BIBLICAL BRIEFS 33
In the time that elapsed between Adam’s fall (when he lost eternal life) and the great flood of Noah – Biblical calculated – almost 1652 years passed [about the same time span from the birth of Jesus until Jan van Riebeeck landed at the Cape]. The people who lived in those times, according to Gen. 5, became exceptionally old, with Methuselah holding the record in becoming 969 years old. The reason for this long life expectancy is twofold. Firstly, the genetic pool was still quite clean and there were very few iniquities and illnesses in the bloodlines. Secondly, the waters above the earth (Gen.1:7) formed a dome over the earth which brought about a hydrosphere resulting in everything on earth, mainly being able to continue to exist in an ideal state. These circumstances also ensured that man could particularly grow very old. In Gen. 7:11 we read that this condition changed when the waters above the earth were poured out as rain, and resulted in the great flood (Ps. 104: 6). [It was then the first time that rain fell on earth (Gen. 2: 5-6; Heb. 11: 7) and the rainbow became visible for the first time (Gen. 9: 13-16).] With this radical change in man’s cosmos his potential lifespan became drastically shortened: “And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.” (Gen. 6:3). In my opinion, it is still God’s standing decision regarding the apportioned age to man, something which is confirmed by the Guinness World Records. In Ps. 90, Moses writes about “our iniquities, our secret heart and its sins” (verse 8, AMP) which shortens human life to “seventy years, or if we are very strong, eighty years” (verse 10). But the fact that some people are getting much older, but not older than 120, clearly indicates that this is the limit God has set and which we need to focus on. Yet there is a strong awareness that God envisions a new dispensation regarding this matter in Rom. 8:11 -” But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.”
Dr. Tom Gouws
