History Hound Travels

Chapters 13 and 14 describe the re-population of the earth, and the wickedness that soon re-developed in the Cushite family. We read also about the cursing of the Hamites.

It was approximately 100 years after the flood that the Tower of Babel was begun. Isn’t it incredible that the sons and grandsons of those that survived the flood could so quickly forget the lessons learned there-in? Nimrod (he was the son of Cush,who was the son of Ham) began to take over the cities that were built up along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. He also killed the those who preached about God.

The largest city was eventually renamed Bel, in honor of the serpent, and it was here that the massive tower, with it’s shrine to Satan at the top, was built. The people were called to come to the city to celebrate. While the city was full of people, the common language was confused, and there were great earthquakes. The tower was destroyed by fire from heaven. The resultant discord caused the people to disperse into like-speaking groups.

Nimrod was now dead, but his wife set herself up as the Queen of Heaven, and was worshiped, along with the supposedly reborn Nimrod.

It was during this time that Noah’s great-great-great grandson was born. Noah was 701 years old. The child was named Peleg, which means Division.

I think the next session will be the last one for this book. I’ll explore something else when we meet on Wednesday, and then Friday we will pick up here again.

Technorati Tags: Nimrod, Cush, Bel, Noah, Peleg

I took just a few notes as I read these chapters about the time immediately before, during and immediately after the flood.

The flood was the first rain that had ever fallen on the earth. Until this time, the earth had been watered by a mist that rose from the ground. Now the waters under the earth broke forth and the waters above came down. You can see that the earth was then ravaged from above and below. This was a fact I had missed for many years, until read this book some time ago.

Here are another couple of things I missed. The ark took one hundred years to build! Go ahead and look for yourself: I had to. My mind could not comprehend, living as I do in this age of rapid construction, that it could take that long to do anything. But remember that Noah lived almost 1000 years, so only 10 percent of his life was consumed by building this ark. Considering that everything was done with hand tools, it’s not that amazing a length of time.

Noah and his family spent a year in the ark. We commonly think of the flood as lasting just 40 days and 40 nights, and it’s true that the rain stopped after that time. But it took all those other days for the waters to recede enough for the family and animals to come out. If you’ve ever been through a hurricane or other large water storm, you will understand how this could be. The waters continue to rise long after the rain stops.

There was major environmental change after the flood, as well. I don’t know if the changes were directly related to the cataclysm, or if they were separately ordained, but until this time, the weather had been relatively constant, and from this time forward, the weather would be varied and seasons would be cyclical. This has historical significance, because climate and seasons control agriculture, and agriculture is a major determinant in where people can and cannot live.

See you Monday!

Technorati Tags: flood, ark, Noah, weather, seasons

These chapters cover life after the Fall up until the Flood. Vivid pictures are painted of the lives of the patriarchs. For our purposes, I just want to point out some of the time spans. I know for myself, when I read the Bible chronology, I don’t tend to think in sweeping segments of time. Because it is crammed in to so small a space, my mind compresses the time involved. I will not go through the entire geneology, but just highlight a few of the better known patriarchs for you.

We started with the premise of roughly 106 lifetimes between Adam’s creation and now. I’ve already pointed out that Adam had lived almost 2 lifetimes before his third child, Seth, was born. Although Adam and Eve had other children, we only know 3 by name: Cain, Abel and Seth. Cain murdered Abel, and moved away from the area of the Garden of Eden. Seth was born when Adam was 130 years old.

When Adam was 687 and Seth was 557, Methuselah was born. Methuselah was the son of Enoch, who “walked with God and was no more, for God took him.” When Methuselah was 369 years old, his grand-son Noah was born. Methuselah died at 969 years of age, just before the flood. So we can do some simple math and find that the flood occurred approximately 1656 years after creation.

In lifetimes: about 22. To put a little perspective on the length of patriarchal life spans, only 10 generations were recorded, inclusive of Adam and Noah from creation to flood, and Adam was still living when Noah’s father was born. Adam lived 930 years, almost an eon, almost 12.5 lifetimes.

We’ll stop here for now. I’ll be back on Wednesday, hopefully before midnight.

Technorati Tags: Flood, patriarchs, Bible, Adam, Cain, Abel, Seth, Methuselah, Enoch, Noah