A Brief Question About Noah's Age. (souls, translation, genesis, mythology)

[rifleman]

I was reading my bible the other day ("He reads the bible? Why would he? We don't read his biology texts!") and came across God's specific notes about man, being only "of flesh and blood", could only live to a maximum of 120 years. In Genesis as I recall.

There are too many instances of Christian debaters here insisting on the most minute of details, no matter how ambiguous, in the bible. Such as God's commentary to Job, which I also read, as "proving" co-existing dinosaurs.

Wrong.

In Job, God is simply noting that He's quite capable of doing anything He desires to do, like, for instance, creating a leviathan. Note that He didn't say "I did create large and small lizard-like leviathans, as well as a huge, 40 ton hippo-like vegetarian, which I will call Brontosaurus!" Or referencing huge flying carnivorous lizards with leathery, versus feathery, wings.

But then, God exactly says "man shall not live longer than 120 years!". But then we have a 900+ year old Noah. Now, given how we reliably fail with age, even with modern medicine, and that no-one else apparently achieved Noah's "maturity", how did he get to be that old? Just so he could build a totally implausible Ark over hundreds of years?

I don't buy it. But perhaps I haven't read enough of the bible. Yet. Just tell me where to find it!

[Rafius]

Apparently, some ancient scribe mistranslated the ages.
How old was Noah and Methuselah?


Well I suppose as more people become educated and move away from ridiculous mythology, the godzombies need to find some excuse to uphold the myths.

[yeshuasavedme]

Originally Posted by rifleman

I was reading my bible the other day ("He reads the bible? Why would he? We don't read his biology texts!") and came across God's specific notes about man, being only "of flesh and blood", could only live to a maximum of 120 years. In Genesis as I recall.



But then, God exactly says "man shall not live longer than 120 years!". But then we have a 900+ year old Noah. Now, given how we reliably fail with age, even with modern medicine, and that no-one else apparently achieved Noah's "maturity", how did he get to be that old? Just so he could build a totally implausible Ark over hundreds of years?

I don't buy it. But perhaps I haven't read enough of the bible. Yet. Just tell me where to find it!

Dear Rifleman,
God gave Adam -the race of Adam- exactly 120 years to repent in the days of Noah, before the flood. Noah and Methuselah preached repentance for 120 years, and then the flood came, exactly 120 years from the proclamation by YHWH that it would come -to the day.
Noah's grandfather, Methuselah, was older at his death than Noah was at his death, too.

Also, the words of wisdom are dual in meaning, as it is said in Job, and God also had a dual meaning in that,as He also has Jubilee years counted by 50's, and this present creation has 120 Jubilee years from the date of that proclamation before the regeneration of it.

And in the two hundred and thirty fourth year of the life of Noah, Mahlallel the son of Cainan died, and the days of Mahlallel were eight hundred and ninety-five years, and he died.
And Jared the son of Mahlallel died in those days, in the three hundred and thirty-sixth year of the life of Noah; and all the days of Jared were nine hundred and sixty-two years, and he died.

And all who followed the Lord died in those days, before they saw the evil which God declared to do upon earth. And after the lapse of many years, in the four hundred and eightieth year of the life of Noah, when all those men, who followed the Lord had died away from amongst the sons of men, and only Methuselah was then left, God said unto Noah and Methuselah, saying, Speak ye, and proclaim to the sons of men, saying, Thus saith the Lord, return from your evil ways and forsake your works, and the Lord will repent of the evil that he declared to do to you, so that it shall not come to pass. For thus saith the Lord, Behold I give you a period of one hundred and twenty years; if you will turn to me and forsake your evil ways, then will I also turn away from the evil which I told you, and it shall not exist, saith the Lord. And Noah and Methuselah spoke all the words of the Lord to the sons of men, day after day, constantly speaking to them. But the sons of men would not hearken to them, nor incline their ears to their words, and they were stiffnecked.
And the Lord granted them a period of one hundred and twenty years, saying, If they will return, then will God repent of the evil, so as not to destroy the earth.

In a similar fashion Jonah [reluctantly] preached to Ninevah that they had been given forty days to repent, else God would destroy them at the end of that forty days. They repented and God did not destroy them.

Jasher chapter 6

1. At that time, after the death of Methuselah, the Lord said to Noah, Go thou with thy household into the ark; behold I will gather to thee all the animals of the earth, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and they shall all come and surround the ark.
2. And thou shalt go and seat thyself by the doors of the ark, and all the beasts, the animals, and the fowls, shall assemble and place themselves before thee, and such of them as shall come and crouch before thee, shalt thou take and deliver into the hands of thy sons, who shall bring them to the ark, and all that will stand before thee thou shalt leave.
3. And the Lord brought this about on the next day, and animals, beasts and fowls came in great multitudes and surrounded the ark.
4. And Noah went and seated himself by the door of the ark, and of all flesh that crouched before him, he brought into the ark, and all that stood before him he left upon earth.
5. And a lioness came, with her two whelps, male and female, and the three crouched before Noah, and the two whelps rose up against the lioness and smote her, and made her flee from her place, and she went away, and they returned to their places, and crouched upon the earth before Noah.
6. And the lioness ran away, and stood in the place of the lions.
7. And Noah saw this, and wondered greatly, and he rose and took the two whelps, and brought them into the ark.
8. And Noah brought into the ark from all living creatures that were upon earth, so that there was none left but which Noah brought into the ark.
9. Two and two came to Noah into the ark, but from the clean animals, and clean fowls, he brought seven couples, as God had commanded him.
10. And all the animals, and beasts, and fowls, were still there, and they surrounded the ark at every place, and the rain had not descended till seven days after.
11. And on that day, the Lord caused the whole earth to shake, and the sun darkened, and the foundations of the world raged, and the whole earth was moved violently, and the lightning flashed, and the thunder roared, and all the fountains in the earth were broken up, such as was not known to the inhabitants before; and God did this mighty act, in order to terrify the sons of men, that there might be no more evil upon earth.
12. And still the sons of men would not return from their evil ways, and they increased the anger of the Lord at that time, and did not even direct their hearts to all this.
13. And at the end of seven days, in the six hundredth year of the life of Noah, the waters of the flood were upon the earth.
14. And all the fountains of the deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened, and the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
15. And Noah and his household, and all the living creatures that were with him, came into the ark on account of the waters of the flood, and the Lord shut him in.
16. And all the sons of men that were left upon the earth, became exhausted through evil on account of the rain, for the waters were coming more violently upon the earth, and the animals and beasts were still surrounding the ark.
17. And the sons of men assembled together, about seven hundred thousand men and women, and they came unto Noah to the ark.
18. And they called to Noah, saying, Open for us that we may come to thee in the ark--and wherefore shall we die?
19. And Noah, with a loud voice, answered them from the ark, saying, Have you not all rebelled against the Lord, and said that he does not exist? and therefore the Lord brought upon you this evil, to destroy and cut you off from the face of the earth.
20. Is not this the thing that I spoke to you of one hundred and twenty years back, and you would not hearken to the voice of the Lord, and now do you desire to live upon earth?
21. And they said to Noah, We are ready to return to the Lord; only open for us that we may live and not die.
22. And Noah answered them, saying, Behold now that you see the trouble of your souls, you wish to return to the Lord; why did you not return during these hundred and twenty years, which the Lord granted you as the determined period?
23. But now you come and tell me this on account of the troubles of your souls, now also the Lord will not listen to you, neither will he give ear to you on this day, so that you will not now succeed in your wishes.
24. And the sons of men approached in order to break into the ark, to come in on account of the rain, for they could not bear the rain upon them.
25. And the Lord sent all the beasts and animals that stood round the ark. And the beasts overpowered them and drove them from that place, and every man went his way and they again scattered themselves upon the face of the earth.
26. And the rain was still descending upon the earth, and it descended forty days and forty nights, and the waters prevailed greatly upon the earth; and all flesh that was upon the earth or in the waters died, whether men, animals, beasts, creeping things or birds of the air, and there only remained Noah and those that were with him in the ark.
27. And the waters prevailed and they greatly increased upon the earth, and they lifted up the ark and it was raised from the earth.

[rifleman]

Interesting. I found the information in Rafius' link...

How old was Noah and Methuselah?

...to be most informative as well, YSM. Don't know if you opened that one. The obvious mis-interpretation & subsequent misinformed presentation in the final biblical translation is apparent and is well-known amongst serious biblical scholars. Odd then that it's perpetrated in it's current highly exaggerated, stylized and mythic form, and the correct and far more believable version is not openly passed on to the congregation, huh? I guess the intent is to deceive, not to educate and promote thoughtful discourse.

I particularly liked the information provided when you finish reading the article and "go to home page" at the bottom, whereupon you'll find a rational description of the fabled Ark as a local river barge. They also note the believable story of an archeologically documented but localized flood at about 2900.

Such a major but local flood could nonetheless have made quite the impression on a budding young, but scientifically illiterate, author of myths and fables. Such primitive writings, found many many years later, would be easily subject to the wildest speculation by gospel authors who of course weren't there to actually witness it, but simultaneously had a very real goal in mind with their biblical writings. Why not "embellish" a bit, huh?

I'll cut & paste a tiny bit of it here, FYI:
________________________________________

The first book about Noah's flood that makes sense...

Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic: Sumerian Origins of the Myth

...is a book that takes a fresh look at six versions of the Ancient Near East flood myth, de-mythologizes them, and combines the various story elements like pieces of a jigsaw picture puzzle into one coherent story.

There actually was an archaeologically confirmed flood about 2900 BC on which the ark stories were based, but it was a local river flood, not a global deluge. The original ark stories were about a small commercial river barge that was hauling a few hundred cattle, sheep, and goats, but there were no kangaroos, lions, apes, elephants, or giraffes on that cattle barge.

The emphasis in this book is on what was physically possible, technologically practical, and consistent with archaeological facts in ancient Sumer, now southern Iraq.

From:Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic - home page noahs-ark-flood.com

Turns out (as one would reasonably expect...) the guy was just like the rest of us!

By the way: I'm relatively "illiterate" as regards all the books & sources of the bible, but hey; I'm tryin' at least. Mine is a very fine old book, given to my father by his grandmother in 1940 on the occasion of his wedding to my mother, and it's absolutely beautiful!

Frontispiece inscription: "Containing the Old and New Testaments Translated out of the Original Tongues and with the Former Translations Diligently Compared and Revised."

Leather-bound, printed in England. So then... where do the writings of "Jasher" come from and fit in? I'll check on the web, but your comments?

______________ Post-script editorial add:

That's OK; just found it. The writings of Jasher: An alternate, sometimes partially corroborating, but often contradictory, personal historical gospel. Probably quickly dicarded by the Council of Nicea.

http://logosresourcepages.org/History/jasher.htm

I note here in my research the many variations and outright contradictions or impossibilities listed at the bottom of this link page. Hmmm... internal disputes about the accuracy of the bible? Who'da thunk, huh?

Thanks. Any other commentary?

[legoman]

Hi Rifleman,

I didn't read through the links above, but there is indeed debate about the "globalness" of the flood that covered the "earth" in Genesis, unfortunately most people won't look at it reasonably.

Ray Smith goes into it in much detail in this link; He believes the flood was local. Here is a transcript of one of his talks, if you want to wade through it, he has some interesting points:
Nashville Conference 2008 - audio #7, 8a, 8b, 9 and 10

Just search down for "NOAH".

Here are the videos:
2008 NASHVILLE BIBLE CONFERENCE VIDEOS

He gets into the obvious problems with a global flood; like how did a global flood create the grand canyon yet leave the pyramids untouched? What about all these craters from meteorites that are at least 50000 years old? Why didn't the flood destroy them? How did all the dinosaurs fit on the ark? Or why didn't Noah save the dinosaurs? What about ice core samples, tree rings, etc.?


Its fairly easy to disprove YEC and the global flood and still stay within scripture.

For me I'm 100% Old earth, the global flood is still a bit of a mystery, but I can see that it is maybe not what mainstream Christianity teaches.

Peace out.