Lemekh Redux (Gen 5:25–29)

The Genealogy of Adam

²⁵ Methuselah lived 187 years and fathered Lemekh. ²⁶ Methuselah lived, after he fathered Lemekh, 782 years, and he fathered sons and daughters. ²⁷ All the days of Methuselah were 969 years. Then he died.

²⁵‏ וַיְחִ֣י מְתוּשֶׁ֔לַח שֶׁ֧בַע וּשְׁמֹנִ֛ים שָׁנָ֖ה וּמְאַ֣ת שָׁנָ֑ה וַיּ֖וֹלֶד אֶת־לָֽמֶךְ׃ ^‎26‏ וַֽיְחִ֣י מְתוּשֶׁ֗לַח אַֽחֲרֵי֙ הוֹלִיד֣וֹ אֶת־לֶ֔מֶךְ שְׁתַּ֤יִם וּשְׁמוֹנִים֙ שָׁנָ֔ה וּשְׁבַ֥ע מֵא֖וֹת שָׁנָ֑ה וַיּ֥וֹלֶד בָּנִ֖ים וּבָנֽוֹת׃ ^‎27‏ וַיִּהְיוּ֙ כָּל־יְמֵ֣י מְתוּשֶׁ֔לַח תֵּ֤שַׁע וְשִׁשִּׁים֙ שָׁנָ֔ה וּתְשַׁ֥ע מֵא֖וֹת שָׁנָ֑ה וַיָּמֹֽת׃ פ

Our story resumes, after our side trip to examine Enoch and the unusual way that Genesis 5 refers to him. Besides the intrinsic interest of the subject, it’s always worth remembering that the biblical writers (and their readers!) knew more than we know, about Enoch and more or less everything else they say. I wanted to include at least some of the Enoch “story-cloud” from ancient Israel.

Now we resume our close reading of Genesis 5 with vv. 25–27.

Basically all we know about Methuselah is in this paragraph, except for what Ira Gershwin told us about him so many centuries later. (Listen here, if you like, to Cab Calloway, Reggie Whitehead, or Bill Murray sing the song.) We included this paragraph three or four weeks ago, skipping Enoch to list all the “regular” ancestors in the Genealogy. So …

Consider its inclusion here a repetitive resumption — a Wiederaufnahme, as scholars like to call it, because everything sounds more scholarly when you say it in German. (In this case, the English term actually came first.) That is, I am circling back to an earlier post and repeating it to be able to resume our discussion from that point.

In all the previous paragraphs of the Genealogy, the son who was (first) born in the first verse of the paragraph fathers a son of his own in the first verse of the next paragraph. That’s exactly what happens this time as well. Spoiler: it will happen one more time, in the last verse of this chapter. But each of these is a slight variation in the pattern.