Any comment W_Fortenberry?

doctrbill writes:

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I believe doctrbill has offered an efficient answer to this question:

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http://www.sun-day-school.us/many_moons.htm

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Specifically, this states that when the Bible says "year," it really means "month."There's a problem with this...in the same geneologies where these people are described as living for hundreds upon hundreds of years, they are also listed as having children.If we take the ages to be months instead of years, these people were fathering children when they were 8 years old. While this might be acceptable when it comes to Adam, who was seemingly created as an adult, it doesn't make any sense when it comes to any of the others. For example Cainan, great-grandson of Adam, fathered his first child, Mahalaleel, when he was 70:Genesis 5:12: And Cainan lived seventy years and begat Mahalaleel:Now, if "years" really means months, then Cainan was only 5 when he did this. Note that the next verse says that Cainan lived an incredibly long time:Genesis 5:13: And Cainan lived after he begat Mahalaleel eight hundred and forty years, and begat sons and daughters:This makes him 910 when he died. Again, if "years" are really months, this is fine since this would put him in his 70s but if so, his parents are guilty of heinous abuse of their child not to mention the biological miracle of being potent at that age.But wait...later on we hear of the generations of Shem, son of Noah. These people, too, are living incredibly long lives. For example, Salah, grandson of Shem, lived to be 433. But, he had a son when he was only 30. If "years" really means months, he died when he was 35 and had a child when he was only 2.Somehow, I don't think the claim of it being months instead of years can be claimed as the real interpretation.Instead, it's just another incredible, mythological trait.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

Brian Johnston quotes from doctrbill's web site in response to me.The thing is, there is nothing in the biblical text that supports this claim. And the covenant is with Abraham...over a thousand years later. We shouldn't apply the covenant of Abraham to Adam or Noah or anybody who came before.As for 2 Kings 22:1, it doesn't really apply:2 Kings 22:1: Josiah was eight years old when he began to reign, and he reigned thirty and one years in Jerusalem. And his mother's name was Jedidah, the daughter of Adaiah of Boscath.This seems to indicate that later writers understood the difference between years and months and that things could happen when you were very young. Becoming king when you're young isn't such a bizarre thing in an inherited system...the current ruler dies and the heir takes over.And notice, Josiah becomes king when he's 8...not 13.Let's not forget that Abraham is shocked to find that he's going to have a son when he's 100...and yet the men of generations before were having children when they were well over 100. Jarod was 162 when he had his first child, Enoch. Methuselah was 187 when he had Lamech. Lamech was 182 when he had Noah and Noah was 500 when he had his three sons. Why such a worry?The attempt to say that the Bible really meant month when it said year doesn't wash.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!

doctrbill responds to me:

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And the covenant is with Abraham...over a thousand years later. We shouldn't apply the covenant of Abraham to Adam or Noah or anybody who came before.

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I agree that we shouldn't apply the covenant to previous generations but the covenant is irrelevant here. The custom of recognizing manhood at age thirteen precedes the covenant. Ishmael is thirteen when Abram proposes to make him heir of the estate. Genesis 17:18,25.

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Um, you do realize that Genesis 17 is the establishment of the covenant of circumcision with Abraham, yes?Genesis 17:10: This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between me and you and thy seed after thee; Every man child among you shall be circumcised.So you're absolutely right about Ishmael being 13...that was the establishment of the covenant. God told Abraham that he was establishing a covenant right there, right now, so Abraham did what he was told to do with his son Ishmael, who happened to be 13, and that is the origin of the tradition.------------------
Rrhain
WWJD? JWRTFM!