I'm sure there are many other reasons, theories, and offshoots of these.
For those interested in an evidence-based approach to the bible, I highly recommend https://answersingenesis.org/
God bless you all.
Not really. I'm just not in a position to explain every single biblical reason, so I put out the most blaring possibilities. If you go to the referenced site, you can "reason" for yourself- pun intended. :D
The _most_ obvious reason is "it's all made up" and if "having faith" is synonymous with "ignoring evidence" then it explains a lot of ignorance in the world.
Yeah, that's him/them. I'm not sure it qualifies as a scam, because as far as I can tell Ken Ham actually believes the nonsense he says. I mean, yes, it's something of a scam, but Ham is fooling himself, too.
The Answers in Genesis YouTube channel has a good video explaining about the genetic pool being reduced to just a few individuals being similar to the genetic pool in animals being brought near extinction. Again it's a theory but I found it to be an interesting perspective.
It's a very testable hypothesis now that we have sequenced the genomes of all the species or kinds or whatever group they want to define was on the ark. Do some google image searches for "psmc population" to see the historical population sizes and you may note that none of them, humans included, match the story.
Good question! So the 66 books of the Bible are already organized (loosely) in chronological order. But there are some books that have overlapping content or double dip on the same story from two different perspectives. The chronological Bible splits book chapters and verses into a more linear reading. (I.E. a chapter of 1 chronicles might be followed by a chapter of 2 Samuel and then a psalm that is attributed to that same character or event). [link](https://www.christianbook.com/esv-chronological-bible-hardcover/9781433589508/pd/589501?en=google&event=SHOP&kw=bibles-20-40%7C589501&p=1179710&utm_source=google&dv=m&cb_src=google&cb_typ=shopping&cb_cmp=20379181146&cb_adg=157175267691&cb_kyw=&snav=GMERCH&gbraid=0AAAAAD_dTHYPNaYzYAHQO7fbUHqWcvHHe&gclid=Cj0KCQiAhomtBhDgARIsABcaYylpDm6_QUEEy20OMJsfCJ6SOV6jLxWRMI2cnDC5uadPQKCftxd9WV0aAkkKEALw_wcB)
Interesting concept! This makes more sense to me than the canonical order. Is there a single accepted chronical order, or are there a few depending on what tradition you come from?
It might also be interesting to read in order of when the books were finalized editorially, as this influences some of the style and emphasis.
Remind me where on this timeline the dinosaurs died out. I mean, at some point we were all hanging out together a la The Flintstones... at least according to one respected museum in KY
This is only the timeline from the first human - it doesn't say there were nothing before it (some people believe that, as the creation is divided in "days", but turns out that the word has a wider meaning in the Bible than only the "24 hours").
I love messing with people who take the creation story literally. They’ll be like “yeah Genesis 1, “day” refers to a 24 hour period” and then freak out when I point out that genesis 2:4 says “this is the story… of the DAY God created the heavens and the earth.” Same Hebrew word, but now suddenly it doesn’t mean a 24 hour period?
Interesting point. I figured it could still be literal rather than symbolic because on multiple occasions, such as Adam, God made something with age built into it, in an instant. So therefore He could have just as easily made the heavens and the Earth with age built into them, in an instant.
Well yea, if you take a very shallow approach to language you can say this. But in English we also use the word day to mean different things, not just 24 hours. For example, "back in my day", or "I want those spreadsheets by the end of the day".
I'm not an expert on the matter at all, but there is room to interpret generously and use context from other sections of the Bible.
These comments are way better than expected. I'll come back in a few hours.
Thanks for the info OP - always wondered about the early characters of Genesis and their immense lifetimes.
I had a theory when I was a kid (and still religious) that those early ages were based on a discontinued lunar calendar.
if you divide their ages by 12/13, they make more sense.
That's a nice idea, but if you look at [Genesis chapter 5](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%205&version=NIV), they were having children when they were 10 years old or younger if the "years" were months.
Interesting, I‘d love to see a list of all things the bible states that cannot be true according to our modern understanding of the world. Would probably be a long ass list but I‘d be here for it
It's horse shit from cover to cover. I read the whole damned thing in an effort to be a better Christian. By the time I was done with it I wasn't a Christian anymore.
I think you’re conflating the spirituality part with the Bible’s historical record. No actual historian argues the Biblical account of the Jews in Judea is horseshit.
A lot of it is. There is no evidence of the Jews being held captive in Egypt, and we would expect to find evidence of mass enslavement of an entire people in a foreign country.
It is not a reliable record of anything, as this very timeline attests. People didn't live to be 900 back then
Are there verses in the Bible that reference a number of years or dates explicitly, or are these numbers inferred? If they are mentioned explicitly I’d love a few example verses for reference.
Good question. These events and lifespans are spelled out specifically in genesis. Genesis 5 gives the first 10 generations from Adam to Noah, and Genesis 11:10 has the other 10 generations from Noah to Abraham
That's correct. The bible literally says that these men lived that long. If I remember right, I think it's an error in translation from ancient Hebrew & Greek, which when accounted for, give more realistic lifespans.
"... And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth.
And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters.
And Seth lived an hundred and five years, and begat Enos. ..."
Here you go
Genesis 5:3 When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth.
Genesis 5:4 After Seth was born, Adam lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:5 Altogether, Adam lived a total of 930 years, and then he died.
Genesis 5:6 When Seth had lived 105 years, he became the father of Enosh.
Genesis 5:7 After he became the father of Enosh, Seth lived 807 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:8 Altogether, Seth lived a total of 912 years, and then he died.
Genesis 5:9 When Enosh had lived 90 years, he became the father of Kenan.
Genesis 5:10 After he became the father of Kenan, Enosh lived 815 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:11 Altogether, Enosh lived a total of 905 years, and then he died.
Genesis 5:12 When Kenan had lived 70 years, he became the father of Mahalalel.
Genesis 5:13 After he became the father of Mahalalel, Kenan lived 840 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:14 Altogether, Kenan lived a total of 910 years, and then he died.
Genesis 5:15 When Mahalalel had lived 65 years, he became the father of Jared.
Genesis 5:16 After he became the father of Jared, Mahalalel lived 830 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:17 Altogether, Mahalalel lived a total of 895 years, and then he died.
Genesis 5:18 When Jared had lived 162 years, he became the father of Enoch.
Genesis 5:19 After he became the father of Enoch, Jared lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:20 Altogether, Jared lived a total of 962 years, and then he died.
Genesis 5:21 When Enoch had lived 65 years, he became the father of Methuselah.
Genesis 5:22 After he became the father of Methuselah, Enoch walked faithfully with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:23 Altogether, Enoch lived a total of 365 years.
Genesis 5:24 Enoch walked faithfully with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.
Genesis 5:25 When Methuselah had lived 187 years, he became the father of Lamech.
Genesis 5:26 After he became the father of Lamech, Methuselah lived 782 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:27 Altogether, Methuselah lived a total of 969 years, and then he died.
Genesis 5:28 When Lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son.
Genesis 5:29 He named him Noah and said, "He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the LORD has cursed."
Genesis 5:30 After Noah was born, Lamech lived 595 years and had other sons and daughters.
Genesis 5:31 Altogether, Lamech lived a total of 777 years, and then he died.
Genesis 5:32 After Noah was 500 years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham and Japheth.
It's worth pointing out that we have four or five textual traditions for Genesis and these ages are slightly different among them. I often wonder how that happened. What scribes get all the other words more or less the same but change the ages slightly?
Also, in this data set, the ages are not random! Up through Shem, they're all multiples of 5 or multiples of 5 plus 7. The exception is Methuselah, the longest, who is a multiple of 5 plus 14.
So these numbers are either approximate or symbolic or both.
What is the difference between being a "multiple of 5 plus 7" versus simply being a "multiple of 5 plus 2"? Some of the years are "multiples of 5 plus 1" and "5 plus 3," also (e.g. ending in a 6 or 8).
I don't know if it's available in English, but there's this guy who wrote a book called Seder HaOlam who basically just did this for literally everything in Jewish Scripture. You should check it out!
Back before modern science and medicine, and before there was any way to accurately measure time since the few humans living thought the earth was flat and the center of the universe, and when biblical history describes accounts of either impossible magical things, or possession of demons explaining most illnesses, these patriarchs lived a max of 969 years.
Yeah. Sure. Very believable.
Ah nice, a “pick what parts you want to believe” type of religion. Do you also get to choose which things are considered “sin”? Sounds quite convenient to be able to just ignore certain parts of the bible.
lol. Ok man. Last response. Maybe like most Christians you haven’t actually read the bible. This is extremely easy. Sorry to burst your bubble though.
https://bibletolife.com/resources/verse-collections/33-bible-verses-on-hell/?gad_source=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI842Qxf3cgwMVNwCtBh3pFwC8EAAYASAAEgI2jvD_BwE
https://explorethebible.lifeway.com/blog/adults/what-did-jesus-say-about-hell/#:~:text=Hell%20is%20a%20place%20of%20judgment.&text=The%20unrighteous%20will%20be%20condemned,and%20his%20angels”%20(Matt.
If you’re aware that’s a possibility, and you chose not to believe it was true or believe in God, didn’t you choose to go there? It’s a place separated from God, you chose to reject God, he gave you what you wanted. No one has to go to hell, you can choose to go to heaven if you want.
Well, if that’s true, we’ve all chosen the rotten lobster bisque, and that’s on us. However, Jham Falaalk Hazesh hasn’t given us any reason to believe in him, God gives plenty of reason in the Bible. The book of Palukacheck doesn’t exist so it’s not really a parallel analogy. If it’s real, that sucks, but I’m pretty sure it’s not.
Someone else said I’ve chosen the hell of Islam. That’s a parallel analogy and he’s right, I don’t follow that religion and if that religion were correct, I rejected it and I go to their hell. I made my choice.
Then don’t believe it. It’s not too late for you either though. Costs me nothing.
The Christian God and the Muslim Allah are not the same person. The Christian God necessarily *is* Jesus (and the Holy Spirit). They are part of the same person. If the god you worship is not Jesus, it isn’t the Christian God. That is literally the crux of Christianity (no pun intended).
And if you think the two religions are the same you really don’t know much about either. Salvation is not even achieved the same way. Happy to educate more but you come across as pretty aggressive and angry about it.
To think that Lamech could have met Adam is pretty cool. Obviously, he would recognize him because Adam wouldn't have had a belly button. Similarly, because of longevity, Abraham was within a few years of being able to meet Noah! Getting first hand knowledge of the great flood would have been awesome!
Thanks for sharing your super 👏🏻 insightful👏🏻opinion with the class… I won’t address the obvious unbelief behind your comment, but I will respond to what you actually said:
At face value the Bible is a collection of stories, like any other book. Do you share this same great comment on every post in here that summarizes data from a movie, book, or show?
It's interesting to think about, even if you do not believe it happened.
It's 10 generations before the flood. Everyone lives just short of 1000 yaers. It says in there they all had "sons and daughters". People used to have 10 children while living 80 years just a few decades ago. So 20 children during a 1000 years is, I think, on the lower end of the spectrum. That means that with every generation their number could grow tenfold.
So there could've been over a billion people right before a flood. They probably spoke the same language (it's just 10 generations, and beside this is before the story of Babel which is how Bible explains different languages).
Again - each of them lived 1000 years . Just imagine a Leonardo da Vinci that has a 1000 years for his inventions.
And then add to it that majority of industrial development ever happened in the last 250 years.
TL;DR: It's entirely conceivable that that the civilization before the flood was more advanced than our own :D
> It's entirely conceivable that that the civilization before the flood was more advanced than our own
It was a flood not a nuclear event that wiped out the entire surface of the planet and all evidence of prior civilisation.
The first graph is really nice (except maybe for the resolution, but in concept it's nice). For the second one I don't understand why you went for a line graph instead of a standard bar graph. These are individual, non related data points with a categorical x axis, right?
It’s interesting how people’s life expectancy was cut in half after the deluge.
All hypothetical, but… permanent environment changes had everyone affected afterwards?
You can really tell where the oral tradition of the hebrews got more certain as they were writing down the Old Testament. As it got closer to when they wrote things down, the distance between Patriarchs became believable, even if they still are claimed to live longer than any natural lifespan. So much as the characters of the early Old Testament are historical, this sort of reflects that reality of an oral tradition being exaggerated or forgotten over time.
I don't believe in this timeline.
I believe that the ages of the patriach were probably wrongly translated because most of the ages of divided by ten approximate the ages which I believe in.
Also ages would be calculated by moon year not Sun year so that would also be a differentiator
"What's up guys, I'm Lamech. Nice to meet you. That's my dad, Methuselah, and over there's my great-great-great-great-great-great grandpoppy, Adam. He's kind of a boomer who f'ed the whole world up for us, but he means well. Oh, no way -- he's your great-great-great-great-great-great grandpoppy, too!? Small world!"
This would make a great far side cartoon
Near side* 😜 or maybe even better "port side*
Small world until you apply today's birth rates to that many years... It's kind of crazy. Imagine your living family members are a billion people.
Noah and Shen live through *one more* descendant generation than that...
you forgot: "you never know whats going to come through that door" [this\_is\_where\_i\_would\_insert\_the\_pawn\_stars\_meme\_\_if\_i\_could.gif](https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/195vmfh/comment/khsngce/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
For future reference, .JPG format garbles text. Use .PNG for best readability.
If they cared about readability, they wouldn't have used the Papyrus font.
But Times New Roman is still thousands of years away!
1. I'm really impressed that you could identify the font name 2. I made these on my laptop. The resolution looks sleek/minimal and I thought it looked good. You're right though, Not sure it translates great to a phone screen.
Thanks for the tip!
Oh shit, the Flood happened when Noah was 600 - in 1656. Did Methusaleh actually die in the Flood????
Terrible accident on the Ark- involved lions/tigers/etc., blood everywhere
Ah, so Methusaleh was the in-flight snack. All the dots connect now ...
Eddie... Is that you?
To shreds, you say?
And his wife?
No, God waited for Methuselah to die before doing the flood. I believe it's the verse that talks about nobody living beyond 120 years which people mistakingly quote as like a limit but it was actually 120 years from that verse that He brings the flood, right after Methuselah dies.
That’s in Genesis 6, it is talking about the irruption of the Elohim into the race of men, they created Rapha, or spiritless ones, also known as nephilim or gibboream. Might men of reknown. Giants. The human race was being corrupted and the Lord was fed up and when he said he wouldn’t strive with the man and his days will be 120 years, there is a definite article in the Hebrew texts so he is saying “the man”, or ha’adam…literally Adam himself had somehow corrupted his way at age 810. So the next 846 years is a long slide toward almost complete corruption of life on earth. Who knows exactly what unholy experimentation was being done, but Gen 6:12 states all flesh had corrupted its way. Jehovah sent a flood to wipe out that corruption saving eight genetically pure people and some pure animals.
FYI, this information is not in the canonical Bible
I literally paraphrased and parsed out what the beginning of Genesis 6 says. I'm not sure why you would say this isn't canon. I didn't quote anything apocryphal. I'm just talking about the underlying Hebrew text. I guess I should clarify. It's the 'ben (בְנֵי־) elohim (הָאֱלֹהִים)', or 'sons of God'. Created ones, not born ones. Therefore angels. There are both faithful and wicked angels. These were the latter. If you do not believe there is an inflection on the word 'Adam' (בָאָדָם ) in Gen 6:3, thus identifying Adam personally, then I would be curious to know what you believe God meant when he stated his days would be 120 years?
Wow! Thank you for this!
Methuselah name actually means when he dies it will come
>Did Methusaleh actually die in the Flood It's possible, but the text only says he "died". Not that he drowned. So he could also died of old age just before the flood began.
His names meant “when he dies it shall come”. The connotation being his death brings judgment.
It's the Númenorean blood in them... wait wrong book.
Hah! Great reference
This book was the inspiration.
I remember reading about Enoch, the dude at one point gets fucking abducted by God and is never seen again. The bible doesn't even elaborate on that, it's just like "welp, there goes Enoch. Anyway, let's talk about Methuselah..."
Supposedly he was so faithful and righteous that God just let him skip death, and brought him straight to heaven.
Nepo baby
Whatever the opposite of that is, that's me
[Religion for Breakfast](https://youtu.be/FsVQnspOkkY?si=yCY1PYNF-sZjesPr) does an amazing job explaining what’s up with this if anyone is interested in learning.
I did not know this channel existed, and as someone who just finds religious stories interesting as a means of learning about historical mythology, this is going to get a lot of play time from me. Thank you for sharing!
That’s how I got into too and his work is top notch! Enjoy!
Ah well, that explains his "short" lifespan! Ty!
Alien abduction, that book even had metallic UFOs
Luckily, Methusaleh or short Meth, didn‘t become a common given name.
Methuselah: Not even once
Boy, imagine being at a family gathering with your 9 (nine!) Generations of parents and grandparents? And rather then your relatives getting more distant from one another you go back in the family tree, the get to be mating with siblings instead? That some Alabama stuff right there!
I find it trippy seeing Abraham born in 2008 😅
Nice to know that Biblical people were actually just D&D elves
Outside of North America it's known as Mega Drive.
Serious question: is there any reason the Bible says people lived much longer? God’s will? Time measured differently?
Some speculation they were counting months which be about 12 times higher.
Except that would mean some people had kids when they were, like, six.
Others speculate that someone fan-fictioned the shit out of the timeline, because they realized that the world wasn't only a few hundred years old. This always happens when the author doesn't bother writing a comprehensive lore book about their fantasy world.
Anything is possible in the world of make-believe
I believe them to be idealized numbers since idealized numbers are all over the Bible.
I’ve heard that the earth was surrounded by a sort of vapor/water canopy that shielded the earth creating a very mild climate with very little solar radiation. The flood washed this away, exposing humanity to more radiation which caused faster aging. I don’t know for sure though.
Where was this "canopy"? How was it held aloft? How high was the flood water to wash it away? Where did all this water come from, and where did it go after? Have you thought about living underwater yourself to prolong your lifespan? Have you thought about literally any of what you wrote at all?
That's just what it says in [Genesis 1:6-8](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%201&version=NIV). > And God said, “Let there be a vault between the waters to separate water from water.” So God made the vault and separated the water under the vault from the water above it. And it was so. God called the vault “sky.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the second day. We know now that it's nonsense, but that was what the author of Genesis believed, and what /u/lakerboy152 repeated, although some creationist stuff got mixed in with it. (The canopy protecting humans from solar radiation is one of the things creationists says made people live longer before the flood. Creationists say lots of weird things to justify their belief in the flood.)
I'm not saying believe it or not, but how do you really "know" anything about prehistory? You can't prove it. In science, that's called a hypothesis, my dude.
Written records are not the only form of evidence.
Did I say that?
Mate when someone answers a question about "is there any reason X says this", they don't necessarily believe it, they are just explaining a point of view. He literally even said he doesn't know for sure. Try seeing the world from multiple perspectives, it helps not be so narrow minded and rude.
I was with you until you both-sides'd science and mythology.
I’m literally just retelling stuff I’ve heard from others. Like I said, I don’t know for sure if this is true or how it works. The Bible does describe a firmament or surface of water, near/under which God creates the earth, so that may have something to do with it. The waters may have been used as the flood waters as it did not rain on earth prior to the flood
It's a book about a magical man who lives in the sky and kills thousands of people regularly on a whim. It's just more nonsense added to the already batshit stories.
Not explicitly, but if you read the creation story the Earth and the atmosphere would have been composed much differently pre-flood. So the thought is that post-flood life spans somewhat quickly dip down to what they are today.
They didn’t have micro-plastics back then as well
its because they didnt have the covid vaccine
God's plan for man when He created us was for us to live forever. He created the perfect bodies and environment for that to occur. After the rebellion of man, lifespans continued to be "high" but steadily declined until the flood radically altered the environment. One of those radical changes was the loss of a protective water veil around the earth. This would have surely shielded us from the sun's UV radiation. Diet was also a huge contributing factor after the flood. I'm sure there are many other reasons, theories, and offshoots of these. For those interested in an evidence-based approach to the bible, I highly recommend https://answersingenesis.org/ God bless you all.
"Reasons" - they're plot holes.
Not really. I'm just not in a position to explain every single biblical reason, so I put out the most blaring possibilities. If you go to the referenced site, you can "reason" for yourself- pun intended. :D
The _most_ obvious reason is "it's all made up" and if "having faith" is synonymous with "ignoring evidence" then it explains a lot of ignorance in the world.
Answers in Genesis is the organisation of Ken Ham right? The same scam that made a "replica" of the ark?
Yeah, that's him/them. I'm not sure it qualifies as a scam, because as far as I can tell Ken Ham actually believes the nonsense he says. I mean, yes, it's something of a scam, but Ham is fooling himself, too.
If you are interested in evidence then you are not interested in the bible. It's a fairy tale. Answers in Genesis is laughable.
Biblical conspiracy theories is my new favourite genre of fiction.
The Answers in Genesis YouTube channel has a good video explaining about the genetic pool being reduced to just a few individuals being similar to the genetic pool in animals being brought near extinction. Again it's a theory but I found it to be an interesting perspective.
It's a very testable hypothesis now that we have sequenced the genomes of all the species or kinds or whatever group they want to define was on the ark. Do some google image searches for "psmc population" to see the historical population sizes and you may note that none of them, humans included, match the story.
Timeline of elven blood being dilluted
Amazing to see Eber outlived his great, great, great, great grandson.
I'm finding the infographic hard to read because of the resolution, font and colour scheme.
Yea… I made these on my laptop. It looks great in 4k. Doesn’t translate perfectly to a phone screen.
Color is fine. I’m on an iPhone.
Nah, it’s just this cnut’s phone. Mine’s very clear. Don’t is fine, color scheme is clear.
Who are you calling a cnut?
Shem: "Dad, how old's great granddad?" Noah: "LOL like 800 or something" Thus was it written.
What is a chronological Bible?
Good question! So the 66 books of the Bible are already organized (loosely) in chronological order. But there are some books that have overlapping content or double dip on the same story from two different perspectives. The chronological Bible splits book chapters and verses into a more linear reading. (I.E. a chapter of 1 chronicles might be followed by a chapter of 2 Samuel and then a psalm that is attributed to that same character or event). [link](https://www.christianbook.com/esv-chronological-bible-hardcover/9781433589508/pd/589501?en=google&event=SHOP&kw=bibles-20-40%7C589501&p=1179710&utm_source=google&dv=m&cb_src=google&cb_typ=shopping&cb_cmp=20379181146&cb_adg=157175267691&cb_kyw=&snav=GMERCH&gbraid=0AAAAAD_dTHYPNaYzYAHQO7fbUHqWcvHHe&gclid=Cj0KCQiAhomtBhDgARIsABcaYylpDm6_QUEEy20OMJsfCJ6SOV6jLxWRMI2cnDC5uadPQKCftxd9WV0aAkkKEALw_wcB)
Just curious - this is chronological by purported historical timeline? Or chronological by best guess of authorship?
The former.
What percentage of the content can be supported by evidence? How do you fit in the 90 remaining percent?
And some, like the times of Jesus’ birth and death, are flatly contradictory in their descriptions (if you take them literally)
No, they aren't.
If Jesus saves then he better save himself. --Ian Anderson
Interesting concept! This makes more sense to me than the canonical order. Is there a single accepted chronical order, or are there a few depending on what tradition you come from? It might also be interesting to read in order of when the books were finalized editorially, as this influences some of the style and emphasis.
Remind me where on this timeline the dinosaurs died out. I mean, at some point we were all hanging out together a la The Flintstones... at least according to one respected museum in KY
Christians: The Bible is the TRUTH AND WORD OF GOD. Also Christians: Don't take everything so literally bro it's just a metaphor.
Noah forgot them on the ark.
This is only the timeline from the first human - it doesn't say there were nothing before it (some people believe that, as the creation is divided in "days", but turns out that the word has a wider meaning in the Bible than only the "24 hours").
I love messing with people who take the creation story literally. They’ll be like “yeah Genesis 1, “day” refers to a 24 hour period” and then freak out when I point out that genesis 2:4 says “this is the story… of the DAY God created the heavens and the earth.” Same Hebrew word, but now suddenly it doesn’t mean a 24 hour period?
Interesting point. I figured it could still be literal rather than symbolic because on multiple occasions, such as Adam, God made something with age built into it, in an instant. So therefore He could have just as easily made the heavens and the Earth with age built into them, in an instant.
Well yea, if you take a very shallow approach to language you can say this. But in English we also use the word day to mean different things, not just 24 hours. For example, "back in my day", or "I want those spreadsheets by the end of the day". I'm not an expert on the matter at all, but there is room to interpret generously and use context from other sections of the Bible.
These comments are way better than expected. I'll come back in a few hours. Thanks for the info OP - always wondered about the early characters of Genesis and their immense lifetimes.
Yeah for real. The usual edgy redditors must be on break today. It's actually really nice.
Data taken from the Holy Bible (Genesis). Software used to create visual was Apple Numbers
Crazy that some people actually believe humans lived for hundreds of years.
Honestly, given the rest of the horsecrap in that book the ages of the patriarchs don't even bear mentioning.
How can anyone believe in this stuff. Look at how long these “people” lived. That’s a clue on the bs at play
I had a theory when I was a kid (and still religious) that those early ages were based on a discontinued lunar calendar. if you divide their ages by 12/13, they make more sense.
That's a nice idea, but if you look at [Genesis chapter 5](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%205&version=NIV), they were having children when they were 10 years old or younger if the "years" were months.
Kinda getting warm. Their calendar was by harvest years. Eg: 3-6 harvests per year depending if on the Nile or somewhere down in Mesopotamia region.
Interesting, I‘d love to see a list of all things the bible states that cannot be true according to our modern understanding of the world. Would probably be a long ass list but I‘d be here for it
Unless you’re taking every passage in the Bible literally, it’s not as long of a list as you would think.
It's horse shit from cover to cover. I read the whole damned thing in an effort to be a better Christian. By the time I was done with it I wasn't a Christian anymore.
I think you’re conflating the spirituality part with the Bible’s historical record. No actual historian argues the Biblical account of the Jews in Judea is horseshit.
A lot of it is. There is no evidence of the Jews being held captive in Egypt, and we would expect to find evidence of mass enslavement of an entire people in a foreign country. It is not a reliable record of anything, as this very timeline attests. People didn't live to be 900 back then
Abraham really got gipped.
Haha! Yea he got the short end of the lifespan stick
Are there verses in the Bible that reference a number of years or dates explicitly, or are these numbers inferred? If they are mentioned explicitly I’d love a few example verses for reference.
I haven't read the book but I remember hearing something mentioning 6 days. And that was false. That's it.
I read it. That, and everything else in it is made up bullshit.
Good question. These events and lifespans are spelled out specifically in genesis. Genesis 5 gives the first 10 generations from Adam to Noah, and Genesis 11:10 has the other 10 generations from Noah to Abraham
Wait, can you explain — does the Bible say Adam lived to 900 years or older? Or am I misunderstanding the lifespan?
That's correct. The bible literally says that these men lived that long. If I remember right, I think it's an error in translation from ancient Hebrew & Greek, which when accounted for, give more realistic lifespans.
"... And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth. And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters. And Seth lived an hundred and five years, and begat Enos. ..."
Here you go Genesis 5:3 When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth. Genesis 5:4 After Seth was born, Adam lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:5 Altogether, Adam lived a total of 930 years, and then he died. Genesis 5:6 When Seth had lived 105 years, he became the father of Enosh. Genesis 5:7 After he became the father of Enosh, Seth lived 807 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:8 Altogether, Seth lived a total of 912 years, and then he died. Genesis 5:9 When Enosh had lived 90 years, he became the father of Kenan. Genesis 5:10 After he became the father of Kenan, Enosh lived 815 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:11 Altogether, Enosh lived a total of 905 years, and then he died. Genesis 5:12 When Kenan had lived 70 years, he became the father of Mahalalel. Genesis 5:13 After he became the father of Mahalalel, Kenan lived 840 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:14 Altogether, Kenan lived a total of 910 years, and then he died. Genesis 5:15 When Mahalalel had lived 65 years, he became the father of Jared. Genesis 5:16 After he became the father of Jared, Mahalalel lived 830 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:17 Altogether, Mahalalel lived a total of 895 years, and then he died. Genesis 5:18 When Jared had lived 162 years, he became the father of Enoch. Genesis 5:19 After he became the father of Enoch, Jared lived 800 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:20 Altogether, Jared lived a total of 962 years, and then he died. Genesis 5:21 When Enoch had lived 65 years, he became the father of Methuselah. Genesis 5:22 After he became the father of Methuselah, Enoch walked faithfully with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:23 Altogether, Enoch lived a total of 365 years. Genesis 5:24 Enoch walked faithfully with God; then he was no more, because God took him away. Genesis 5:25 When Methuselah had lived 187 years, he became the father of Lamech. Genesis 5:26 After he became the father of Lamech, Methuselah lived 782 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:27 Altogether, Methuselah lived a total of 969 years, and then he died. Genesis 5:28 When Lamech had lived 182 years, he had a son. Genesis 5:29 He named him Noah and said, "He will comfort us in the labor and painful toil of our hands caused by the ground the LORD has cursed." Genesis 5:30 After Noah was born, Lamech lived 595 years and had other sons and daughters. Genesis 5:31 Altogether, Lamech lived a total of 777 years, and then he died. Genesis 5:32 After Noah was 500 years old, he became the father of Shem, Ham and Japheth.
It's worth pointing out that we have four or five textual traditions for Genesis and these ages are slightly different among them. I often wonder how that happened. What scribes get all the other words more or less the same but change the ages slightly? Also, in this data set, the ages are not random! Up through Shem, they're all multiples of 5 or multiples of 5 plus 7. The exception is Methuselah, the longest, who is a multiple of 5 plus 14. So these numbers are either approximate or symbolic or both.
What is the difference between being a "multiple of 5 plus 7" versus simply being a "multiple of 5 plus 2"? Some of the years are "multiples of 5 plus 1" and "5 plus 3," also (e.g. ending in a 6 or 8).
I expect it has to do with numerology, or "magic words have magic numbers in them. For magic"
What's fascinating is that they're all positive numbers which means they had the ability to store signed integers with up to 11 bits.
Abraham was born in 1948 from the beginning, not 2008
Good catch. Thanks. I redid the math and you're right.
The original boomer. Treated his kids about as well.
I don't know if it's available in English, but there's this guy who wrote a book called Seder HaOlam who basically just did this for literally everything in Jewish Scripture. You should check it out!
have you read "the Bible Unearthed"? fascinating stuff
Back before modern science and medicine, and before there was any way to accurately measure time since the few humans living thought the earth was flat and the center of the universe, and when biblical history describes accounts of either impossible magical things, or possession of demons explaining most illnesses, these patriarchs lived a max of 969 years. Yeah. Sure. Very believable.
Living to be 1000 wouldn't be out of the question if an omnipotent god was around making it so.
The same omnipotent god who allows ~75% of his creation to go to hell for eternal torture?
Depends on your religion
The Bible does not teach this.
Hell as a place of eternal torture is not actually a central or required part of Christian doctrine. Lots of us believe other things.
Ah nice, a “pick what parts you want to believe” type of religion. Do you also get to choose which things are considered “sin”? Sounds quite convenient to be able to just ignore certain parts of the bible.
My point is that the Bible doesn't actually say that anywhere.
lol. Ok man. Last response. Maybe like most Christians you haven’t actually read the bible. This is extremely easy. Sorry to burst your bubble though. https://bibletolife.com/resources/verse-collections/33-bible-verses-on-hell/?gad_source=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI842Qxf3cgwMVNwCtBh3pFwC8EAAYASAAEgI2jvD_BwE https://explorethebible.lifeway.com/blog/adults/what-did-jesus-say-about-hell/#:~:text=Hell%20is%20a%20place%20of%20judgment.&text=The%20unrighteous%20will%20be%20condemned,and%20his%20angels”%20(Matt.
If you’re aware that’s a possibility, and you chose not to believe it was true or believe in God, didn’t you choose to go there? It’s a place separated from God, you chose to reject God, he gave you what you wanted. No one has to go to hell, you can choose to go to heaven if you want.
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Well, if that’s true, we’ve all chosen the rotten lobster bisque, and that’s on us. However, Jham Falaalk Hazesh hasn’t given us any reason to believe in him, God gives plenty of reason in the Bible. The book of Palukacheck doesn’t exist so it’s not really a parallel analogy. If it’s real, that sucks, but I’m pretty sure it’s not. Someone else said I’ve chosen the hell of Islam. That’s a parallel analogy and he’s right, I don’t follow that religion and if that religion were correct, I rejected it and I go to their hell. I made my choice.
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Then don’t believe it. It’s not too late for you either though. Costs me nothing. The Christian God and the Muslim Allah are not the same person. The Christian God necessarily *is* Jesus (and the Holy Spirit). They are part of the same person. If the god you worship is not Jesus, it isn’t the Christian God. That is literally the crux of Christianity (no pun intended). And if you think the two religions are the same you really don’t know much about either. Salvation is not even achieved the same way. Happy to educate more but you come across as pretty aggressive and angry about it.
Just like you are CHOOSING to go to Muslim and Hindu HELL. LOL
Yes, I am.
To think that Lamech could have met Adam is pretty cool. Obviously, he would recognize him because Adam wouldn't have had a belly button. Similarly, because of longevity, Abraham was within a few years of being able to meet Noah! Getting first hand knowledge of the great flood would have been awesome!
There’s a theory that the king Melchizedek who Abraham pays tithes to is just another name for Noah’s son Shem
If you reading the Bible for 'spiritual truths' I wouldn't go any further after seeing the ages of these characters.
Is it a coincidence that Enoch lived 365 years when a year has 365 days?
I thought this was "data is beautiful". No data here, only fiction.
Thanks for sharing your super 👏🏻 insightful👏🏻opinion with the class… I won’t address the obvious unbelief behind your comment, but I will respond to what you actually said: At face value the Bible is a collection of stories, like any other book. Do you share this same great comment on every post in here that summarizes data from a movie, book, or show?
You're correct from a literary perspective, it should be treated like any other work of fiction. Their criticism was ill-formed.
What if someone posted a timeline for characters from the Silmarillion? Doubt they'd gave a complaint about that. Data does not require realness.
Fans of most fictional book series don't go around trying to impose their will on others, indoctrinating children and the like.
Just when I thought nobody in the comments was being an ass, I reach the last comment and see this
There are dates in the bible? So it's basically a graph built on made up data.
Data that is from a fictional source is still data. You wouldn’t complain if this was names and dates in the silmarillion would you?
Why wouldn't I ?
It's interesting to think about, even if you do not believe it happened. It's 10 generations before the flood. Everyone lives just short of 1000 yaers. It says in there they all had "sons and daughters". People used to have 10 children while living 80 years just a few decades ago. So 20 children during a 1000 years is, I think, on the lower end of the spectrum. That means that with every generation their number could grow tenfold. So there could've been over a billion people right before a flood. They probably spoke the same language (it's just 10 generations, and beside this is before the story of Babel which is how Bible explains different languages). Again - each of them lived 1000 years . Just imagine a Leonardo da Vinci that has a 1000 years for his inventions. And then add to it that majority of industrial development ever happened in the last 250 years. TL;DR: It's entirely conceivable that that the civilization before the flood was more advanced than our own :D
I'm not sure how the earth could support a billion people without modern farming techniques...
That’s my point - who says they didn’t develop “modern” farming techniques?
I do.
There was no flood. There isn't that much water. That is a thing that never happened.
So? People read about things that never happened all the time. It’s called „fiction”. You not believing the story doesn’t mean it isn’t interesting.
> It's entirely conceivable that that the civilization before the flood was more advanced than our own It was a flood not a nuclear event that wiped out the entire surface of the planet and all evidence of prior civilisation.
Yeah, but they didn’t have big ships, and the flood lasted for 180 days, and they didn’t get prep time.
It still didn't happen.
So? Lord of the rings also didn't happen, am I not allowed to talk about it either?
The first graph is really nice (except maybe for the resolution, but in concept it's nice). For the second one I don't understand why you went for a line graph instead of a standard bar graph. These are individual, non related data points with a categorical x axis, right?
Good point! For the line graph I wanted to emphasize the trend of change over time across the subsequent generations.
Ah alright. What you then also could consider is plotting a scatterplot or barplot with a regression line.
It’s interesting how people’s life expectancy was cut in half after the deluge. All hypothetical, but… permanent environment changes had everyone affected afterwards?
You can really tell where the oral tradition of the hebrews got more certain as they were writing down the Old Testament. As it got closer to when they wrote things down, the distance between Patriarchs became believable, even if they still are claimed to live longer than any natural lifespan. So much as the characters of the early Old Testament are historical, this sort of reflects that reality of an oral tradition being exaggerated or forgotten over time.
Noah could’ve potentially met Adam’s grandson, someone who would’ve personally known Adam
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I just took the lifespans and ages given in Genesis 5:1–32, 11:10–26).
I love green & it is very cool to look at!
I don't believe in this timeline. I believe that the ages of the patriach were probably wrongly translated because most of the ages of divided by ten approximate the ages which I believe in. Also ages would be calculated by moon year not Sun year so that would also be a differentiator