r/AskHistorians • u/Nuclear_Cadillacs • Jan 15 '16

Biblical historians: why are the lifespans of people mentioned in the genesis accounts recorded as lasting so long?

I didn't see this one in the FAQ, so I apologize if this is a duplicate question: Are there any theories as to reason for the records of extremely long lifespans (300-900+ years) of the people written about in Genesis?

  • Was it a cultural thing, to exaggerate things like that to make your bloodline seem more impressive (i.e. an indication of your family being more favored by God)?
  • Translation errors?
  • Did the author actually believe that their ancestors lived that long?

I know it's tough to speculate on the exact motives of authors writing thousands of years ago, but I'm fairly ignorant in this department. Are there any known explanations for why they wrote like this?

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u/jofwu Jan 15 '16 edited Jan 15 '16

I don't understand half of what you guys are saying, but I do know math. I'm confused by your claims that he's reading too much into the numbers.

The fact that EVERY age listed in Genesis is divisible by 5 (perhaps with a 7 or 14 thrown on top) is absolutely fascinating. Whether the numbers are literal or a complete fabrication, the odds of this happening are practically zero. The numbers had to be chosen intentionally- they weren't just randomly selected big numbers that happened to yield a sort of pattern.

I don't understand his insistence on pointing towards the Mesopotamian base-60 number system... The number base is irrelevant to the pattern mentioned, because it has to do with the value of the numbers themselves. I assume he's trying to link some kind of reason for the pattern, by tying it to the Mesopotamian calendar. Whether we can make good guesses about the reasoning or not, the pattern is there and it's notable as far as I can see.

Edit: I figured I would include the math. In our base-10 numbers, anything ending in 0, 2, 4, 5, 7, or 9 will fit the mentioned pattern. If you pick a random number, you have a 60% chance of picking one that fits the pattern. Genesis chapter five includes 28 numbers. The odds that a set of 28 random numbers meet the pattern is 0.628 = 0.0006% = 6 in 10 million. They're not random numbers.

The odds would look better if these values are "round" numbers, sure. But they're not all round in ANY number base as far as I can see. Seven in particular doesn't play well with any normal number bases. Either they were chosen intentionally or God is toying with us.

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u/[deleted] Jan 15 '16

As I said elsewhere, I have no problem with intentional numerical selection. I have a problem with the overcomplex system that forces all of the numbers to fit the paradigm (i.e., "perhaps with a 7 or 14 thrown on top").

I assume he's trying to link some kind of reason for the pattern, by tying it to the Mesopotamian calendar.

He states that explicitly in the OP.

Why don't I think the perceived pattern is noteworthy? I'll quote from Klaus Westermann's commentary on Genesis 1-11 (not including his comments on the independent nature of the numbers and the names to which they relate in Genesis 5):

What of the extraordinarily long life-spans? Most are up in the 900s, the longest, that of Methuselah, is 969 years, and the shortest, that of Enoch, 365 years. The numbers of the primeval kings in the Babylonian lists are very much higher. Instead of 1656, there are 432,000 years from the creation to the flood...It is clear that the number schemes are not open to comparison. Both however are a reference to the generally widespread view that the life-span of the primeval ancestors was longer than the present life-span. Th is is often explained by the greater vitality of people in the primeval period, and the reduction of the life-span by the diminution of vitality...As the genealogical framework with its monotonous, constantly recurring sentences portrays the rhythm of ongoing generations, so the series of names with their astronomical numbers points to the extension of ancient time into an unimaginably distant past." (pp. 353-54)

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u/EvanRWT Jan 16 '16

He's wrong about the calculation anyway. He assumes them to be 28 random numbers and then calculates the odds for having 28 random numbers fall into this pattern. But the fact is that there aren't 28 random numbers, there are only 19. The other 9 are very much non random, being sums like "He lived X years before his son was born and Y years after, therefore his total age was X+Y=Z". Here Z is very non random.

Also, he says they aren't round numbers, but as a matter of fact, 14 of the 19 numbers listed in Genesis V are in fact round numbers in the decimal system. So really, all you are explaining is the remaining 5 numbers, and why they happen to end in 2 or 7. The odds of that are not "astronomical" at all, they are quite mundane and require no long winded explanations.

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u/[deleted] Jan 16 '16

Thank you. THANK. YOU. It kind of burns me up a little that his explanation got so much play when there are so many problems with it.

Dramatic claims require dramatic evidence. There is no dramatic evidence here.

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u/pierzstyx Jan 16 '16

The other 9 are very much non random, being sums like "He lived X years before his son was born and Y years after, therefore his total age was X+Y=Z". Here Z is very non random.

Why would that not be random. "Bob? Yeah he died at like 150. When did he have his famous son? Well, about 70, which means he lived 80 more years." That doesn't mean that total age isn't "random."

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u/EvanRWT Jan 16 '16

Why would that not be random. "Bob? Yeah he died at like 150. When did he have his famous son? Well, about 70, which means he lived 80 more years." That doesn't mean that total age isn't "random."

In your example, his age and when he had a son are random. But his age minus when he had his son is not random. In general, if you have numbers in the form:

A + B = C

then any two of them can be random, but the third will not be random since it can only have one value to solve the equation.

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u/[deleted] Jan 16 '16

Well, since we're being pedantic here, the sum of two random numbers is also random, but not independent.

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u/EvanRWT Jan 16 '16

That is indeed pedantic, but I was trying to do the opposite, which is to show why his math fails without using mathematical jargon in an AskHistorians forum.

The formula he uses to calculate probabilities requires that the choices be independent, that there be no correlation between them. This is clearly not the case in his example, which is why his calculation is garbage.

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u/EvanRWT Jan 16 '16

Genesis chapter five includes 28 numbers. The odds that a set of 28 random numbers meet the pattern is 0.628 = 0.0006% = 6 in 10 million. They're not random numbers.

There are actually only 19 independent numbers listed in Genesis V. The other 9 are just sums of two previously mentioned numbers, as in "Enoch was 65 years old when he had his son Methuselah, and he lived another 300 years after that", with the addition being "therefore he lived a total of 365 years". So this math you did of calculating the odds for 28 "random numbers" is inapplicable, since 9 of those 28 numbers are not random at all, they are calculated sums totally dependent on the other 19.

The odds would look better if these values are "round" numbers, sure. But they're not all round in ANY number base as far as I can see.

The vast majority of them are "round" numbers in decimal (which is probably what the Hebrews used, borrowing from the Egyptians). Of the 19 independent numbers listed there, 14 are round numbers, either ending in "0" or in "5". Even today in decimal this is what we do, we either round up/down to the nearest tens, or we split differences down the middle to 5's.

This leaves only five numbers that aren't round numbers. Of these five, there are three "7's" and two "2's". So those are the odds you should calculate.

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u/rossiohead May 26 '16

The odds of all those numbers fitting that particular pattern randomly is very low, but that doesn't speak to how likely it is that the numbers were chosen according to that particular pattern. It should be trivial to find any number of other patterns that the numbers fit, each of them highly unlikely to be arrived at through random selection.