# Why do people live so long in Genesis? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 26, 2003, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530 "2003-05-26T04:41:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![PatriotX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c4cdca/32.png) [@PatriotX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotX)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/21 "2003-05-26T19:03:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Phnord Prephect \* > \*\* > So, Methuselah is 187 when **he** gives birth to Lamech. > \*\* That’s got to be as miraculous as the immaculate conception of Mary. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/22 "2003-05-26T19:17:31Z")
I don’t even want to know _how_ a 187 year old man “gives birth.” ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/23 "2003-05-26T19:22:44Z")
In terrible agony, especially the last part. When it’s over, you got a _schvanz_ that would scare a dinosaur. ---
**Author:** ![jsleek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8dc957/32.png) [@jsleek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsleek)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/24 "2003-05-26T19:35:48Z")
Maybe some of the years are actually months? 1000 months = 83 years 187 months = 15 years or, maybe not… ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/25 "2003-05-26T19:55:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Musicat \* > \*\*That is, not only are these ages impossible outside of mythology, and unlikely given the level of medical care, but it is totally unreasonable to expect them to be true or even close. > \*\* Well, I suppose that all depends on whether you believe in miracles. I mean, if you’re going to accept the idea of a divine God-man who rises from the dead, a 200 year-old father is small potatoes. \*\* [/QUOTE] Yet they are taught as true without question, as gospel 🙂 in bible schools. Or they at least were when I attended. \*\* [/QUOTE] Most evangelicals / fundamentalists are well-aware of the math issues, and they point out that the word “Son” was sometimes used loosely to mean “descendant;” and claim that in long lists the Hebrews would delete some of the less important people. i.e. “A begets B who begets C who begets D” might be shortened to “A begat D” if B and C were not historically significant. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/26 "2003-05-26T19:58:18Z")
**MCMoC:** _It’s comes from the literary tradition started in Ancient Babylonia where on the king lists the older and mythological kings would live for huge periods of time (I believe as much as 30,000 years!)._ Right. Edward Chiera, in _They Wrote on Clay,_ suggests that > [@](#): > > Hebrew historians who tried to bridge the gap between what they thought was the correct date for the creation of the world and the time for which they had sufficiently reliable records, found that they had only a limited number of names [of earlier rulers and heroes] to do it with. Rather than invent new ones, they simply stretched the lives of the ones they had to fill their need. […] the Babylonians […] too stretched the few personages they had to fill the gaps, but of course they had to stretch them a great deal more [to account for the remnants of much earlier civilizations]. I don’t think that any non-fundamentalist Biblical scholars now hold that these recorded lifespans are biographically accurate. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/27 "2003-05-26T20:09:51Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Shadez \* > \*\*Guess God didn’t account for our advances in technology 😃 Seriously, though, I like the theories here, but if yours were true…how do you explain for today’s age? More a rhetorical question than anything else, unless you see it differently. \*\* Didn’t say it was “my” theory; it’s one (and no, not the only one)commonly given by Biblical scholars. And I don’t see anyhing in that explanation that has a problem with technology. The claim is that in the early age of the world people lived longer, and that steadily dropped. At some point it bottomed out. ---
**Author:** ![bizzwire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/958977/32.png) [@bizzwire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bizzwire)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/28 "2003-05-26T22:10:08Z")
Jeez…can you imagine what condition a 900 year-old man’s teeth would be in? ---
**Author:** ![istara](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e79b87/32.png) [@istara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/istara)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2003, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/29 "2003-05-26T22:24:44Z")
Genesis was compiled from more than once source, hence the duplication. It presents two quite different images of God - one as a very incorporeal, heavenly sort of being, and another as a more physical being, walking through Eden etc. Wish I could remember more of this - I wrote a whole essay on it at college, in relation to Milton’s Paradise Lost. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2003, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530/30 "2003-05-27T08:03:52Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by furt \* > \*\*Most evangelicals / fundamentalists are well-aware of the math issues, and they point out that the word “Son” was sometimes used loosely to mean “descendant;” and claim that in long lists the Hebrews would delete some of the less important people. i.e. “A begets B who begets C who begets D” might be shortened to “A begat D” if B and C were not historically significant. \*\* So the world might be more than six thousand years old? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-people-live-so-long-in-genesis/177530.md?page=1)