Mysteries and Intrigues of the Bible Extraordinary Events and Fascinating People

Shrinking Life Spans Why did human life expectancy decline sharply in early Bible times? Enoch was a mere child when his life on earth ended at age 365. Today, at the ripe old age of thirty, most people find they cannot run the mile quite so fast as those younger kids they used to compete against. At forty, fathers begin to lose arm-wrestling matches with their sons, and at fifty with their daughters. At sixty, you may be feeling young but a look in the mirror prevents self-deception. At seventy, you have qualified for every senior-citizen discount ever invented, and people say, "You're so young looking," only to coax you for a walk around the block. How did those people in the Bible live so long, when in comparison many of us grow tired and old so soon? One of the oldest people in the Bible was Methuselah, a man who lived 969 years, nearly a full millennium. Most of these people had begun raising kids when they reached our age of retirement. How did these ancients live so long? Did they have a purer air and water? Was their some type of enzyme or protein in the food they ate that gave them immunity against diseases that plague our populations, such as cancer? What secret did the ancients possess that enabled them to live superhuman lives? Was there actually some Fountain of Youth, the same one that Ponce de Le-n searched for in Florida in the sixteenth century? Although the Bible lists the names and ages of these ancient heroes, it does not provide any explanation for the longevity of the people. We can well imagine that in those days stress wasn't as prevalent, food was purer, the environment was less toxic, disease was less virulent, and the air was less adulterated than it is today. The agricultural pace of life was most likely slower, giving the ancients time to achieve mental peace. The rat-race pace of life was still to be invented by distant descendants who would look back disbelievingly at the incredible life spans once enjoyed. Perhaps environmental and lifestyle factors explain much of the disparity between the modern person's life expectancy and that of the ancients of old. The fact that these extremely old people existed before the biblical account of the flood might account for some of the differences in life expectancy. An extensive flood may have changed prehistoric atmospheric and climatic conditions that supported human existence much more readily than the environmental conditions we endure today. Still, a person's body must be unusually strong to last seven, eight, or nine centuries. A more theological explanation is that the life expectancies declined according to a divine plan; as the earth became more populous, the need for such long life spans disappeared. God's displeasure with human behavior enters into the explanation as well. Genesis 6:3 contains this terse comment: "Then the Lord said, 'My Spirit will not put up with humans for such a long time, for they are only mortal flesh. In the future, their normal lifespan will be no more than 120 years.'" The life expectancy after Noah indeed drops sharply; Noah himself lived 950 years, his son Shem only 600; six generations later, Terah, the father of Abram, died after 148 years of life. The reason why these ancient people lived so long continues to be a complex puzzle, and we may never have the pieces necessary to provide a complete answer. For some ancient genealogical data, read Genesis 5. (c) 2007 The Livingstone CorporationHoward Books Staff is the author of 'Mysteries and Intrigues of the Bible Extraordinary Events and Fascinating People', published 2007 under ISBN 9781416543565 and ISBN 1416543562.