Genesis

[Joost]

I’ve started reading the Bible and I finished Genesis. It explains how life started according to the Bible.

What I’m confused is about how the age is mentioned (like Noah being 600 years old, someone else’s wife bearing children at 99 and so forth).

I was looking online and two theories are that the first men were more pure (less inbred) and thus had a longevity of 600-700 years.
Another is that the way age was counted was different.

Can you guys shed some light?

 

[Husky]

I like the Answers in Genesis website and videos for these kind of questions.

This one relates to your question specifically, I think. There's an audio version (at the top of the page).

 

[GodfatherPartTwo]

It is important to remember that Genesis sets the foundation for the Christian worldview. A woman giving birth at 99 is impossible in a naturalistic universe but it is trivial to a God who can do all things. The extended ages of early man make sense in a universe that is upheld on the contingency of God's Providence.

Remember how Genesis begins, God created everything from nothing. Everything else in Genesis should be understood in light of that fact.

 

[Bird]

Is Genesis History? - Full Film

 

[GoodShepherd]

I dont see the problem with people living for hundreds of years back then Iv always taken it as literal, the human being was supposed to live forever the people in genesis were closer to the time of creation, mankind and the earth has been on a downward spiral since then up until now, until the end of the world,

 

[Lawrence87]

This assumption that people were always the same throughout the entirety of history is based on a materialistic conception of reality. The idea being that without some kind of external influencing factor (such as God) things could not have operated in a way different to what experience nowadays.

Theories like the idea that they must have been counting years differently back then is tacitly accepting a materialist paradigm, because it is predicated on the assumption that people simply could not have lived vastly longer lives than they do now. Evolution presupposes that in the past humans were more primitive and had a shorter lifespan, but evolution is a lie.

You might as well come up with a scientific explanation for the resurrection, or say maybe Christ didn't really die, and that's how he was seen again by His disciples. There is really no reason to pander to materialistic presuppositions if you are a Christian. Christianity teaches that the opposite of evolution is true, that we are fallen. In this paradigm there is nothing wrong or surprising about longevity decreasing with time.